Henri de Lubac
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His Eminence Henri-Marie Cardinal de Lubac, SJ (February 20, 1896—September 4, 1991) was a French priest of the Roman Catholic Church, and is considered to be one of the most influential theologians of the 20th Century. His writings and doctrinal research played a key role in the shaping of the Second Vatican Council.
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[edit] Early life
He was born in Cambrai to an ancient, noble family of the Ardèche. His father was a banker. A born aristocrat in manner and appearance, de Lubac joined the Society of Jesus in Lyon on October 9, 1913, at which time there was no Jesuit scholasticate in France owing to political persecution. Accordingly, he was trained in England.
He fought in the trenches during the Great War and was severely wounded in the head at Verdun. He was ordained to the priesthood on August 22, 1927, and obtained a doctorate in theology from the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome. De Lubac served as a professor of fundamental theology at the Catholic University of Lyon from 1929 to 1961, except during World War II, when he was forced underground because of his activities with the French Resistance. He declared to the Abbé Pierre (1912-2007) on the day of his ordination in 1938, "Ask to the Holy Spirit that he grants you the saints' anti-clericalism" [1].
His first book was published in 1938 and was followed by numerous others until he was forbidden to publish anything in 1946, after doctrinal objections were raised against his book Surnaturel. His orthodoxy had become suspect after he showed that Francisco Suárez, favorite authority of neo-Thomists, had actually commented on some works by Aquinas which were now known to be spurious.
Later Henri de Lubac created the series Sources Chrétiennes ("Christian Sources"), a collection of bilingual, critical editions of early Christian texts and of the Fathers of the Church that has revolutionized both the study of Patristics and the doctrine of Sacred Tradition. His pioneering study Exégèse Médiévale revived interest in the spiritual exegesis of Scripture and provided a major impetus to the development of Covenantal Theology (Roman Catholic).
[edit] Second Vatican Council
In 1960, however, Pope John XXIII named him to the preparatory commissions organising the upcoming Second Vatican Council. "I was treated like a hostage, sometimes like a criminal in the dock", he later declared. Nevertheless the Nouvelle Théologie, of which Henri de Lubac (along with Yves Congar and Karl Rahner) was one of the most distinguished exponents, soon became dominant among the council fathers. Paul VI appointed de Lubac to be a peritus—a theological consultant—to the council, on which his influence is considered enormous. His contributions were especially notable in the fields of Ecclesiology and Patristics. The final conciliar texts, celebrated for their irenic, non-bullying tone, owe much to Henri de Lubac's encyclopædic knowledge, clear thinking and elegant latinity.
In the aftermath of Vatican II, however, de Lubac became disappointed by what he perceived as the ensuing disorder. He wrote several works explaining the true teaching of the Council fathers and decrying the uncritical disorder that he believed to have settled over theological minds. It is perhaps because of this that, in the consistory of February 2, 1983, Pope John Paul II raised the unlikely Henri de Lubac, at 87, to the College of Cardinals. He was created Cardinal Deacon of Santa Maria in Domnica.
[edit] Late years
In 1969 Pope Paul VI, an admirer of de Lubac's works, had proposed making him a Cardinal, but de Lubac demurred, believing Pope John XXIII's 1962 requirement that all cardinals be bishops was "an abuse of an apostolic office". Paul VI instead elevated de Lubac's junior colleague Jean Daniélou in that consistory, having committed to grant the cardinalate to a Jesuit theologian, but in 1983 Pope John Paul II offered de Lubac the cardinalate again, this time with a dispensation from being consecrated a bishop. At 87, de Lubac accepted. At his death he was the oldest living Cardinal.
[edit] References
- ^ «demandez à l'Esprit saint qu'il vous accorde l'anticléricalisme des saints», quote in Le diable et le bon dieu, Le Figaro, January 26, 2007 (French)
[edit] Selected bibliography
- Catholicisme, 1938
- Surnaturel, 1946
- Exégèse Médiévale, 1959, 1961, 1964
For more information see Justin Nickelsen's website: www.nouvelletheologie.blogspot.com
