Ecumenical Potentials of Vatican II - 40 Years After

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The Père Marquette Lecture in Theology 2006

The Ecumenical Potential of the Second Vatican Council

Otto Hermann Pesch

Otto Hermann Pesch

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Pesch, Otto Hermann. The ecumenical potential of the Second Vatican Council / Otto Hermann Pesch.— 1st ed. p. cm. — (The Père Marquette lecture in theology ; 2006) Includes bibliographical references. ISBN-13: 978-0-87462-586-8 (hardcover : alk. paper) ISBN-10: 0-87462-586-6 (hardcover : alk. paper) 1. Vatican Council (2nd : 1962-1965) 2. Christian union—Catholic Church. 3. Catholic Church—Doctrines. 4. Vatican Council (2nd : 1962-1965). Decretum de oecumenismo. I. Title. II. Series. BX8301962 .P47 2006 262’.52—dc22 2006005194 © 2006 Marquette University Press Milwaukee WI 53201-3141 All rights reserved. Manufactured in the United States of America Member, Association of American University Presses

The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Information Sciences— Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1992.

Ecumenical Potential of the Second Vatican Council

Foreword The Joseph A. Auchter Family Endowment Fund generously supports the Père Marquette Lecture in Theology. The Fund was established as a memorial to their father by the children of Milwaukee-native Joseph A. Auchter (1894-1986), a banker, paper-industry executive, and long-time supporter of education. The lecture presented here is the thirty-sixth in the series, inaugurated in 1969, that commemorates the missions and explorations of Père Jacques Marquette, S.J. (1637-1675). The lecture is offered annually under the auspices of Marquette University’s Department of Theology. Otto Hermann Pesch

Pesch Ecumenical Potential of Second Vatican Council

Among Catholic contributors to ecumenical theology in the period following Vatican II, perhaps none has done more work, and work of more lasting significance, than this year’s Père Marquette Lecturer, Otto Hermann Pesch. Pesch was born in Cologne, Germany in 1931 and finished his “Abitur” degree there in 1952. The same year, he became a member of the Dominican Order, and in 1953 he began work at the Dominican House of Studies in Wahlberberg, where he earned the “Lector” degree. In 1958, he was ordained a Catholic priest. In 1960 he became a student at the University of Munich, where he earned the Dr. Theol. degree in 1965. From 1965-1971, Pesch served as Professor of Systematic and Ecumenical Theology in Wahlberberg. He spent the 1971-72 academic year in residence at the Harvard Divinity School, where he served as Stillman Professor of Roman Catholic Studies. In 1972, Pesch was laicized and married. In 1974 he took the position of Visiting Professor of Systematic Theology in the Faculty of Protestant Theology at the University of Hamburg. In 1975 he was tenured in the same position and thus became the first Catholic theologian to serve as “ordinarius” professor in the Protestant faculty of a German university. During 1988-89, Pesch served as Visiting Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Temple University, and as Visiting Professor of Church History and Systematic Theology in the Candler School of Theology at Emory University. In 1992, Pesch received the Doctor’s degree, honoris causa, from the Faculty

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of Catholic Theology of the University of Mainz. In 1993, he returned for a second stay as Visiting Associate Professor at Temple University. For the academic year 2002-2003, he served as Professeur extraordinaire de théologie systematique in the University of Fribourg, Switzerland. Pesch retired from his faculty position in Hamburg in 1997, but in the years since has been anything but resting. Among his numerous books (not to mention the countless articles), surely the best known is Theologie der Rechtfertigung bei Martin Luther und Thomas von Aquin (1967, 2nd ed. 1985). Examining comparatively the doctrine of justification in these two theologians—whose works in so many ways epitomize the Lutheran and Catholic traditions—Pesch drew those traditions back from an armed standoff into a fraternal, persistent and theologically sensitive dialogue. Although this was a work easily sufficient to establish and maintain a scholarly reputation, Pesch has continued to publish at an astonishing pace throughout his career. His subsequent books include: Twenty Years of Catholic Luther Research (LWF, 1966); The God Question in Thomas Aquinas and Luther (1972); Das Gesetz. Kommentar zu Thomas von Aquin: Summa Theologiae I-II 90-105 (1977); Einführung in die Lehre von Gnade und Rechtfertigung [with Albrecht Peters] (1981, 3rd ed. 1994); Hinführung zu Luther (1982, 3rd rev. ed. 2004); Gerechtfertigt aus Glauben. Luthers Frage an die Kirche (1982); Frei sein aus Gnade. Theologische Anthropologie (1983); Streiten für die eine Kirche [with Heinrich Fries] (1987); Dogmatik im Fragment. Gesammelte Studien (1987); Thomas von

Pesch Ecumenical Potential of Second Vatican Council

Aquin. Grenze und Größe mittelalterlicher Theologie. Eine Einführung (1988, 3rd ed. 1995); Rechtfertigung im Disput. Eine freundliche Antwort an Jörg Baur [with Ulrich Kühn] (1991); Das Zweite Vatikanische Konzil. Vorgeschichte, Verlauf, Ergebnisse, Nachgeschichte (1993, 5th ed. 2001); Martin Luther, Thomas von Aquin und die reformatorische Kritik an der Scholastik (1994); Die Sünde. Kommentar zu Thomas von Aquin, Summa Theologiae I-II 71-89 (2002). As the titles of these many books quite rightly indicate, Pesch’s work has continued to revolve around its ecumenical center by means of an illuminating comparative analysis of Martin Luther and Thomas Aquinas. In addition to these many and weighty tomes, and to a number of others for which he served as editor, Pesch has also written frequently for a more popular audience. These “pocket books” are frequently addressed to the practical questions faced by the average Christian, e.g., Das Gebet (1980); Die Zehn Gebote (1976, 9th ed. 1995); Heute Gott erkennen (1980, 3rd ed. 1988); Kleines Katholisches Glaubensbuch (15th rev. ed. 2004); and Die Sünde (2004). Finally, as if to add good humor to such a long and impressive list of publications, mention must also be made of his Warum hast du so große Ohren? Rottkäppchen—theologisch zu Gehör gebracht (1993), ET as What Big Ears You Have! The Theologians’ Red Riding Hood (3rd rev. ed. 2000). These extensive scholarly contributions brought with them quite naturally a long history of cooperation and friendship with colleagues in Germany and

Foreword

beyond. Indeed, Pesch has lectured in no less than 11 countries, nowhere more than in the United States. In addition to frequent service as visiting professor in American universities, he has been a frequent participant and lecturer in meetings of the International Luther Congress, as well as a plenary speaker at the Aquinas-Luther Conference at Lenoir-Rhyne College. In addition, he is past President, now Vice President, of the Académie internationale des sciences religieuses (Brussels), and serves on the editorial boards of Concilium and Ökumenische Rundschau. Pesch is a member of the Advisory Board of the Institut für Europaische Geschichte—Abteilung Abendländische Religionsgeschichte (Mainz), and a member of the Joachim-Jungius-Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften in Hamburg. He has also been for many years a member of the influential Ökumenischer Arbeitskreis evangelischer und katholischer Theologen, a group whose work helped make possible the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification in 1999. As a Catholic university with an ecumenical faculty of theology, one with a longstanding commitment to “Luther studies in a Catholic context,” it is fitting, indeed it is a profound honor, that we should welcome Prof. Dr. Otto Hermann Pesch to Marquette not only as a guest, but as a colleague and friend in what we hope will have already become a newfound home away from home. Mickey L. Mattox Ash Wednesday 2006

The Ecumenical Potential of the Second Vatican Council Retrospective and Prospective

Otto Hermann Pesch University of Hamburg/Germany

A. Looking Back The Ecumenical Start of the Council I. The Point of Departure The ecumenists, the so-called “Pan-Christians,” “arrange conferences and meetings; they give lectures for large audiences to which they invite for discussion all kinds of people whether they are pagans, Christians, or even those who unfortunately have fallen away from Christ. Given this state of affairs it is clear that neither the Apostolic See can attend such conferences [i.e. the conferences of the Ecumenical Movement], nor can Catholics be somehow allowed to support these attempts or to contribute to them. If they did, they would legitimate a false Christian religion that is fundamentally divergent from the one Church. Can we tolerate such a great ungodliness, that the truth, indeed the truth revealed by God, would be

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made a subject of negotiations?” The only means to bring about the unity of Christians is “…to promote the return of all separated brothers to the one true Church of Christ from which they once have unfortunately separated.” It is “absolutely inadmissible to make, on the field of the truths of faith, the difference introduced by them [i.e. the ‘Pan-Christians’] between the so called ‘fundamental’ and ‘non-fundamental’ truths as if the fundamental ones must be accepted from all whereas the non-fundamental ones could be left to the free assent of the faithful… Therefore all true adherents of Christ must, for instance, give the same credence to the dogma of the Immaculate Conception of Mary the Mother of God as to the mystery of the Triune God, and they must not believe in another way the Incarnation of our Lord as does the infallible magisterium of the Pope.” It was Pope Pius XI who formulated in 1929 in the Encyclical Letter Mortalium animos these phrases in a manner so sharp that it could scarcely be surpassed. The pope refuted everything that is customary today, and he confirmed the harsh “No” of the Roman Catholic Church to all invitations from the side of the Ecu Quoted in A. Rohrbasser, Heilslehre der Kirche (Fribourg: Paulus-Verlag, 1953), p. 404; translation mine. Ibid., 408. Ibid., 407f. This text is wanting in the Denzinger; cf. DS 3683. One apparently felt ashamed of these phrases and omitted them. With regard to the church-political context see Peter Neuner, Ökumenische Theologie. Die Suche nach der Einheit der christlichen Kirchen (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1997), 137-142.


