ZÄNGERLE, ROMAN SEBASTIAN. - Bishop, b. at Oberkirchberg near Ulm (Württemberg) on 20 Jan. 1771, d. at Graz on 27 Apr. 1848.
A Benedictine in 1788, ordained priest in 1793, he was a teacher of philosophy and biblical exegesis, as well as master of novices in the abbey of Wiblingen, before being called to profess Sacred Scripture at the University of Salzburg, whence he passed successively to the Athenaeums of Brünn, Prague and Vienna, where he became a disciple of St. Clement Hofbauer. By special dispensation of the Holy See, although he was a monk, he obtained in 1821 the dignity of canon of the metropolitan church of Vienna. A man of profound culture and enlightened apostolic zeal, he devoted his particular care to the intellectual class and had the consolation of leading or leading back to the faith numerous among the most chosen minds of Austria in the early nineteenth century, who had been led astray by Enlightenment or liberal theories.
In 1824 Msgr. Z. was appointed prince-bishop of the diocese of Seckau and apostolic administrator of that of Leoben, which had been vacant, owing to Josephine interference, for more than twelve years. The scholar was transformed then into a pastor of unsuspected energy: in a twenty-five-year episcopate he truly changed the face of the two dioceses, erecting two seminaries in them, introducing the Jesuits, the Carmelites and the Redemptorists, promoting the rise of new Congregations, especially women's, raising up schools, hospitals and charitable institutions, leading both clergies back to a holier life, improving the morals of the people. He also occupied himself with doctrinal problems and with the codification of canon law.
Bibliography2 works
Renzo U. Montini