Around 215 abbots from all over the world voted for Schröder in the election in Rome to become the highest representative of the Benedictine order, the Archabbey of St Ottilien announced on Saturday.
At the head of the order's confederation, he thus represents around 22,000 Benedictines worldwide. Schröder is therefore handing over his current office as Abbot President of the Missionary Benedictines of St Ottilien to his previous deputy, Abbot Michael Reepen from Münsterschwarzach Abbey.
He will assume the office until the new Abbot President is elected by the General Chapter of the Missionary Benedictines in January 2025.
Schröder was elected as Abbot Primate for eight years and can be re-elected twice for a further four years, the Archabbey announced.
In his new office, the German Benedictine presides over the Abbey of Sant'Anselmo in Rome and is Grand Chancellor of the Benedictine College, the Pontifical Athenaeum Sant'Anselmo on Rome's Aventine Hill. Schröder is a long-standing author of katholisch.de in the opinion section Standpunkt.
Schröder thanks predecessor Gregory Polan
"Worldwide monasticism and its service to the Church have been my passion since I became a monk in St Ottilien 40 years ago," said Schröder on his election. "When I was young, our Sant'Anselmo College and community life here in Rome gave me an awareness and a love for our worldwide Confederation family."
Schröder said that he was happy to accept the ministry at Sant'Anselmo and thanked his confreres for their trust. He paid tribute to his predecessor Abbot Gregory Polan from the USA as a man of letters who had shaped the Benedictine community through his moving and scholarly reflections, his prayer and his friendship. He thanked him for eight years of self-sacrificing service and his tireless commitment to the Benedictines.
"As a monastic community, we are grateful and also a little proud that Abbot Jeremias is the third former Archabbot of St Ottilien to be elected to the responsible office of Abbot Primate of the Benedictine Confederation," said the Archabbot of St Ottilien, Wolfgang Öxler. "We wish Abbot Primate Jeremias all the best and God's blessing for his ministry in Rome and in the monasteries worldwide."
With his excellent knowledge of the Benedictine world, his deep roots in the monastic tradition and his vision for the future, Schröder will lead the Benedictines well worldwide. Before Schröder, the Ottilian monks Abbot Viktor Josef (1977-1993) and Abbot Notker Wolf (2000-2016) had already held the office of primate.
Elected at the abbots' congress in Rome
Schröder was born in Bad Wörishofen in the Allgäu region in 1964 and joined the monastery in Sankt Ottilien after leaving school. He then studied philosophy and theology in Rome and history in Oxford. He was ordained a priest in 1992.
In 2000, he became Archabbot of Sankt Ottilien and President of the Missionary Benedictines, then their Abbot President in 2012; he was re-elected in September 2022. In addition to German, he also speaks Italian, English, French and Spanish.
The election took place during the two-week abbots' congress of the Benedictines in Rome. In addition to the abbots, 22 representatives of the Communio Internationalis Benedictinarum, the Benedictine women's counterpart to the abbots' congress, took part in the meeting.
The Congregation of the Missionary Benedictines of Saint Ottilien is an association of 21 independent monasteries with more than 50 branches and 1,029 missionary monks worldwide with a focus on Africa.
More than half of the monks come from Africa.