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  • The Ecumenical Legacy of Johannes Cardinal Willebrands (1909–2006) ed. by Adelbert Denaux and Peter De Mey
  • John W. Crossin O.S.F.S.
The Ecumenical Legacy of Johannes Cardinal Willebrands (1909–2006). Edited by Adelbert Denaux and Peter De Mey in collaboration with Maria Ter Steeg and Lorelei Fuchs. [Bibliotheca Ephemeridum Theologicarum Lovaniensium, 253.] (Walpole, MA: Peeters. 2012. Pp. xiv, 376. $107.00. ISBN 978-90-429-2735-3.)

The papers composing this volume come from two symposia held in fall 2009 in Utrecht and Rome honoring the life and work of Cardinal Johannes Wille-brands, a defining figure of the ecumenical movement in our time. Willebrands believed his career was a “vocation from above” (p. 28), with a close link in his life [End Page 387] between ecumenism and spirituality. His life’s work spanned the emergence of Catholic ecumenism, the Second Vatican Council, and the first decades of the Secretariat for Promoting Christian Unity (SPCU).

The papers are scholarly and readable. They cover all the major aspects of Willebrands’s administrative, diplomatic, ecumenical, and interreligious work, offering exposition and analysis. The volume includes a comprehensive bibliography of the cardinal’s writings and is a treasure for those who have entered the ecumenical movement in recent decades. Its varied essays provide an education about the movement’s history and the important issues.

Willebrands in his “Dutch Period” wrote his doctoral dissertation on Blessed Cardinal John Henry Newman, served as secretary to the Catholic Conference for Ecumenical Questions, and built bridges to the newly formed World Council of Churches. He was the first Catholic ecumenical officer in the world—named by the Dutch bishops in 1958.

Willebrands began his “Roman Period” in 1960 as the first secretary of the new SPCU. He worked at the Second Vatican Council with the Protestant, Anglican, and Orthodox observers. His other work in collaboration with colleagues included the Decree on Ecumenism, the Declaration on Relations of the Church to Non-Christian Religions, the Declaration on Religious Liberty, and significant contributions to other Council documents. Willebrands’s extensive travels encompassed trips to the Middle East to ensure consensus on the section of Nostra Aetate pertaining to relations with the Jewish community.

In 1969 Pope Paul VI appointed Willebrands as president of the SPCU. During his two decades in that office he set directions in relationships with the World Council, the Protestant world communions, the Orthodox churches, and Judaism. His successor, Cardinal Walter Kasper, marvels at what was achieved (p. 305). That so many fruitful relationships would develop and that so much agreement would be achieved was not to be presumed. Willebrands was noted for his friendliness, patience, and preparedness. He realized that the work of Christian unity was a long-term project.

Willebrands’s views should be studied for their relevance to the ongoing work of ecumenism. His hermeneutic of the Second Vatican Council, his views on the famous “subsistit in” of the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church (Lumen Gentium), his awareness of the importance of religious liberty for successful ecumenical work, and his commitment to building a new relationship with the Jewish community are a few of the areas where his thought is still quite relevant. As Jared Wicks notes: “The cardinal’s address … in January 1970 on different ‘types’ of church life within a larger unity is rightly considered the articulation of a significant ecumenical theological theme” (p. 135). This theme, rooted in Newman, calls for further exploration. Wille-brands saw dialogue as a norm that comes from the Gospel. He “understood dialogue as a spiritual way of life.” As Paul-Werner Scheele points out, repentance, conversion, reconciliation, and hope were all part of this spirituality (p. 329). [End Page 388]

The outstanding essays in this volume not only present the contribution of a leading Catholic ecumenist but also contribute to the ongoing work for unity. Ecumenism was a key to renewal in Willebrands’s time and remains so in our own.

John W. Crossin O.S.F.S.
Secretariat for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs
United States Conference of Catholic Bishops
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