In a move rumored for several weeks, Pope Benedict XVI [Thursday] appointed Swiss Bishop Kurt Koch of Basel, Switzerland, to be the new president of Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity and of the Pontifical Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews.
Bishop Koch, 60, will succeed German Cardinal Walter Kasper, 77. Kasper has been at the Council for 11 years — first as Secretary (the Number 2 post), then as President since 2001.
In a letter to Catholics in Basel June 30, Bishop Koch said the Pope had asked him in February if he would take the job, stressing that he wanted someone who had both theological knowledge and practical experience in living and working alongside Protestant communities.
Bishop Koch, 60, will succeed German Cardinal Walter Kasper, 77. Kasper has been at the Council for 11 years — first as Secretary (the Number 2 post), then as President since 2001.
In a letter to Catholics in Basel June 30, Bishop Koch said the Pope had asked him in February if he would take the job, stressing that he wanted someone who had both theological knowledge and practical experience in living and working alongside Protestant communities.
It has often been said — by others and also by myself in these newsflashes — that one of Pope Benedict’s primary concerns is to improve relations with the Orthodox, separated from Rome since 1054 AD.
But improved relations with the Orthodox are not the Pope’s only concern, Koch said. The Pope sees the unity of all Christians, including Protestants, as the will of Jesus, he added.
In this sense, Koch’s appointment does not represent a “tilt” away from the line followed by Kasper — who was an expert in Protestant-Catholic dialogue — toward a line privileging the Orthodox.
It is rather, one might say, “steady as she goes.”
Bishop Koch has served as a member of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity — meaning he sits on the equivalent of a “governing board” which meets to oversee the work of the Council (each Vatican dicastery has such an oversight committee) — since 2002.
He has also been a member of the international Catholic-Orthodox theological commission and a member of the international Catholic-Lutheran dialogue commission.
What kind of man is Koch, and what type of bishop has he been?
In his farewell letter, Koch — a past president of the Swiss bishops’ conference and a former professor of dogmatic theology and liturgy — said that when he became bishop, he promised to personally answer every letter Catholics in Basel sent him.
“In recent years, however, so many new areas of work have been added and the time-consuming internal Church conflicts and polarizations have grown, so it increasingly became impossible for me to honor my resolution,” he said. “For that I apologize.”
So he is a man who attempts to carry out his pastoral duties with great diligence and discipline — and someone willing to admit his limitations, in all humility, when circumstances make it impossible for him to fulfill a promise he has made.
As president of the Swiss bishops’ conference, Koch helped smooth tensions with Protestants in 2007 when the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith issued a document reaffirming Catholic teaching that the Catholic Church is the one, true Church of Christ, and Protestant communities should therefore, to avoid doctrinal confusion, not be referred to as “Churches” — even if elements of truth and Christ’s saving grace can be found in such separated Christian communities.
Bishop Koch said at the time that he understood how the document could be confusing or even hurtful to Protestants, and to those Catholics who regularly refer to such Protestant communities as Churches.
The document, he said, was looking at the term “Church” in a “strictly theological” way. He said that if the Catholic Church believes apostolic succession and valid sacraments, particularly the Eucharist, are essential aspects of the Church established by Christ, it cannot recognize as a “Church” those communities which do not have them.
The Rev. Olav Fykse Tveit, general secretary of the World Council of Churches, issued a statement June 30 saying the ecumenical organization rejoices at Bishop Koch’s appointment.
“Bishop Koch is well known for his openness and deep ecumenical commitment,” Tveit said. “His book That All May Be One: Ecumenical Perspectives is an excellent summary of the present state of ecumenical dialogue and relations.”
