Commemoration of the Seventh Centenary of the Death of St. Bonaventure

Abstract

COMMEMORATION OF THE SEVENTH CENTENARY OF THE DEATH OF ST. BONAVENTURE The year 1974 marked the seventh centenary of the death of Bonaventure of Bagnoregio, one of the leading theologians of the thirteenth century, a Friar Minor who was subsequently elected minister general and then named bishop and cardinal shortly before his death during the twelfth ecumenical council of the Church at Lyons in France.1 The Franciscan Institute and St. Bonaventure University honored the occasion at the beginning of the centenary year by a four-day celebration (July 12-15, 1974) which featured talks by eminent scholars and ecclesiastics and a solemn convocation during which the University conferred honorary degrees upon the four invited speakers. Since the CouncU of Lyons in 1274 was an attempt to effect the reunion of the Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches, it was considered fitting that the theme of the celebration be 'Ecumenism'. The ecclesiastics so honored were Lawrence Cardinal Shehan, archbishop of Baltimore, who, on Monday, July 15, spoke on "Ecumenism Today" suggesting that doctrinal differences on moral and sacramental issues between the Roman Catholic Church and the various Protestant denominations do not offer much hope for any "reunion" in the immediate future. The cardinal did cite dialogs between Roman Catholics, Anglicans and Lutherans as promising some hope in "closing the doctrinal gaps." The second ecclesiastic to be honored was Archbishop Joseph Tawil, who spoke on the history of the Melkite churches, pointing out the fears of the Eastern Rite churches—whether Orthodox or 'Uniate'—regarding 'latinization' and the preponderant role of the Roman Curia, as distinct from the 'college' of bishops. The archbishop saw some signs of hope, particularly in the suggestion 1 An account of the Franciscan Institute celebration as well as of other events around the world commemorating the seventh centenary of Bonaventure's death has been published in Acta Ordinis Fratrum Minorum 94 (1975): 341-416. 138GIRARD J. ETZKORN that a synod of bishops be created in collegiality with the pope, a model already in vogue among the Eastern churches, as the modern equivalent of the college of the Apostles. The third person to be honored was Fr. Zachary Hayes, O.F.M., universally respected as a theologian and interpreter of the thought of St. Bonaventure for the modern world. Fr. Zachary gave two talks. The first entitled "Toward a Philosophy of Education in the Spirit of St. Bonaventure." There are two questions, he said, which are fundamental to any such philosophy of education: 1) What is man? and 2) What sort of world does he inhabit? These in turn give rise to a third question and suggest 'an answer' namely 3) What is the aim of scientific culture? Fr. Zachary's second talk centered around Bonaventure's second sermon on the Nativity where Bonaventure compares the Incarnation of the Word to the vocalizing of one's hidden thoughts. Fr. Zachary's lecture revolved around three subthemes : 1) The Humanity of Jesus, 2) Hiddenness and Revealedness and 3) The Accessibility of Revelation to Faith. The fourth person to be given an honorary degree was Fr. Ignatius Brady, O.F.M., one of the century's foremost historians of Francis, Clare and the Franciscan movement. Fr. Ignatius's first talk was entitled "The Opera Omnia of St. Bonaventure Revisited," a summary of the history of the Quaracchi critical edition, its problems, subsequent discoveries and still 'lost' works of St. Bonaventure over the three-quarters of a century since its appearance. The Opera Omnia stands as a monument to the original editors but is not without challenges to later scholars. Fr. Brady's second talk was entitled "St. Bonaventure's Theology of the Imitation of Christ." He emphasized the Seraphic Doctor's growing preoccupation with the centrality of Christ as imitated by Francis of Assisi. The lecture was divided into two parts: 1) The Gradual Growth of Bonaventure's Thought and 2) The Synthesis of the Apologia pauperum. The talks were held in the university chapel where, as was fitting, the speaker and listeners were surrounded by the stainedglass windows depicting the life of Bonaventure of Bagnoregio. The proceedings of this phase of the Bonaventure Centenary were published under the editorship...