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menical Movement, which was already a half-century old at that time. This situation persisted for a long time. The Church of Rome did not become a member of the World Council of Churches, not even after the Orthodox Churches had joined the World Council at New Delhi in 1961. It cooperates however in the sub-commissions of the Council, especially in the Commission on Faith and Order, and is there indeed entitled to vote. In fact, the Roman Church was not fully engaged in hindering the revision of the Catholic image of Luther beginning simultaneously with Mortalium animos. Generally, also in the Roman Catholic Church it was no longer possible to suppress a development parallel to that in the Protestant ecumenical movement. Already from the time before World War II, one could establish a long list of Catholic pioneers of the Ecumenical Movement: Max Pribilla, Arnold Rademacher, Karl Adam, Yves Congar, Charles Boyer, Jean Danielou, Robert Grosche, Gottlieb Söhngen, Max Josef Metzger, Otto Karrer – these are only a few See Otto Hermann Pesch,“‘Nun fühlte ich mich neugeboren.’ Luthers Weg zur Reformation: Rückblick und ein Urteil aus katholischer Sicht”, in Luther in Erfurt und die katholische Theologie, ed. by Josef Freitag, Erfurter Theologische Schriften 29 (Leipzig: Benno, 2001), 29-58. See once again Neuner, 142-148; also Otto Hermann Pesch,“Theologie in ökumenischer Verantwortung: Zur Gegenwart und Zukunft ökumenischer Theologie”, in Zäsur. Generationswechsel in der katholischen Theologie, ed. Gebhard Fürst, Hohenheimer Protokolle 51 (Stuttgart: Akademie der Diözese Rottenburg-Stuttgart, 1997), 29-68.

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names. During and after the war, due to a common experience of emergency, much ice has melted away between theologians, ministers and congregations. But when in 1948 the World Council of Churches was officially founded at Amsterdam, the Sanctum Officium, now the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, issued an explicit Monitum according to which participation in dialogues about questions of faith is allowed only after prior permission from the Holy See. Only one year later, after the regulations were published more free ground was granted. In particular, they authorized the bishops not only to give the appropriate permissions but also first of all, with regard to the reunion of the separated churches, to promote prudent efforts to come to know their doctrines and practices. Nevertheless, before the next Plenary Assembly of the World Council in Evanston, Illinois in 1954, Rome issued once again a prohibition that during the meeting Catholic observers were not allowed to enter the city of Evanston. The result: they met one another in cafes and restaurants along the periphery! But these were no more than temporary setbacks. Two years later, in 1956, Pope Pius XII welcomed the Chairman of the German Protestant Church (Evangelische Kirche in Deutschland, EKD), bishop Otto Dibelius of Berlin, in a private audience. It was the first time that a Protestant bishop was received in the Vatican. The picture of the event went around the world. Thus the time for the ecumenical pioneers had come. It came definitely at the Second Vatican Council. So far it has not initiated a new movement.


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Rather it has procured a right to be at home in the church and a public acknowledgment, indeed a public ecclesiastical urgency to join a movement, which has come into play long ago. But this is a retrospective evaluation. In the very beginning all this was anything but self-evident. II. The Formation of the Decree on Ecumenism 1. Ecumenism: No Concern Pope John XXIII had announced the convocation of an “Ecumenical Council of the entire Church,” at the surprise and even at the shock of many people. This happened in the famous allocution that he gave on January 25, 1959 to the 17 cardinals present at Rome after a Holy Mass in the Church of St. Paul Beyond the Walls (San Paolo fuori le mure) – three months after his election. When the pope spoke about an With regard to the following paragraphs see Otto Hermann Pesch, Das Zweite Vatikanische Konzil: Vorgeschichte – Verlauf – Ergebnisse – Nachgeschichte (Würzburg: Echter, 1993; 5th edition as pocket-book, Topos plus 393, 2001), 57-59; 68f.; 209-227. (Marquette University Press is currently preparing an English translation of this text.) Extensive presentation by an international team of experts in Geschichte des Zweiten Vatikanischen Konzils, ed. by Giuseppe Alberigo and Klaus Wittstadt, 5 vols. (Mainz: Grünewald/Leuwen: Peters, 1997ff.). For our context is particularly relevant vol.1: Die Katholische Kirche auf dem Weg in ein neues

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“Ecumenical Council” he obviously thought about what Canon Law at that time meant by this term: a Council of the entire Roman Catholic Church unlike the synod of a diocese. Eventually he may have thought of an invitation of the separated Eastern Orthodox Churches, which he knew very well from his activities in Turkey, Bulgaria and Greece, 1925-1945. But such an invitation would certainly have been as ineffective as it was at the First Vatican Council (1869/70). Never, however, did he think of an invitation of the Protestant Churches. Nevertheless, with a sovereign carelessness and without the obligatory canonical correctness of language games he formulated this invitation to the non-Catholic Churches: “… and a friendly and new invitation to our brothers in the separated


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separated communities to follow us with good will as well on this search for grace and unity” (italics mine). But the pope acted according to his original text. 2. Ecumenical Expectations On May 17, 1959 – less than four months after the announcement of the Council – the pope appointed the Commissio antepraeparatoria, the “Pre-Preparation-Commission,” soon simply called the Antepraeparatoria. It was charged to start the preparation of the Council. Therefore, it requested proposals from the bishops, from the superiors of the religious orders as well as from the Catholic Universities and Theological Faculties, the so-called “postulates” that would be discussed in the Council. This was a totally unconventional, indeed an adventurous procedure, which in itself brings to light the entirely new type of council created by Vatican II. In all previous councils the topics and the agenda were given without long debates through the crisis to be solved through the convocation of the council. Thus the addressees reacted quite differently. The bishops were not accustomed at all to be interrogated with regard to their own opinions. Some of them therefore reacted anxiously in order not to give offence to the Roman authorities. Others, however, declared frankly what was their concern year after year. Even applications for new dogmas and condemnations were not wanting. Altogether, there were 2821 “postulates” mailed to Rome. The Antepraeparatoria sifted the materials and forwarded them to the

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competent offices of the Curia. These offices were also asked to formulate proposals and suggestions (proposita, monita) on their own account. On June 5, 1960, the eve of Pentecost, the pope appointed ten formal Preparatory Commissions (Commissiones praeparatoriae). The most important of them was the Central Commission, charged first of all with the coordination and, if necessary, the doctrinal evaluation of the drafts elaborated in the other commissions. The chairmen of all these commissions were the presidents or prefects of the corresponding curial offices. In the case of the Central Commission, it was Cardinal Alfredo Ottaviani, one of the most conservative Fathers of the Council. The Preparatory Commissions elaborated a total of 69 schemata, that is, texts to be discussed and to be decided by the Council—what a nightmare to imagine that all these drafts should have become conciliar documents! They were then reduced to a total of 17 schemata—by means of combination, avoiding overlapping, and last but not least by canceling from the agenda. However, one field of topics was added: the intra-Christian ecumenical movement with its question of “reunion,” as one called it quite naively at the time. Among the 2821 “postulates” there were no more than three that referred to the relationship between the Church of Rome and the other Christian churches. When the pope spoke explicitly of the “unity of Christians” which the Council should serve, it was hardly avoidable that Christians in countries that had been strongly marked by the Reformation


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(Germany, Switzerland, Austria, the Netherlands, the USA) thought also of a new unity of the divided Christendom. Thus it happened that not on the level of the ministry and its statements – for instance those of the bishops – but on the level of the faithful people and of the theologians a bursting of the dike of expectations took place with regard not only to the internal problems of the Church, but also to the relationship between the Church of Rome and the non-Catholic churches. For the sake of justice and in honor of Germanlanguage theology it must be mentioned that within this discussion two books played an influential role. They found the attention of the pope and provoked the humor, sometimes even a silent joy in the Curia and, moreover, had an influence on the general public in the Church. The first one was the book by the archbishop of Paderborn and later cardinal, Lorenz Jaeger, with the title: “Das ökumenische Konzil. Die Kirche und die Christenheit (The Ecumenical Council: The Church and Christendom). The other was the book of the 32 year-old Hans Küng under the title: Paderborn: Bonifatius, 1960. The “spiritus rector” in the background of the book and of all other ecumenical initiatives of the archbishop was Professor Eduard Stakemeier, Professor at the Theological Faculty at Paderborn and director of the Johann-Adam-Möhler-Institut for ecumenical research. On this very fruitful cooperation see Wolfgang Thönissen, “Zur Relevanz historischer Konzilsforschung für die Interpretation des Ökumenismusdekretes. Korreferat [zu Günther Wassilowsky],” in “Unitatis redintegratio” (see below, n.18), 35-46.

