Dr. Wolfgang (Fritz) Jungschaffer CanReg

Fritz Jungschaffer attends grammar school in Ried im Innkreis. In January 1945, he was drafted into an HJ Volkssturm company in the barracks (former school dormitory) on the Freinberg in Linz. His duties included guarding the Ebelsberg labor camp. As a fourteen-year-old, he was interrogated for almost an hour by the HJ leaders because they wanted to find out something incriminating about the youth pastor Jakob Pramhas (1911-1976) from him, which was unsuccessful:

"I knew nothing, but I wouldn't have said anything if I had known anything."

He later reported on the experience:

"I remember the night of May 1st when, after the radio report about Hitler's death, our snappy Reich German company commander ordered us to line up and shouted: 'Boys, listen up: the Führer is dead! The war is lost! Who will fight on? Who wants to go home - get out on the left!' With this question, he wants to test the willingness and reliability of the soldiers and is horrified when the majority of them leave on the left because they have realized the futility and madness of their actions.

"Cowards! ... you are all under arrest and will be interned here. Anyone who makes a stink will be killed!"

Despite the threat of summary execution, Fritz Jungschaffer could no longer withstand the pressure and left "without permission from the troops". He made his escape home to Ried and hid in his parents' house. His father is able to persuade him to return to his company "voluntarily" in order to prevent worse things from happening. Shortly before the end of the war, Fritz Jungschaffer returned to his unit and was punished with four days in a dark cell in the attic.

Fritz Jungschaffer graduated from grammar school in 1949 with distinction. In the same year, he entered the Augustinian monastery in Reichersberg and was given the religious name Wolfgang. He made his perpetual profession in 1953. After completing his philosophical and theological training, he was ordained a priest in Linz in 1954 and took on various pastoral roles, most recently as dean of the monastery in Reichersberg.

After obtaining his doctorate in theology, he pursued a parallel academic career: lecturer in homiletics at the University of Salzburg, professor of homiletics at the Baden Pedagogical Academy and at the religious college in Mödling/St. Gabriel. In 1977 he taught at the Pedagogical Academy in Salzburg.