LIEBERMANN, BRUNO FRANZ LEOPOLD. - Head of the theological school of Mainz, b. at Molsheim (Alsace) on 12 Oct. 1759, d. at Strasbourg on 11 Nov. 1844. Ordained priest in 1783, he immediately received the office of spiritual director of the Seminary and of preacher in the German language at the Cathedral. Appointed parish priest of Ernolsheim (1783), he fulfilled his office with zeal and courage during the French Revolution. Imprisoned by Napoleon, under the false accusation of being a royalist conspirator, he was granted his freedom after eight months (1805) on condition that he never reappear in Strasbourg.
Invited by his friend Joseph Colmar, who had become bishop of Mainz under Napoleon's auspices, he accepted the direction of the Seminary, which had then been reopened. L. created around the young men an atmosphere of piety and faith, developing in their souls sentiments of respect for the Pope and for the bishop, the true "sentire cum Ecclesia", in opposition to the Enlightenment tendencies of the theology then in vogue and to the prevailing Febronianism. His teaching left its mark on young souls through the vastness of his culture (he taught successively ecclesiastical history, canon law, dogmatic theology) and above all through the clarity and inner warmth of his exposition. He collected his theology lectures in the Institutiones theologiae dogmaticae (5 vols., Mainz 1818-27), which had many editions, among which the Roman one is notable, praised by Card. Cappellari who, having become Gregory XVI, had it adopted in the College of Propaganda Fide, while however demanding a more decided affirmation of pontifical infallibility. His Institutiones iuris canonici are preserved unpublished in the major Seminary of Strasbourg. The Predigten were printed in 3 vols. (Mainz 1851-53).
Around L. there developed spontaneously what was later called the school of Mainz, which through the review Der Katholik, whose motto was "Christianus mihi nomen, catholicus cognomen", engaged, in a more popular than scientific tone, a victorious struggle against the spirit of the age, causing a breath of Roman faith to blow over Germany. L.'s best disciples were Raess, bishop of Strasbourg, Weis, bishop of Speyer, Card. Geissel, who from his see of Cologne guided the German Church, Lenning, canon of Mainz, who prepared the unification of the Catholic energies of Germany, and Klee, a learned theologian, who at Bonn firmly opposed the Hermesians. In 1823 L. refused the episcopal see of Metz, but accepted the office of vicar general of the bishop of Strasbourg, Msgr.
Tharin. Under Msgr. Trevern he presided over the commission that prepared the condemnation of Bautain (v.).