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“Konzil und Wiedervereinigung.” Erneuerung als Ruf in die Einheit” (Council and Reunion: Renewal as Call Into Unity). It was at once translated into several languages and intensively discussed in the media. The book brought Küng into his first and triumphant journey for lectures in the USA. Küng in his well-known frankness went so far as to recommend an agenda to the Council. He argued that one could come to an internal reform of the Church that would correspond to the legitimate demands of the Reformation. Thus Küng focused upon: acknowledgment of the Reformation as a religious event; a more intensive evaluation of the Bible and its reinforced use in theology and worship; a greater nearness to the people and the native language within the liturgy; the “common priesthood of all baptized;” a dialogue between the Church and other cultures; a liberation of the papacy from political ties and entanglements; a reform of the Roman Curia; and the abolition of the “Index of Prohibited Books.” Küng’s proposals turned out to be quite prophetic. At least in a modified way all seven of his recommendations were incorporated into the documents of the Council. “Never again would one single theologian have such an influence on the Council,” wrote Peter Hebblethwaite, the biographer of Pope John XXIII. Freiburg i.Br.: Herder, 1960 (7th edition 1964). American edition, The Council, Reform and Reunion (New York: Sheed & Ward, 1961). New edition with a new Introduction: Image Books (New York: Doubleday, 1965). Peter Hebblethwaite, Johannes XXIII: Das Leben des Angelo Roncalli (Zürich, 1986), 475. English language


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3. Ecumenical Decisions It was these expectations of the general public in the Church that directed the pope’s attention to the urgency of the ecumenical problem. In order to comply with them the pope made three decisions of great consequence. a. It was clear from the very beginning that the Second Vatican Council would not be a “Union Council” in the manner of those medieval councils which negotiated about a reunion with the Eastern Churches and which occasionally even succeeded, at least for a brief historical moment. The pope was realistic enough to know that in 1959, unlike in the later Middle Ages and still at Trent, the unity of the Church through a unity of the churches could be nothing but a long distance goal. Still at the First Vatican Council, no formal invitation to participate was issued to the non-Roman churches, not even to the separated Eastern Churches with which the pope had good contact since his stays in Bulgaria, Greece and Turkey. The catchword “invitation” in the papal allocution of 1959 was intended to be quite open and informal. Additionally, in a news conference on October 30, 1959 – already in 1959! – the Cardinal Secretary of State Tardini made it known that the pope also planned to invite official observers from the separated edition in America: John XXIII: Pope of the Council, (London: Geoffrey Chapman, 1984).

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churches. This turned out to be a good solution. It did not oblige the non-Roman churches to anything; consequently it spared them long and painful internal controversies. And it did not oblige the Church of Rome to anything and prevented ruptures that might have occurred already in the preparation-phase of the Council.10 In this regard, one should know that in the beginning the Protestant world had no confidence in the Council. One particular Protestant Church was so afraid of an alliance between Rome and Eastern Orthodoxy that it even canceled a planned studyconference.11 b. In a second decision the pope followed a suggestion by Cardinal Jaeger of Paderborn and founded the “Secretariat for the Promotion of the Unity of Christians,” soon to be called the “Unity Secretariat.” Within the Curia, the staff consisted primarily of Italians. Protestant Christianity exists in Italy nearly exclusively in the small Church of the Waldensians who were, first of all, concerned with delimitation.12 10 Further detail in Alberigo and Wittstadt (ed.), Die Ankündigung und Vorbereitung des Zweiten Vatikanischen Konzils, 366; 455f.; 502f. There one also finds a list of the names of observers. 11 Ibid., 31. 12 With the exception of a small number of translations of some writings of Luther’s in the early years of the Reformation, Italy was not seriously touched by the Reformation movement. See Eric W. Gritsch, A History of Lutheranism (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2002); see “Italy” in the Index.


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Thus it is not surprising that in the other Preparation-Commissions, due to the routine of their daily work, there was neither interest nor competence with regard to the ecumenical relationships between the churches. Therefore the ecumenical concern could show itself in the Council only under the condition that a regular new work could be done. Beyond the only three among the 2821 postulates, it was necessary to formulate substantial ecumenical topics for discussion in the assembly room. Indeed, such topics had been familiar for a long time in the theological discussion. Given this situation, a totally new institution was needed, outside the framework of the other offices of the Curia. Here the new topics came together, and the Secretariat was in the position to take responsibility for them. According to the minutes, it was on a lower level than the “Congregations” – it was “only” a Secretariat. But the pope equipped it with additional competences and severed ties to the other offices that could have restricted its freedom of working. Consequently, it had, first of all, its own right of speech and application. The Secretariat and its chairman were not forced to look for an agreement with another commission or office for their proposals, and the chairman himself was authorized to communicate his proposals or drafts in St. Peter’s. No wonder that the other Commissions, first of all cardinal Ottaviani’s powerful Theological Commission, repeatedly tried to weaken the Unity Secretariat and to withdraw from it the competence for crucial ecumenical topics. But the pope as well as his successor supported the Secretariat and protected it against all attacks.

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c. A third decision has been called by the biographer of Pope John, Peter Hebblethwaite, the most important of his staff-decisions: He appointed the director of the Pontifical Bible Institute, the Jesuit Father Augustine Bea, to be the chairman of the Unity Secretariat and elevated him simultaneously to a cardinal. This latter step was indispensable for his necessary reputation among the Council Fathers.13 Thus the pope gave a clear signal: The non-Roman churches should become dialogue-partners in the Council as far as this was possible in view of the topics and under the conditions of Canon Law. In convoking the Preparation Commissions, the pope defined the meaning of the Unity Secretariat in cordial and clear words: “In order to show in a peculiar way Our love and Our good will towards those who bear Christ’s name but are separated from this Apostolic See, and in order to enable them to follow up the work of the Council and to find more readily the way to reach that unity which Jesus implored from his heavenly Father, We have established this special Bureau or Secretariat.” The appointment of Bea turned out to be a truly enlightened decision. Cardinal Bea searched for experts on ecumenical questions in the universities and seminaries all over the world. Since under these conditions there were only a few Italians among them, one spoke soon more German, English and French in the Unity Secretariat than Italian. Many people found it humorous that the Unity Secretariat 13 Hebblethwaite, Johannes XXIII, 476; cf. 469-488.


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became the privileged entrance for the “aliens” who could be excluded to some extent in the Preparation Commissions – until the beginning of the Council. And now these “aliens” were frequently non-Catholics! For the Unity Secretariat had the task to establish and maintain personal and professional contacts with the non-Catholic churches and their representatives. In doing that, the extremely skilful and lovable person of Bea succeeded so excellently that the original distrust of the non-Catholic world disappeared. Soon non-Catholics, church leaders as well as theologians, walked freely in and out of the Unity Secretariat; they participated in working dinners including audiences with the pope. It is not an exaggeration to say that without Bea, John XXIII would not have gotten the Council he wanted. Bea “educated” the pope to ecumenism.14 Thus the official observers of the non-Catholic churches came to the Council. Literally in the last minute also the representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church came. In fact, some members of the Curia and some US-American bishops had expected that the Council would express partisan political positions and even consider condemnations. The Russians were allowed to come after the leaders in Moscow were convinced that this would not happen. It was soon a great advantage when shortly after the beginning of the Council the Cuba crisis broke out and brought the world to the borderline of a nuclear war – a crisis which could not in the least be resolved by the 14 Ibid., 476.

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intervention of the pope. The Anglican Community sent three official representatives. The Protestant Church in Germany (EKD)15 sent Professor Edmund Schlink from the University of Heidelberg – a first class expert and at that time theological chairman of the Ecumenical Working Group of Protestant and Catholic Theologians (Ökumenischer Arbeitskreis evangelischer und katholischer Theologen, existing since 15 “EKD” signifies Evangelische Kirche in Deutschland, that is the federation of almost all Lutheran and Reformed (Presbyterian) and United [LutheranReformed] churches and as such the partner of the state in matters of common interest, e.g. with church-statecontracts. The EKD is to be distinguished from the “VELKD” (Vereinigte Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche in Deutschland), the confessional federation of almost all Lutheran Churches in Germany. The member-churches of the VELKD are also members of the EKD, but not vice versa. For further information about the genesis of this complicated system see Dorothea Wendebourg,“Der lange Schatten des Landesherrlichen Kirchenregiments: Aporien der kirchlichen Neuordnung im deutschen Protestantismus nach 1945”, in Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche, 100 (2003), 420-465. The reason for such a constitutional arrangement of German Protestantism was the concern for confessional identity on the one hand and the necessity of “one voice” over against the state and, not to forget, over against the Roman Catholic Church on the other. The confessional differences have been overcome in the meantime through the Leuenberg Concord of 1973. Therefore actually one speaks today of the possibilities of a “fusion” of the VELKD and the EKD. No wonder that the discussion is burdened also by emotional factors.


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1946 and at that time still called Jaeger-Stählin-Kreis according to the founders, Archbishop and later Cardinal Lorenz Jaeger and the Lutheran bishop Wilhelm Stählin). The Lutheran World Federation, the World Alliance of Reformed Churches, as well as the World Council of Churches (WCC) sent representatives, the latter being represented by Dr. Lukas Vischer, the chairman of the Commission on Faith and Order, and later professor at the University of Bern, now retired. The observers were placed at a comfortable location on a special gallery at the right side of the president’s desk in the transept, seen from the nave of St. Peter’s. Thus they could see and hear everything very well. That was good for the discipline of the debates. Antiecumenical polemics were hardly possible under the eyes and ears of the observers who might perceive them as slander. Above all, the pope had ordered that the observers should receive all rough drafts in all phases of their deliberations and revisions. The observers were invited to communicate to the Unity Secretariat proposals for improvement and additions. The representatives of the Secretariat could bring them to the debates of the Council. In this way the observers – without being entitled to vote – contributed to many documents of the Council much more intensively than some Fathers of the Council who simply voted with the majority.

