Florian "Floriano" Abrahamowicz (born 7 April 1961) is an Austrian priest who was formerly the Prior of the Society of St. Pius X in northeastern Italy. He was expelled from the Society in February 2009 for expressing numerous conspiracy theories, including Holocaust denial. Early life and ordination Florian Abrahamowicz was born in Vienna, where his father, Alexander Abrahamowicz (born 10 September 1926), was a Protestant pastor of Armenian background. Alexander's father, Jakob, had moved to Vienna from Pojorâta in Romania before Alexander's birth. Because of his mother, Maria Teresa Amantea, an Italian pianist, Florian Abrahamowicz also has Italian citizenship. Florian is one of five siblings, three of whom became Roman Catholic priests. The other two priests are not linked with the Society of St. Pius X or any traditionalist groups. One, Dom Johannes Paul Abrahamowicz, was Prior (underabbot) of the Benedictine Abbey of Saint Paul Outside the Walls from 2005 to 2009. He was webmaster of the ATLAS of the Benedictine Order OSB International until January 2008. At Saint Paul outside the Walls, he composed the official hymn of the Pauline Year, and gave interviews on ecumenical aspects of the Year. In December 2009, he returned to his monastery in Austria. An aunt, Elfriede Huber-Abrahamowicz (1922–2001), wrote poetry, stories, novels and philosophical treatises and lectured on the philosophy of feminism in Zürich. Views Political views In 2001, Abrahamowicz spoke at a ceremony in honour of those who died in support of Benito Mussolini's Italian Social Republic, fighting, he said, for motherland and religion, "innocent victims because their murderers belonged to no legitimate army", a reference to the partisans whom he described as "poor ignorant fellows fighting for what Pius XI called the perverse sect of communism". In 2006, he said in a television interview that he viewed Erich Priebke, a German SS officer convicted of war crimes for a 1944 massacre in Rome, in which 335 Italian civilians were killed in reprisal for the deaths of 33 German soldiers, not as an "executioner", but rather a soldier who acted "with regret and a heavy heart". He is seen as unofficial chaplain of Italy's regional party Lega Nord. In 2007, Umberto Bossi, the leader of the party, accepted his invitation to his celebration of a Tridentine Mass and said there were affinities between his party and the followers of Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre. In 2008, Cardinal Dionigi Tettamanzi of Milan deplored the