Friedrich Karl Joseph Von Erthal - Theological Position

Theological Position

As a spiritual ruler, Erthal was guided by the principles of Febronianism. In union with the Archbishops Max Franz of Cologne, Clemens Wenzeslaus of Trier, and Hieronymus Joseph of Salzburg he convoked the Congress of Ems at which twenty-three antipapal articles, known as the "Punctuation of Ems", were drawn up and signed by the plenipotentiaries of the four archbishops on 25 August 1786. The purpose of the Punctuation was to lower the papal dignity to a merely honorary primacy and to make the pope a primus inter pares, with practically no authority over the territories of the archbishops. In order to increase his political influence he joined (25 October 1785) the Confederation of Princes which was established by King Frederick the Great. In 1787 he apparently receded from the schismatic position of the Punctuation of Ems and applied to Rome for a renewal of his quinquennial faculties and for the approbation of his new coadjutor, Karl Theodor von Dalberg. Somewhat later, however, he resumed his opposition to papal authority and continued to adhere to the Punctuation even after the other archbishops had rejected it.