1.   In a landmark statement this month, the German bishops for the first time explicitly acknowledged the collective wartime guilt of German Catholics.

2.   In a landmark statement in February, the German bishops for the first time explicitly acknowledged the collective wartime guilt of German Catholics.

3.   Newspapers in other European countries also praised the German bishops.

4.   The pope sent a letter to the German bishops last September telling them to close their centers.

5.   A top German bishop, Karl Lehmann, said in February he thought the pope would step down if he thought he could no longer lead the church.

6.   Archbishop Karl Lehmann, president of the German bishops conference, said there had been no consultation previously about what the pope might drop from his speech.

7.   Archbishop Lehmann stressed that the memorable letter, answered by German bishops, helped to open a new chapter in the history of the two nations.

8.   Bishop Karl Lehman, the head of the Bishops Conference, is to inform other German bishops of the contents of the letter in Wuerzburg, the station said.

9.   Bishop Franziskus Eisenbach, the first German bishop to come under criminal investigation, had been accused by a woman of sexual abuse and injury caused during an exorcism.

10.   German bishops have conceded that Christians share responsibility for the Holocaust, an admission Lehmann repeated in a statement released Thursday.