The Flemish theologian Edward Schillebeeckx, who was active in the Netherlands, died at the end of December aged 95 (photo). Schillebeeckx was born in Antwerp in 1914, the sixth child in a family of fourteen. Educated by the Jesuits henonetheless opted for the Dominicans. He studied philosophy in Ghent and theology in Leuven and Paris. He remained Belgian even after moving into the Albertinum, the Dutchheadquarters of the Dominicans in Nijmegen,in late 1957, where he became a professor. He stayed there after his retirement in 1983 and died there on 23 December 2009.

Reform
For decades Schillebeeckx played an important role in the reform of the Church and theology. He was an advisor to the Dutch bishops during the Second Vatican Council in Rome (1962-1965). His most important books were published in the seventies and eighties - books like Jesus. An Experiment in Christology (London, 1979; New York, 1981), Christ. The Christian Experience in the Modern World (London, 1980) and Church. The Human Storyof God (New York, 1990).  They were a source of inspiration to a large audience of readers. His eminent knowledge of the Christian tradition was coupled with a passionate commitment to the Church and society. Schillebeeckx took a critical stance towards the ideologies with which positions of power inthe church and society are legitimised and change blocked. The focus of his theology is man at the centre of creation. God himself is a pre-eminently humane God intent on man’s salvation: ‘Deus humanissimus’. He reveals himself in and through people.

Justification
Schillebeeckx was called to account several times by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in Rome, in particular for his views on Jesus, the priesthood, the role of the laity in the Church and the separation of priesthood and celibacy. Schillebeeckx also insisted frequently that knowledge of God’s reality could not be exhausted within one single religious tradition. He dutifully obeyed the summons and defended himself brilliantly in Rome. The theologian was never convicted. For all his criticism of its structures he remained faithful to the Church.

Schillebeeckx in Ons Erfdeel, Septentrion and The Low Countries
Schillebeeckx himself wrote a detailed essay on the Catholic Church in the Netherlands for the first issue of Septentrion in 1972. In 1983 Herman-Emiel Mertens wrote an article about his Christian humanism in Ons Erfdeel and in 1996 he did so in The Low Countries.