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4. The Elaboration of the Text In December 1962, that is shortly before the end of the First Session, the Council – it was first the Council itself! – charged the Unity Secretariat with responsibility for elaborating the three “postulates” that concerned ecumenical topics, and to formulate the draft of a “Decree on Ecumenism.” In this first draft the following topics were placed side by side, and their order, according to the authors, corresponds to an inner logical coherence: —the complex question of the unity of the separated churches; —the question of the relationship of the Church to the Jews; —the question of the relationship between the Church and non-Christian religions, at least in a provisional form; —finally the attitude of the Church towards the question of religious liberty. The combination of these topics, to be sure, is not without intellectual appeal. It could even lead to weighty arguments. When not only the USA but one country after the other becomes more and more multicultural and religiously pluralistic – with corresponding consequences for Christians and the Church – it seems indeed a good idea to disconnect the problem of the intra-Christian ecumenical movement from an introverted narrowing and put it into the wider context of what Karl Rahner, during the last years before his death (1984), frequently called “theistic ecumenism” in confrontation with all variations


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of modern atheism.16 However, there were external reasons, particularly the troubles around the plans for a declaration on the relationship to the Jews,17 which caused the authors to take this topic out of the draft of the Decree on Ecumenism, to enlarge it to a general declaration on non-Christian religions and to produce a separate declaration on religious freedom. Thus in the Decree on Ecumenism Christian ecumenism remained, so to speak, newly isolated to itself. From this time on the elaboration of the Decree was parallel to the elaboration of the Constitution on the Church; it took over its assertions and carefully carried and applied them theoretically and practically to the relationship of the separated churches to each other. In this way the Decree on Ecumenism is counted among only five of the eventual total of sixteen documents that could already be solemnly proclaimed in the Third Session in the fall of 1964, one year before the end of the Council on November 21, 1964.

16 See Karl Rahner, “Kirche und Atheismus,” in idem, Schriften zur Theologie, 15 ( Zurich: Benziger, 1983), 139-45, 150f. 17 See Pesch, Das Zweite Vatikanische Konzil (cf.n.6), 291-310.

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B. Looking Forward – The Ecumenical Potential of Vatican II III. The Council on the Unity of the Church: The Content of the Decree on Ecumenism 1. The Disposition of the Decree on Ecumenism

The Preface evokes the dark background that made a Decree on Ecumenism necessary at all in the first place: the history of ever new divisions among Christians, from the apostolic congregations up to our time. The present time, however, is enlightened by the Ecumenical Movement, which was, at the time of the Council, already 100 years old. The Council acknowledged it as the work of the Holy Spirit. In a first chapter (Articles 2-4), the dogmatic foundation is laid out as is customary in a Decree focused on a practical matter. Here one refers to the assertions of the Constitution on the Church. A second chapter (Articles 5-12) deals with the practical realization of the ecumenical concern in general, more exactly with the demands that Catholic Christians have to take to heart when they get engaged in ecumenical dialogue. Only the third chapter (Articles 13-24) takes up the application to the separated churches. Here, according to the nature of things, one must distinguish between the separated Eastern Churches – the United Eastern Churches have their own Decree – and the churches and ecclesial communities that immediately or indirectly have come forth from the Reformation. In a


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wise self-restraint, the Council postponed a more exact description of them. 2. Between Pretension and Helplessness: The Fundamental Statement of the Decree on Ecumenism The Decree on Ecumenism begins with the words Unitatis redintegratio,“The Restoration of Unity” (thus the abbreviation UR). How far has the Decree carried its project? How far did the Council go with the opening for the non-Catholic churches? With regard to this, I offer four statements which still belong to the “retrospective,” but are nevertheless already a “prospective.”18 18 On the self-understanding of the Church according to the Council, on the Decree on Ecumenism and/or on the actual ecumenical situation, see the following selected monographs, collective works and articles recording further titles (in the series of their publication): George H. Tavard, Geschichte der Ökumenischen Bewegung (Mainz: Grünewald, 1965); Ulrich Kühn, Die Ergebnisse des II. Vatikanischen Konzils (Berlin: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 1967), especially 76-132 [positive protestant view]; Gottfried Maron, Kirche und Rechtfertigung: Eine kontroverstheologische Untersuchung, ausgehend von den Texten des Zweiten Vatikanischen Konzils (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1969), especially 60-149 [critical protestant view]; Unitatis redintegratio 1964-1974: Eine Bilanz der Auswirkungen des Ökumenismusdekretes, ed. by Gerard Békés and Vilmos Vajta (Frankfurt am Main: Lembeck and Knecht, 1977); Heinrich Fries, Ökumene statt Konfessionen: Das Ringen

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der Kirche um Einheit (Frankfurt am Main: Knecht, 1977); Otto Hermann Pesch, Hinführung zu Luther (Mainz: Grünewald, 1982, 3rd enlarged and actualized edition 2004); Heinrich Fries, Karl Rahner, Einigung der Kirchen – reale Möglichkeit (Freiburg i.Br.: Herder, 1983; 7th Edition with an Epilogue about the discussion, 1986); Heinz Schütte, Ziel: Kirchengemeinschaft: Zur ökumenischen Orientierung (Paderborn: Bonifatius, 1985); Werner Löser, “Das Einheits – und Ökumenismusverständnis der römisch-katholischen Kirche,” in Die römisch-katholische Kirche (= Die Kirchen der Welt XX), ed. by Werner Löser (Frankfurt am Main: Knecht, 1986), 331-345; Heinrich Fries, Otto Hermann Pesch, Streiten für die eine Kirche (München: Kösel, 1987); Kurt Koch, Gelähmte Ökumene: Was jetzt zu tun ist (Freiburg i.Br.: Herder, 1992); Reinhard Frieling, Der Weg des Ökumenischen Gedankens: Eine Ökumenekunde (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1992); Otto Hermann Pesch, Das Zweite Vatikanische Konzil (cf. n.6), 132-236; Pope John Paul II, Encyclical Letter “Ut unum sint,” (Rome: Vatican, 1995); Helmut Krätzl, Im Sprung gehemmt: Was mir nach dem Konzil noch alles fehlt (Mödling bei Wien: Verlag St. Gabriel, 1998; 4th edition, 1999), especially 120-134; Johannes Brosseder, Reformatorischer Rechtfertigungsglaube und seine Kraft im ökumenischen Gespräch der Gegenwart: Ausgewählte Beiträge zur ökumenischen Theologie aus drei Jahrzehnten (Frankfurt am Main: Lembeck, 1999); Ökumene vor neuen Zeiten, ed. by Konrad Raiser and Dorothea Sattler (Freiburg i.Br.: Herder, 2000); Herausforderung Aggiornamento: Zur Rezeption des Zweiten Vatikanischen Konzils, ed. by Antonio Autiero (Altenberge: Oros Verlag, 2000); Luigi Betazzi, Das Zweite Vatikanum – Pfingsten unserer Zeit (Würzburg: Echter, 2002); Kirche in ökumenischer Perspektive: Kardinal Walter Kasper zum 70.Geburtstag,


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a. For the first time the Roman Catholic Church does what it had strictly rejected shortly before:19 It consciously entered that Ecumenical Movement which had arisen outside of itself. It joined the existing Ecumenical Movement, and this under the conditions of its genesis and contemporary status. In order to do that, the Church had to create a Latin term unknown until then: oecumenimus, as a Latin word for “ecumeni-

ed. by Peter Walter, Klaus Krämer and George Augustin (Freiburg i.Br.: Herder, 2003); Peter Neuner, “Das Dekret über den Ökumenismus Unitatis redintegratio”, in Vierzig Jahre II. Vatikanum: Zur Wirkungsgeschichte der Konzilstexte, ed. by Franz Xaver Bischof and Stephan Leimgruber (Würzburg: Echter, 2004), 117-140; Zweites Vatikanum – vergessene Anstösse, gegenwärtige Fortschreibungen, ed. by Günther Wassilowsky (Freiburg i.Br.: Herder, 2004); Herders Theologischer Kommentar zum Zweiten Vatikanischen Konzil, vol.3 (Freiburg i.Br.: Herder, 2004 [commentary on the Decree on Ecumenism and on other texts]); “Unitatis redintegratio”: 40 Jahre Ökumenismusdekret – Erbe und Auftrag, ed. by Wolfgang Thönissen (Paderborn: Bonifatius, Frankfurt am Main: Lembeck, 2005); Volk Gottes im Aufbruch: 40 Jahre II. Vatikanisches Konzil, ed. by Manfred Belok and Ulrich Kropac (Zürich: Theologischer Verlag Zürich, 2005); Das unerledigte Konzil: 40 Jahre Zweites Vatikanum, ed. by Ulrich Ruh, Herder Korrespondenz Spezial (Freiburg i.Br.: Herder, Oktober 2005); Das II. Vaticanum – eine vergessene Zukunft, ed. by Albert Melloni and Christoph Theobald = Concilium: Internationale Zeitschrift für Theologie, 41 (2005) n.4 (Mainz: Grünewald, 2005). 19 See above, I.

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cal movement.”20 We shall return to the logical test of tearing apart to which the Council exposed itself by doing that. b. Nevertheless, the fundamental statement is first of all a hard truth which is often overlooked, underestimated, or is wrongly remembered: The Second Vatican Council did not point to a particular path to the unity of the Church, it did not even trace the larger area within which one should look for it. The core problem is this: The division does unambiguously not come up regarding God’s salvation plan as the meaning and mandate of the Church among the nations. Does the Council imagine the overcoming of this division as a “return” of the separated Christians to the Roman Catholic Church under the pope as St. Peter’s Successor – as Pope Pius XI did?21 If the Council in fact would have directed a way towards a new unity such an “Ecumenism of return” must be totally and expressly excluded because it is simply unrealistic. Let us quote the toughest and, as it were, the most disappointing text of the Decree:22 “Nevertheless, our separated brethren, whether considered as individuals or as Communities and Churches, 20 In English, one could easily translate it by “ecumenism.” In German, Ökumenismus sounds rather alien. The term is practically unknown except as part of the decree, Ökumenismusdekret. In good German one should speak of Dekret über die Ökumenische Bewegung. 21 See above, I., nn.1 and 2. 22 Here and in the following passages, I quote the texts of the Council in the official English version.


