In the six months new appointed bishop Gijsen sacked his deputy bishop and two vicar generals. Laying down a strict policy against birth control and abortion.

To the easygoing Roman Catholic burghers of the Dutch diocese of Roermond, their new bishop came on like a thunderclap. Last January, when Johannes Mathias Gijsen, 39, was named to the see from the rectorate of an old-folks home, hardly anyone knew who he was. They soon found out. In…