As Dulles named cardinal, Maine priests remember man

The Rev. Avery Dulles, 82, a Jesuit at Fordham University in New York City, was one of three priests Pope Paul II named cardinal on Jan. 21.

Dulles, son of a Presbyterian, the former Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, is a member of the Jesuit order, whose presence in Maine dates to the 1600s. Jesuits have been parish priests, teachers and hospital chaplains in Maine.

He is familiar to many Maine priests who met him at a priests’ institute or at Catholic University of America. The Rev. Frank J. Murray, pastor of St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Bangor, studied ecclesiology under Dulles in the late 1970s. Murray remembers that Dulles’ teaching was “extremely clear, very logical in its presentation. You could often see the thought development because he was so good at systematically expressing things.”

It is unusual for someone who has not served as a bishop and archbishop to be elevated to cardinal, the priest explained. “He hasn’t sort of come up through the ranks. My guess is that the Holy Father wanted to make an affirmation of theologians. Father Dulles has spent his life studying and teaching and helping the Church understand things,” he said.

Murray said of Dulles, “his tenure as a cardinal will be quite different. He won’t be going into it from the perspective of administration. He will approach it from a theological perspective, helping his colleagues to be very reflective in decision-making.”

Dulles also is author of “Models of the Church,” images of the Catholic Church, from both historical and theological perspectives. His most recent work is “The New World of Faith.”