chapter three

The Founding Periods of the Union of (1889) and the IFI (1902)

Following the periodizations as they were given earlier,1 here the founding periods of the Union of Utrecht and the IFI will be pre- sented and compared. These founding periods contain the develop- ments leading up to the establishment of the Union of Utrecht in 1889 and to the proclamation of the IFI in 1902. In spite of the thirteen years between these two events and the fact that the Union of Utrecht had been expanded with two further members by 1902,2 it is helpful for the purposes of this study to consider the two founding periods in a chapter of their own, as their analysis and comparison will clarify to what extent the Old Catholic Churches of the Union of Utrecht (as a union) and the IFI shared ecclesiological premises at the time of their emergence.

3.1. The Founding of the Union of Utrecht of Old Catholic Churches: Backgrounds and the Churches Involved

This section offers an overview of the development of the ecclesio- logical self-understanding of the Old Catholic Union of Utrecht up until its establishment in 1889, uniting the Bishops of the Old Catholic Churches of the , Germany, and Switzerland into a bish- ops’ conference through their signing of the so-called Convention of Utrecht.3 Their gatherings would eventually become the International Bishops’ Conference.

1 see above, 2.3. 2 The of Austria and the Polish National Catholic Church in the USA, the latter of which represented a distinct ecclesiological tradition. See on both churches below, 4.2.2. 3 The convention consists apart from the Declaration of Utrecht of a Reglement and of a Vereinbarung (= Statute). Together these documents can be termed the Con- vention of Utrecht. See Urs von Arx, ‘Der ekklesiologische Charakter der Utrechter Union,’ Internationale Kirchliche Zeitschrift 84 (1994), 20–61, there 38 for the original places of their publication. the founding periods 51

The focus will be on the Union of Utrecht, rather than on the indi- vidual member churches of this ecclesial communion, because, since its inception, it has functioned as one body in relation to (potential) ecumenical partners, in spite of the various streams of Old Catho- lic tradition that it contains (at least ideally speaking, in other words: according to its own statutes). Nevertheless, some reference will have to be made to the various ecclesiological traditions and their respec- tive preferences that merged (to a certain extent) into an Old Catholic mainstream theology and ecclesiology.4 As indicated, the creation of the Union of Utrecht through the establishment of the International Bishops’ Conference in 1889 repre- sents the rapprochement of two or three theological traditions. These are: the Dutch ‘Old Catholic’ Church of Utrecht5 and the Swiss and German Old Catholic Churches. The latter two churches (together with Old Catholics in the Habsburg Empire) agreed largely in terms of their theology and hence represented a German-speaking Old Catho- lic tradition – even though it was of vital importance that Swiss Old Catholicism incorporated a large body of francophone people, but seem to have differed among each other as far as their relationship to

4 The origins of the term ‘mainstream theology’ as a descriptor of the central Old Catholic theological tradition are unclear; it is, for example, used by Urs von Arx, ‘Vorwort,’ in Statut der internationalen altkatholischen Bischofskonferenz. Offizielle Ausgabe in fünf Sprachen, ed. idem and Maja Weyermann [Beiheft Internationale Kirchliche Zeitschrift 91] (Bern: Stämpfli, 2001), pp. 3–11, there p. 8. See for another description of its content: Von Arx, ‘Churches’ (see above, ch. 2, n. 4), 160: ‘It (the founding of the Union of Utrecht, pbajs) marked the beginning of a process of recep- tion in which the Dutch Old Catholics gradually adopted the comparatively pro- gressive and ecumenically minded position of Old Catholic theology set out by the first generation of German-speaking Old Catholic divines. It was completed by the mid-1920s and resulted in what I would call the Old Catholic mainstream theology manifesting a marked closeness to Anglican and Orthodox ecclesiology. The lead- ing centres of theological reflection were the Old Catholic Faculty of Theology in the University of Berne and the seminaries at Amersfoort (later Utrecht) and Bonn.’ An earlier occurrence is: James S. Pula, ‘A Review of Research on the Polish National Catholic Church, 1978–1988, with Suggestions for Future Studies,’ PNCC Studies 9 (1989), 5–30, 13. For an impression of what Old Catholic mainstream theology entails, see the authors and contributions mentioned by Ploeger, Celebrating (see above, ch. 2, n. 4), pp. 161–233, including: Andreas Rinkel (1889–1979), Urs Küry (1901–1976), Werner Küppers (1905–1980), Kurt Stalder (1912–1996), Jan Visser (1931–), Herwig Aldenhoven (1933–2002), and Urs von Arx (1943–) – Ploeger himself may well be counted as subscribing to the same tradition; Ploeger’s own description of this theol- ogy can be found in idem, o.c., pp. 224–5. 5 it seems to be unjustified to use the term O‘ ld Catholic’ for the Church of Utrecht prior to 1889. See Schoon, Cleresie (see above, ch. 2, n. 89), pp. 17–8.