FABRI, JOHANNES. — Born in 1478 at Leutkirch, died in Vienna on 21 May 1541. He graduated in theology at Tübingen and in law at Freiburg. Vicar at Lindau, parish priest in his native town, canon and official of the bishop of Basel, everywhere he became renowned for his apostolic zeal. After a brief stay in Rome (1517), he became vicar general of Constance; during that period he was Zwingli’s most formidable adversary, with whom he engaged in a public disputation (1523). Confessor and counsellor to Ferdinand of Austria, he was elected bishop of Vienna in 1530.
At the first signs of the Lutheran Reformation, he resolutely entered the struggle, both through his writings and through preaching. His Malleus in Iueresim Luteranum dates from 1524. He took part in the Diet of Augsburg (1530), and, commissioned by Charles V, drafted with other Catholic theologians the response to the “Confession.” His views on the technical preparation of the Council, expressed in a long letter to the Pope (6 July 1536), proved very useful to Contarini; Fabri was one of the Council’s most ardent supporters, seeing in it
the ultimate remedy for the ills of the Church. Indeed, he wrote a pamphlet in 1537, De necessitate et mera utilitate sacrosancti concilii epistula. As bishop, he inspired renewed energies in his diocese; he called the clergy back to a more exemplary life, kept the people from the dangers of heresy by preaching himself on feast days, established a boarding school for poor students, and wished to remain poor until his death, which overtook him in Vienna.