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are not blessed with that unity which Jesus Christ wished to bestow on all those who through Him were born again into one body, and with Him quickened to newness of life – that unity which the Holy Scriptures and the ancient Tradition of the Church proclaim. For it is only through Christ’s Catholic Church, which is ‘the all-embracing means of salvation,’ that they can benefit fully from the means of salvation. We believe that Our Lord entrusted all the blessings of the New Covenant to the apostolic college alone, of which Peter is the head, in order to establish the one Body of Christ on earth to which all should be fully incorporated who belong in any way to the people of God. This people of God, though still in its members liable to sin, is ever growing in Christ during this pilgrimage on earth, and is guided by God’s gentle wisdom, according to His hidden designs, until it shall happily arrive at the fullness of eternal glory in the heavenly Jerusalem.” (Article 3, paragraph 5, italics mine: they mark the assertions that are most provoking for the ecumenical dialogue.) This text, part of the introductory fundamental chapter of the Decree, is quite clear: —Since the unity of the Church, based on God’s salvation plan in Christ, is a question of confession, it is self-evident that it can never be an object of negotiation or of a diplomatic compromise. —Because this confession refers to the Church “which is governed by the successor of Peter and by the bishops in communion with him” (Constitution on the Church, Article 8 paragraph 2), one cannot desist from the final goal to reunify all Christians in

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this Church under the government of the successor of Peter. —But already now “in any way” the separated Christians belong indeed to the people of God – which is the Church according to Article 9 of the Constitution on the Church. —The reference to the “sin,” to which the Church is liable “in its members” (nota bene: not in its structures), can thus only mean the discrete request, that the nonCatholic churches must not be impeded from making a clear decision of conscience. —In a later paragraph the Decree drives the matter unambiguously home to a point: “It is, of course, essential that the doctrine should be clearly presented in its entirety. Nothing is so foreign to the spirit of ecumenism as a false irenicism, in which the purity of the Catholic doctrine suffers loss and its genuine and certain meaning is clouded” (Article 11 paragraph 1). The problem of the unity of the Church thus is the acknowledgement of the full Catholic doctrine. There is no hope for unity with the Church of Rome at a lower price.23 23 How difficult this can be, can be observed in the discussion about the recent German ecumenical document Communio Sanctorum: Die Kirche als Gemeinschaft der Heiligen, ed. Bilaterale Arbeitsgruppe der Deutschen Bischofskonferenz und der Kirchenleitung der Vereinigten Evangelisch-Lutherischen Kirche Deutschlands (Paderborn: Bonifatius, Frankfurt am Main: Lembeck, 2000). This document tries honestly to interpret the dogmas of the Immaculate Conception of Mary and of papal primacy in such a way that they can be acceptable


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—Nevertheless one avoids constantly to speak about a “return,” indeed a return to the Roman Catholic Church. This would indeed discriminate against the United Eastern Churches, which in fact are not Roman Catholic. c. Certainly, one can discover many open points in these statements. But even – and this is the next hard truth – the most favorable interpretations cannot do away with this point: It would be a self-deception to imagine that the existing Church of Rome with regard to the unity of the Church would take over the famous pattern of the World Council of Churches according to which the unity of the Church has been lost, so that the churches now are sitting in a circle around Christ as their center in order to search for that unity which is meant by their Lord.24 According to a Protestant mind; the renouncement of these dogmas is impossible for Roman Catholics. Sadly, it seems to say too much for Protestant ears and too little for Catholics. Yet never before has a stumbling block of the ecumenical dialogue been dealt with in such an honest way and combined with the acknowledgement of a crucial past. For that, one ought to give thanks to the authors, both Protestants and Catholics – and not indulge solely in malicious criticism. 24 As far as I know, this pattern of understanding can to be traced back to Willem Viser’t Hooft, the first General Secretary of the World Council of Churches. On Visser’t Hooft see Dietrich Ritschl,“Willem Visser’t Hooft,”, in Wegbereiter der Ökumene im 20.Jahrhundert, ed. by Christian Möller, Christoph Schwöbel, Christoph Markschies and Klaus von Zedtwitz (Göttingen: Van-

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to the official Catholic teaching, maintained also by leading theologians of the Council, there is no lost unity. There is only a broken unity by segregation from the existing one Church.25 And this Church, existing once as before, is “the Catholic Church which is governed by the successor of Peter and by the bishops in communion with him.” To say anything else was not only impossible for reasons of tactics, it was also not to be expected of the Fathers. d. It is from these literally pretentious statements that the Decree draws the consequences for the way to unity – the only one that the Council knows. It is signified by the catchword “conversion.” One can focus the repeated directions of the Decree by means of the following catchwords: “conversion,” “fidelity to one’s own calling,” “continual reformation.” More detailed catchwords are: Regarding conversion: self-denying, acknowledgement of one’s own sin, especially of the sin against unity, consciousness of the many common causes with the other churches which the Decree lists, study in a context of patient listening. Regarding fidelity: a pure life according to the Gospel, patient service, brotherly (and sisterly) kindness, veracity and humility. denhoeck & Ruprecht, 2005), 214-231, here: 221f. See also Neuner, Ökumenische Theologie (cf.n.3), 41-43. 25 See the representative article by Yves Congar, “Ökumenische Bewegung,” in Lexikon für Theologie und Kirche, 2nd edition, vol. 7 (Freiburg i.Br.: Herder, 1962), 11281137; here, 1133f.


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Regarding reformation: All that has been humanly instituted in the Church – and how much this is compared with the inalienable divine institution even according to a totally traditional Catholic understanding! – must give way to a continual reformation. Moreover, the formulation of doctrine, which is “to be carefully distinguished from the deposit of faith itself ” (Article 6), is to be set right where it creates barriers of language over against the separated churches (cf. Article 11). From these fundamental demands the concrete directions are derived, e.g., the duty of appropriate knowledge – and therefore the instruction of the priests about questions of ecumenical theology, the suggestion of interdenominational encounters and discussions, cooperation particularly in the field of social aid and education, and so on. All this is a “way to unity” (Article 12). If then the Roman Catholic Church feels obliged to insist that all Christians must belong to the Church which is governed by the successors of Peter in communion with the bishops, then, regarding “conversion,” the question arises: Is it possible to combine this pretension with a model of unity and reunion which does not mean return, but in fact means incorporation? Into a Church if not under but indeed obligatorily with the successor of Peter? Of course, in order to obtain that, this Church must take seriously the historical reasons of the division with the lasting consequence of invincible resentments. With regard to these reasons for division the Church must “relativize” itself, that is, it must distance itself from itself – otherwise all hope

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is not only in vain but cynical. Thus the question for the texts of the Council on the unity of the Church and especially for the Decree on Ecumenism is this: What elements of “self-relativizing” does the Council formulate beyond the tough statements quoted above, and how are they to be evaluated? Here we come to the problems in detail. 3. Between Constancy and Self-Relativizing: Assertions of the Decree on Ecumenism in Detail Despite all the difficult truths that at a first glance leave no room for further deliberations, at a second glance there are astonishing elements of self-relativizing. We have to strengthen them both in the internal discussion in the Church as well as in the interdenominational debate. a. The elements of self-relativizing begin with the original headline of the first chapter,“The Principles of Catholic Ecumenism.” That was changed into “Catholic Principles of Ecumenism.” The reason was clear: there is no “Catholic” Ecumenism. There is only the Ecumenical Movement, which the Catholic Church now joins – evidently according to its own principles and to its own self-understanding, as the Protestant churches do as well. b. The most weighty self-relativizing appears in Article 8 paragraph 2 of the Constitution on the Church on which the Decree on Ecumenism builds.


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There it is stated that the Church as described in the Creed “subsists in the Catholic Church which is governed by the successor of Peter and by the bishops in communion with him.” What is the intention behind this formula? The Constitution on the Church starts with a theological, if not to say an abstract description of the Church according to God’s salvation plan as a “sacrament,” that is to say, as an instrument of the unity of human beings with God and with one another. The Church is the (provisional) result of a history within which the triune God progressively communicates and reveals God’s self, thus making this history a salvation history. The culmination of it is the mission of the Son and the pouring out of the Holy Spirit. After this description, which fills Articles 1-7, it must be asked where this Church of the Creed concretely exists on earth. The answer is the sentence just quoted. Nobody would have been surprised if one had simply, and according to custom, continued: This Church is the Church under the successor of Peter. Instead of the word “ is” one chooses a word that comes forth from the debates and decisions in the ancient Church. There it was used to determine the relationship between the divine and the human nature in Christ: The eternal Son of God, the Word, the Logos “subsists” in two natures, the divine and the human. In a resemblance, an “analogy” to this, the relationship of the concrete, empirical Church that we experience corresponds to the Church we confess in the Creed as the work of the Holy Spirit. The empirical social shape of the Church serves the Holy Spirit as instrument just as the human nature served the Logos as instrument.

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In the words of the Council: “As the assumed nature, inseparably united to him, serves the divine word as a living organ of salvation, so, in a somewhat similar way, does the social structure of the Church serve the Spirit of Christ who vivifies it, in the building up of the body (cf. Eph 4:15).” Thereupon the Council, after the subsistit phrase, continues: “Nevertheless, many elements of sanctification and truth are found outside its visible confines. Since these are gifts belonging to the Church of Christ, they are forces impelling towards Catholic unity.” With a simple est one could not have said this the same way. “Sanctification and truth” – this pair of terms one encounters even more frequently, and they allude to the sacramental life and to the doctrine of faith. Since the Declaration of the Congregation on the Doctrine of the Faith Dominus Jesus from the year 2000 the attempt of restoration can be proven by the document’s attempt to interpret tooth or nail the subsistit in the direction of an est and thus to close again the ecumenical opening.26 But against facts there is no help by arguments (contra factum non valet argumentum)! According to the proceedings of the debates we know that the Council intended 26 See, e.g., Alexandra von Teuffenbach, Die Bedeutung des “subsistit in” (LG 8): Zum Selbstverständnis der katholischen Kirche (München: Neue Stadt, 2002); and the harsh but legitimate criticism in Günther Wassilowsky, “Zur Relevanz historischer Konzilsforschung für die Interpretation des Ökumenismusdekretes,” in “Unitatis redintegratio” (cf. n. 18, above), 19-32, here, 20; 31f.


