Archbishop's web site Denver Catholic Register Parishes Catholic Pastoral Center
January 24, 2001
First U.S. priest-theologian named cardinal by Pope
Jesuit Father Avery Dulles, scholar and ecumenist, the son of John Foster Dulles
WASHINGTON (CNS) - Jesuit Father Avery Dulles is the first U.S. priest ever named a cardinal in honor of his service as a theologian.
The 82-year-old scholar and ecumenist was one of three nonbishops among 37 new cardinals named Jan. 21 by Pope John Paul II. They are to be installed in the College of Cardinals Feb. 21 in a consistory at the Vatican.
The son of John Foster Dulles, U.S. secretary of state in 1953-1959, Cardinal-designate Dulles was raised Presbyterian but became a Catholic in 1940, the year he graduated from Harvard University. As a graduate student in Harvard's law school he co-founded the St. Benedict Center nearby.
He joined the Jesuits in 1946 after service as a Navy officer in World War II. He did his theological studies in the 1950s at Woodstock College in Maryland, where the faculty included two of the most noted theologians in the country, Jesuit Fathers Gustave Weigel and John Courtney Murray.
By the 1970s he was one of the best-known Catholic theologians in the United States and was beginning to be regarded by many as the leading U.S. figure in Catholic systematic theology.
His 1974 book, "Models of the Church," which also appeared the following year in Spanish, was a major contribution to Catholic understanding of the different theologies of the church to be found in the teachings of the Second Vatican Council.
He was on the papally appointed International Theological Commission from 1992 to 1997. He has been involved in numerous ecumenical dialogues, most notably the U.S. Lutheran-Roman Catholic Dialogue and the World Council of Churches' 1983 faith and order meeting in Lima, Peru, that produced the landmark consensus statement on Christian unity, "Baptism, Eucharist and Ministry."
Before this consistory, Pope John Paul had named five other theologians as cardinals. Like Cardinal-designate Dulles, all were over the age of 80 before they were named, and therefore were not eligible to enter into a conclave to elect a new pope.
Avery Dulles was born Aug. 24, 1918, in Auburn, N.Y., the son of one of the leading U.S. statesmen of the 20th century.
John Foster Dulles was involved in drawing up the Treaty of Versailles after World War I and the U.N. Charter after World War II, personally negotiated the postwar peace treaty with Japan and, as secretary of state under Eisenhower, was the chief architect of U.S. foreign policy in the 1950s. He was also a Presbyterian elder and in the 1940s was chairman of the Federal Council of Churches of Christ in America, predecessor of the National Council of Churches.
As a Catholic convert from such a prominent family, Avery Dulles made national news as a Jesuit novice in 1946 when he published "A Testimony to Grace," the story of his conversion.
It was also national news when he was ordained a priest June 16, 1956, by New York Cardinal Francis Spellman.
He earned his licentiate in theology from Woodstock in 1957, did his Jesuit tertianship in Germany and went on to graduate studies in Rome, earning his doctorate in theology from the Gregorian University in 1960.
He spent most of his teaching career at Woodstock College, The Catholic University and Fordham University.