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consciously to acknowledge “elements” of an ecclesial status outside the Roman Catholic Church, which the Church naturally recognized also as its own gifts. It is not yet reflected here how this acknowledgement affects the relationship to the non-Catholic churches. But this statement is the real basis of such a text as the Decree on Ecumenism. And already in Article 15 of the Constitution of the Church, which addresses itself to the non-Catholic churches, it becomes clear that the believers in these churches do not come to their salvation despite their membership but in these churches and through their life with them. c. Looking at the Church in the world of nations and within the plurality of cultures, Article 13 of the Constitution on the Church points to the “legitimate variety” of regional churches. This is immediately important from an ecumenical viewpoint. For within an approaching new unity of the Church it cannot be withheld from the non-Catholic churches what is granted to regional churches of the Catholic Church in other cultures, namely “legitimate variety.” Thus according to the manner of how the Church of Rome deals with its own regional churches, the other churches can get a picture of what they have to expect in case that they enter a new communion with Rome. And vice versa: For the Church of Rome there is no better way to inspire confidence than to demonstrate legitimate internal plurality. The Church should develop a program from the famous formula of Joseph Ratzinger, which he created as professor in 1964 in a presentation: “Churches which stay churches and

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become one Church.”27 Therefore, unlike at the time of the Council, one does not like so much to speak about the “unity” of the church(es) but rather about a “communion of churches.”28 d. Another assertion along the line of self-relativizing is the hint that in the ecumenical dialogue one should pay attention to the “hierarchy of truths” (hierarchia veritatum, Article 8, paragraph 11). This assertion was inserted literally in the last minute, without any comment and thus with the consequence of a real flood of interpreting articles and books after the Decree had been published.29 “Hierarchy” means a “holy ranking.” This catchword must not be under27 See Joseph Ratzinger,“Die Kirche und die Kirchen,” in Reformatio XIII (1964) No.2, 105: “An die Stelle der Idee der Konversion, die für den einzelnen, den sein Gewissen so weist, durchaus ihren Sinn hat, wird grundsätzlich die Idee der Einheit der Kirchen treten, die Kirchen bleiben und doch eine Kirche werden.” The same perspective without the same words in idem, “Prognosen für die Zukunft des Ökumenismus,” in Ökumenisches Forum: Grazer Hefte für konkrete Ökumene 1 (1977), 31-41, reprinted: “Die ökumenische Situation – Orthodoxie, Katholizismus und Reformation,” in idem, Theologische Prinzipienlehre: Bausteine zur Fundamentaltheologie (München: Kösel, 1982), 203-214, especially 211-214. 28 Significant in Germany is the book by Heinz Schütte, Ziel: Kirchengemeinschaft (cf.n.18). 29 More details in Otto Hermann Pesch, “‘Hierarchie der Wahrheiten’: Ein vergessenes Stichwort des 2.Vatikanischen Konzils und die Zukunft der Ökumene,” in Konsensdruck ohne Perspektiven? Der ökumenische Weg


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stood, as Pope Pius XI feared, namely, as if now one should negotiate about the difference between weighty and inalienable truths of faith (sentences of faith!) and less weighty ones which one could renounce. But already in the Council, and then in the subsequent discussion, one made a distinction between statements of faith which refer to the order of the goal of the Church – God, Jesus Christ, our communion with him – and those statements which belong to the order of the means by which the goal can be reached. No doubt, it is to the latter that everything belongs which has to do with the juridical structure of the Church. The immediate ecumenical consequence is the question whether it is possible that a majority of the crucial controversies between the churches concern these means while one permanently assures to have a basic agreement with regard to what belongs to the order of the goal – faith in the redemption through Christ. The catchword of the “hierarchy of truths” signifies an important transition for the ecumenical dialogue; it means the end of the older method of ticking off a list of “doctrines of difference” in order to see how far they really divide, but without an evaluation of their relative importance. e. As already said, the Roman Catholic Church insists on the demand that through the Ecumenical Movement a “full incorporation” of all Christians will be effected which is governed by the successor of nach “Dominus Jesus,” ed. Uwe-Rieske-Braun (Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 2001), 119-140.

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Peter and by the bishops in communion with him. According to the old Canon Law and to the theological conviction in the background, non-Catholic Christians are indeed “persons in the Church of Christ” (persona in ecclesia Christi).30 But they are prevented from executing their membership on account of an (unmerited) hindrance. The Council now uses another linguistic rule, one that cannot be evaluated without knowing the preceding discussion, particularly between canonists and dogmatists. The Council avoids the notion of “church-membership.” It speaks in a verb about “being incorporated.” In any case, the Church knows that she is joined in many ways “to the non-Catholic Christians” (Constitution on the Church Article 15). It means that there is some relation to the Catholic Church according to which the non-Catholic Christians belong; and thereby the Catholic Church recognizes among them precisely those “elements of sanctification and truth” which it considers also as its own gifts. For the Church of the pope, this raises the question how far it is finally responsible for itself, that there is a separate existence of its own “elements” outside its “structure.” f. Finally, there is the strongly controversial and, at first glance, so discriminatory formula of “churches and ecclesial communities.” It is well known that the term “churches” and even “sister-churches,” according to the declaration Dominus Jesus from 2000 (No.16f.), is reserved exclusively for the Eastern Orthodox 30 CIC 1917, Can.87.


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Churches. The churches of the Reformation, even the Anglican community with its episcopal constitution, are “not churches in the proper sense;” they are “ecclesial communities.” What is behind this terminology? In the old Canon Law from 1917 the non-Catholic churches were nothing else than sectae acatholicae, non-Catholic sects. To speak that way was impossible before the eyes and ears of the observers in St. Peter’s. Now, it was already clear, that the non-Catholics in their “communities” find their salvation. The “deficiencies” of the non-Catholic churches, therefore, cannot be situated in the realm of faith and grace but only in the realm of the institutional means – sacraments, obligatory doctrine of faith, structure of the Church in as much of “divine right.” Is that enough to deny them an ecclesial status? It is the Italian bishop Andrea Pangrazio – the same who brought in the catchword of the “hierarchy of truths” – whose name deserves everlasting memory in the history of the Council, because he has effectively appealed to the consciences of the Fathers of the Council with the following words: “It is a good idea to list all the elements of the Church which have been preserved in these communities [!] through God’s grace and which further on produce their redemptive effects. But if I may express my modest opinion, it will seem to me that such a catalogue is too ‘quantitative’, if I once may use this expression. It seems to me that these elements are simply piled up. I believe, however, that there is a necessary tie which binds together these heterogeneous elements. Therefore we should call special attention

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to the centre to which all these elements are referred, and without which they cannot find an explication. This tie and this centre is Christ himself whom all Christians acknowledge as Lord of the Church, whom out of doubt the Christians of all communities want to serve with a faithful heart and who through his active presence in the Holy Spirit performs such wonderful things also with the separated communities – not on the basis of human merits but through the efficiency of his grace alone.”31 To put it into one sentence: One can principally deny the ecclesiastical status to churches of the Reformation only under the condition that – against everything which one has already said in the Constitution on the Church – in a sworn, final statement one holds a purely juridical notion of the Church. The overwhelming majority of the Council no longer wanted to do that. Now one only needs the wise counsel of Cardinal König (Vienna, Austria) to find the solution. He proposed to speak with regard to the separated churches of the West about “Churches and Ecclesial Communities.” That was and is the linguistic rule of the World Council of Churches to which belong also communities that explicitly do not wish to understand them31 The complete text in Acta Synodalia Sacrosancti Concilii oecumenici Vaticani II, II/6 (Rome: Typis polyglottis Vaticanis, 1973), “Congregationes generales” 74-79, sessio publica 3, 32-35; here quoted according to the German translation in Konzilsreden, ed. by Yves Congar, Hans Küng and D.O’Hanlon (Einsiedeln: Benziger, 1964), 140-143; translation mine.


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selves as churches. According to the linguistic rule of the Council they are not excluded either. On the other hand, the self-understanding of those communities as “churches” is accepted by this linguistic rule. Already in the opening allocution to the Third Session, Pope Paul VI addressed the separated churches with the exclamation “O Ecclesiae” (Oh Churches). Nothing more than politeness? The controversial expression “Churches and Ecclesial Communities” therefore is nothing other than a pragmatic linguistic rule under which every Christian community can order itself and also be in the World Council of Churches. There is no prejudice in view of the theological questions about the understanding of the essence of the Church. First, in recent years this pragmatic linguistic rule is theologically “burdened,” combined – from the Catholic side – with an anticipated theological judgment that the Council did not have in mind and which in the best case – or in the worst case! – can emerge at the end of a discussion which has begun but which is not yet concluded. 4. The Indirect Ecumenical Potential of Vatican II The ecumenical potential of Vatican II is not exhausted with the statements of the Decree on Ecumenism and the Constitution on the Church. Other documents contain important assertions for the ecumenical dialogue.

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a. From a practical viewpoint, one can say that the Constitution on the Holy Liturgy and the subsequent reform of the liturgy is the most important ecumenical work of the Council with regard to ecumenical progress. The change to the mother language in combination with the reform and the simplification of the rites have disclosed the great continuity of the forms of worship between the Roman liturgical tradition and the Reformation tradition, especially in the celebration of the Eucharist, the Lord’s Supper, but also in other liturgical forms like morning and evening prayers. Imagine a post-conciliar Eucharist on the one hand and a celebration of the Lord’s Supper on the other, at least according to the solemn Lutheran order of worship, but also, according to my experience, in the Reformed or Presbyterian form: The similarities extend to the melodies based on the old Gregorian type. And then try to convince a young Christian that there is a vast difference, indeed contradiction, between a Lutheran and a Catholic Mass! You may talk about opposed theoretical understandings of what is going on, but our young Christian will not realize them in his or her practical experience. He or she will only see some sympathetic variety in the realm of the ceremonies, and he or she will therefore judge the theoretical difference as a matter of expertise, even as a quarrelling of theologians without practical spiritual relevance. If you do not reduce in an antiCatholic affect a Protestant worship service to a mere intellectual event of word, prayer and music – as it is partly the case in Germany – if you, instead, maintain the liturgical tradition as the Scandinavian and the


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US-American Protestants do, then you will have no chance to convince a broader general public in the churches that the questions of liturgy and Eucharist are once as before one of the most weighty stumbling blocks for an ecumenical understanding. The reform of the liturgy as a consequence of Vatican II is one of the most important ecumenical achievements because it concerns not only a few experts but also countless Christians in their daily faithful experience.32 b. Another ecumenical potential exists in the reinforcement of the importance of the Bible for theology and the Church by the Constitution on Divine Revelation (Dei verbum). Already the acceptance of the historical-critical method in biblical exegesis resolved a great number of difficulties between the churches and their theologians. Today, the exegetes of the churches work with the same methods, are faced with the same questions of interpretation and come 32 During a stay as Visiting Professor at the Candler School of Theology, Emory University, Atlanta/Georgia during the Spring Term 1989, I came to know the Methodist Tradition of worship. What was the most striking phenomenon for me was the same structure of the service, but with other texts than in the Lutheran and Catholic tradition. At the place of the Gloria, e.g., there was a song of praise which did not have the traditional text of the Gloria in excelsis, and so on. This was for me an impressive demonstration of a possible variety within a common structure so that one could easily recognize one’s own worship service under quite other forms and texts.

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frequently to the same results – and controversies go across the denominations. An amusing anecdote is reported from the German Ecumenical Dialogue Group. On a certain topic during the first day the exegetes had made their statements – and came to totally convergent results. “What do we have further to discuss?” one member asked his colleague. “Are we not in full agreement?” “Do not worry about it,” the colleague answered,“tomorrow the dogmaticians will speak, and they will divide us again!” But much more important than the methodological progress is the theological one. Formally the Constitution on Divine Revelation confirms the Bible as the decisive source of Church life and theology. Surely, the tradition is underlined in combination with the competence of the magisterium. But only as interpretation of the Bible, no longer as a second source of new truths of faith. Therefore the Bible and biblical exegesis are “the soul of the entire theology” (Decree on the Formation of the Priests, Article 16). c. A third ecumenical potential is contained in the Declaration on the Relationship of the Church to Non-Christian Religions (Nostra aetate) and in the Declaration on Religious Liberty (Dignitatis humanae) – the latter considered as a fundamental right of the human person.“The truth cannot impose itself except by virtue of its own truth, as it makes its entrance into the mind at once quietly and with power” (ibid., Article 1). If this famous sentence of the Declaration on Religious Liberty is true over against religious and philosophical systems, then it is especially true over


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against the non-Catholic Christians in their churches. This is the end of the old idea that the Catholic Church as the guardian of the only true religion is authorized to monopolize the religious activities in the state and in society as far as it is politically possible. The only chance to come to ecumenical progress is dialogue and serious mutual encounter including legitimate mutual criticism. d. Dialogue, finally, is also the only way of finding the truth within the Church. Article 92 of the Pastoral Constitution “On the Church in the Modern World” confirms the duty of dialogue and cooperation with all human beings of good will regardless of their religious or philosophical convictions. From this duty, the Council draws the conclusion that the Church must be first of all an image of such a dialogue within itself, a dialogue with all Church members, the clergy and the laity. How could such an attitude be denied when the dialogue about ecumenical problems is on the agenda? In fact, this style of dialogue has become self-evident. It is one of the most delightful results of this style that we – I speak of my German experience – are honestly able to touch mutually on our “weak points” without hurting one another and without a trace of triumphalism.

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IV. Forty Years Later 1. A Brief History of Success In the face of a broad feeling of resignation and frustration, it would be totally unjust and ungrateful not to speak first of all about a veritable history of success of the Decree on Ecumenism. The bursting of a dike of world-wide public ecumenical expectations which literally had enforced the Decree on Ecumenism was subsequently, so to speak, channeled by a “history of impact” – in German: “Wirkungsgeschichte” – of the Decree. Here are a few catchwords: The invitation to dialogue “on the level of equality” (par cum pari, Article 9) was taken to heart literally. In all countries of a strongly mixed denominational situation not only were institutes for ecumenical theology founded at the universities, but also ecumenical commissions and dialogue groups gathered, or, where they already existed, emerged from secrecy into the public light. For example, the Dialogue Group in the USA with its series of convergence-papers, Lutherans and Catholic in Dialogue; the Groupe des Dombes in France; the Ökumenischer Arbeitskreis evangelischer und Katholischer Theologen (Ecumenical Working Group of Protestant and Catholic Theologians) in Germany; the Deutscher Ökumenischer Studienausschuss (German Ecumenical Committee of Studies); on the international level the Societas Oecumenica; the Commission on Faith and Order of the World Council of Churches (Roman Catholics are members entitled to vote in this Commission) and, above all, the


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international Lutheran-Roman Catholic Commission on Unity, whose members are sent and authorized by the churches. All these groups elaborated one “agreed statement” after the other about the topics of ecumenical controversies. The results and reports of these dialogues on the world level alone fill three volumes,33 not to speak of the regional and national dialogue papers. Although these texts are not literature for the libraries and bookshops in the churches, but scientific expert evidence for the governments of the churches, congregations are interested in them particularly when an ecumenical question provokes public debates. It was not until recently that these agreed statements could reach a broad general public when the representatives of the Roman Curia and of the Lutheran World Federation signed the “Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification” at Augsburg on October 31, 1999. That alone could be the topic of 33 Dokumente wachsender Übereinstimmung. Sämtliche Berichte und Konsenstexte interkonfessioneller Gespräche auf Weltebene, ed. and introduced by Harding Meyer, Damaskinos Papandreou, Hans Jörg Urban and Lukas Vischer, 3 vols. (Paderborn: Bonifatius, Frankfurt am Main: Lembeck, 1983-2003 (I: 1931-1982: 1983; II: 1982-1990: 1992; III: 1990-2001: 2003). The texts up to the year 1998 are brought together in English in the following two volumes: Growth in Agreement: Reports and Agreed Statements of Ecumenical Conversations on a World Level, ed. Harding Meyer and Lukas Vischer, (Geneva: WCC, 1984); Growth in Agreement II: Reports and Agreements of Ecumenical Conversations on a World Level, 1982-1998, ed. Jeffrey Gros, FSC, Harding Meyer, and William G. Rusch, (Geneva: WCC, 2000).

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a special presentation.34 It is very important to note about this event that, for the first time, the churches engaged in the process made this text officially their own, despite all criticisms and remaining open questions. With previous agreed statements the churches contented themselves with friendly evaluations, followed by the already ritual demands for further studies to “deepen” their understanding. But also in view of the unresolved differences the churches no longer reproached one another in a triumphant manner but more with a significant mood of impatience that 34 This Declaration is, so to speak, a German-American “joint venture,” based first on the statement of the German dialogue group, Lehrverurteilungen – kirchentrennend? Rechtfertigung, Sakramente und Amt im Zeitalter der Reformation und heute, ed. by Karl Lehmann and Wolfhart Pannenberg (Freiburg i.Br.: Herder/Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1986); American translation: The Condemnations of the Reformation Era – Do They Still divide? (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1990), as well as on the “Three Proposals” of the American Lutherans. Informed about this, the Lutheran World Federation took the initiative. Details in Otto Hermann Pesch, “Die ‘Gemeinsame Erklärung zur Rechtfertigungslehre’: Probleme und Aufgaben,” in Ökumenisches Forum: Grazer Jahrbuch für konkrete Ökumene 23/24 (2001/2002), 223-251; id., Hinführunz zu Luther (cf. n.18), 3rd Ed. 297-310; 383-388; The Doctrine of Justification: Its Reception and Meaning Today, ed. Karen L. Bloomquist and Wolfgang Greive, LWF Studies 2003 (Geneva: Lutheran World Federation, 2003); Im Licht der Gnade Gottes: Zur Gegenwartsbedeutung der Rechtfertigungsbotschaft, ed. Wilfried Härle and Peter Neuner, (Münster: Lit, 2004.


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this or that hurdle could not yet be overcome. The “Ecumenism of Conversion” has yielded its fruits. On the other hand, also the most severe critics of the “negotiation ecumenism” – an offending invective, like “modernism” at its time – are full of praise for the growing communion in faith between Protestant and Catholic congregations. And there is another success: the falling away of anxieties regarding contact. One can hardly imagine today that the Editorial Board of the Second Edition of the (Catholic) Lexikon für Theologie und Kirche had still difficulties in the 1960s with Church authorities when the editors wanted to engage a Protestant author to write an article about a significant term concerning the Protestant church. One can hardly imagine that still at the time of the Council a “progressive” German bishop35 returning from a Session prohibited ecumenical discussions on the level of congregations without the explicit permission of the General Vicar. One can hardly imagine that it was a sensation when in 1965 a “Catholic Academy” – the Academy in Bavaria, with its house in Munich36 – held a conference about the Catholic image of Martin Luther and, for the first time, invited Protestant speakers. 35 De mortuis nil nisi bene! The name of this famous bishop is known to me. 36 The so-called “Catholic (or also Protestant) Academies” are church-related institutions for adult education and as such the result of the new beginning of the churches in Germany (and also in Austria and Switzerland) after World War II.

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Protestant and Catholic congregations cooperate in all unproblematic fields – and sometimes, as everybody knows, also in problematic ones: in common events and feasts, in common social work, in ecumenical worship services, in personal friendships between pastors, and so on. 2. A Brief History of Blockades Only those who retain a vivid memory of the time before the Council, those who are older than 60, know how to evaluate in an appropriate way the history of success. The younger people will think more of the blockades. And they also have “their” texts – the tough truths about which we have spoken.37 The most important blockade is this: The Decree is taken as the last word in view of the relevant topics – the document by which the Church for the first time starts its ecumenical way becomes in fact simultaneously the journey’s end. A significant example – also the most frustrating one – is Article 22 of the Decree on Ecumenism with the controversial word about the defectus ordinis (absence of the Sacrament of the Orders), from which the “invalidity” of the Protestant celebration of the Lord’s Supper is derived and consequently the strict prohibition for Catholics to participate in the Protestant Lord’s Supper. Sometimes one works with an unclean method. The sentence about the defectus is a restricting subordinate clause. The 37 See above III. 2.


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principle clause runs as follows: “The Ecclesial Communities which are separated from us commemorate his [ Jesus’] death and resurrection in the Lord’s Supper, they profess that it signifies life in communion with Christ and look forward to his coming in glory.” As a limitation the following words precede: “Though we believe they have not retained the proper reality (substantia) of the eucharistic mystery in its fullness, especially because of the absence of the Sacrament of the Orders, nevertheless…they profess…” The restricting subordinate clause is thus a notification of a problem for further discussion whereas the principal sentence wants to express the decisive acknowledgement. But again and again38 the subordinate clause is quoted in the form of a principal clause – also grammatically – and the proper principal clause is omitted.39 And this quotation then becomes the last word about the matter – as if we lived in 1964 before all the relevant studies on Eucharist and ministry which the Decree first provoked and encouraged. Just so – not only on the Catholic side! – antiecumenical acts are to be deplored; that is, internal ecclesiastical events where the effects on ecumenical relationships are not sufficiently considered if they were not wanted by interested parties. For instance, the Instruction on Indulgences from January 1, 1967 – less tactful at the 450th anniversary of

38 Not so in the Encyclical Letter Ecclesia de Eucharistia by Pope John Paul II from 2003! See ibid., no. 30. 39 Also in the Declaration Dominus Jesus, para. no. 17.

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Luther’s theses on the virtue of the indulgences;40 or problematic canonizations which were anything else but an ecumenical signal; or the document of the Congregation on the Doctrine of the Faith, “On some Questions of the Church as Communio,” from 1992. It openly affirms papal primacy to be the proper meaning of the ecclesiology of the Council, and, moreover, to represent the objective inner trajectory of the Ecumenical Movement. If this were true, the Second Vatican Council would be the most ridiculous event in church history. Another example would be centralistic interventions in the local and regional churches and their bishops’ conferences – proceedings that do little to dispel the suspicion that “Rome” in fact aspires to an “Ecumenism of Return.” And there are many more of this kind. Most recently, we see once again regular anti-ecumenical campaigns, and newspapers that open their columns to them.41 It is once again dangerous for a young theologian who pursues an academic career to make ecumenical theology his or her special project. Thus a feeling of resignation has affected many faith40 The proclamation of the indulgences at the occasion of the Jubilee Year 2000 must be evaluated in another way. See the masterful analysis in Dorothea Sattler, “Ablass-Streit in neuer Zeit: Beobachtungen zur Wiederbelebung einer alten konfessionellen Kontroverse” in Catholica (Münster) 54 (2000), 14-38; reprinted in D. Sattler, Aufgebrochen: Theologische Beiträge (Mainz: Grünewald, 2001), 111-137. 41 In Germany first of all the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ) and the Tagespost at Würzburg.


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ful people. In the “most favorable” cases they endure it. In the normal case, however, they react by turning off. If so many theologians and competent commissions have worked on these ecumenical problems for decades and, under the impulses of the Council and on the official level nothing happens except “Sunday orations,” many a church member chooses to go his or her own way. So the question arises, “Who will continue to carry the flag?” 3. Unity Is Not to Be Made But Discovered More than 40 years now since November 21,1964 it is agreed that the Church does not know a regal way to unity, and it did not open a new way during these 40 years. But every theologian knows that it is not up to us to “make” the unity of Christendom. It is God’s Spirit who “makes” it. If there is any success, it is His success. However,“success” is no name of God (Martin Buber)! Therefore, it is not legitimate to measure the success of ecumenical endeavors according to the criterion whether or not we can see and gather the fruits. When unity comes, or better now, the new communion of churches, we discover that we have communion. More exactly: we discover by always better insights into our communion that further hurdles are no longer necessary. It is not without reason that the communion of churches is celebrated in worship services – as, for example, between Lutherans and Methodists in Germany some years ago.

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To sum up: the logical paradox, to feel obliged to insist on a full “incorporation” of all Christians and to believe simultaneously in a new way of Church communion, contains the whole result of the doctrine of the Council on the unity of the Church and of the Decree on Ecumenism. The Council knows no possible way for Catholics to the unity of the churches. This is the great disappointment for all those who do not project their own wishes on the Council but let it say what it really says. But the Council invites us to become involved in the ecumenical dialogue with an attitude of penance, conscious of the difference between the truth of faith and the doctrinal formulations under the standard of competence – and this not only in view of practical cooperation. This is the important admonition of conscience for all those who want to abuse the Council to leave everything as it is. If both, the ignorance about the way and the penitent dialogue, prevail, then the Council trusts that within this competent and penitent dialogue under the impulse of the Holy Spirit ways of unity will appear of which we have now only an inkling in the best case. In this dialogue, fidelity to the doctrine of the Church is entrusted, if not to say delivered up, to the blowing of the Spirit—and, as is well known, one must not extinguish the Spirit.

The Père Marquette Lectures in Theology 1969 The Authority for Authority Quentin Quesnell 1970 Mystery and Truth John Macquarrie 1971 Doctrinal Pluralism Bernard Lonergan, S.J. 1972 Infallibility George A. Lindbeck 1973 Ambiguity in Moral Choice Richard A. McCormick, S.J. 1974 Church Membership as a Catholic and Ecumenical Problem Avery Dulles, S.J. 1975 The Contributions of Theology to Medical Ethics James Gustafson 1976 Religious Values in an Age of Violence Rabbi Marc Tannenbaum 1977 Truth Beyond Relativism: Karl Mannheim’s Sociology of Knowledge Gregory Baum 1978 A Theology of ‘Uncreated Energies’ George A. Maloney, S.J.

The Père Marquette Lectures in Theology 1980 Method in Theology: An Organon for Our Time Frederick E. Crowe, S.J. 1981 Catholics in the Promised Land of the Saints James Hennesey, S.J. 1982 Whose Experience Counts in Theological Reflection? Monika Hellwig 1983 The Theology and Setting of Discipleship in the Gospel of Mark John R. Donahue, S.J. 1984 Should War Be Eliminated? Philosophical and Theological Investigations Stanley Hauerwas 1985 From Vision to Legislation: From the Council to a Code of Laws Ladislas M. Orsy, S.J. 1986 Revelation and Violence: A Study in Contextualization Walter Brueggemann 1987 Nova et Vetera: The Theology of Tradition in American Catholicism Gerald Fogarty 1988 The Christian Understanding of Freedom and the History of Freedom in the Modern Era: The Meeting and Confrontation between Christianity and the Modern Era in a Postmodern Situation Walter Kasper

The Père Marquette Lectures in Theology 1989 Moral Absolutes: Catholic Tradition, Current Trends, and the Truth William F. May 1990 Is Mark’s Gospel a Life of Jesus? The Question of Genre Adela Yarbro Collins 1991 Faith, History and Cultures: Stability and Change in Church Teachings Walter H. Principe, C.S.B. 1992 Universe and Creed Stanley L. Jaki 1993 The Resurrection of Jesus Christ: Some Contemporary Issues Gerald G. O’Collins, S.J. 1994 Seeking God in Contemporary Culture Most Reverend Rembert G. Weakland, O.S.B. 1995 The Book of Proverbs and Our Search for Wisdom Richard J. Clifford, S.J. 1996 Orthodox and Catholic Sister Churches: East Is West and West Is East Michael A. Fahey, S.J. 1997 ‘Faith Adoring the Mystery’: Reading the Bible with St. Ephræm the Syrian Sidney H. Griffith 1998 Is There Life after Death? Jürgen Moltmann

The Père Marquette Lectures in Theology 1999 Moral Theology at the End of the Century Charles E. Curran 2000 Is the Reformation over? Geoffrey Wainwright 2001 In Procession before the World: Martyrdom as Public Liturgy in Early Christianity Robin Darling Young 2002 Septuagintal Midrash in the Speeches of Acts Luke Timothy Johnson 2003 The Reception of Vatican II Liturgical Reforms in the Life of the Church Pierre-Marie Gy, O.P. 2004 Bioethics and the Common Good Lisa Sowle Cahill 2005 “Did You Receive the Holy Spirit When You Believed?” Some Basic Questions for Pneumatology David Coffey 2006 The Ecumenical Potential of the Second Vatican Council Otto Hermann Pesch

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