Research areas

Liturgical studies

The worshipful life and liturgy take a central position in Catholic tradition. The church is only truly constituted and substantiated for the purpose of worship in the assembly of the faithful. Accordingly, liturgy studies play a prominant role in Old Catholic theology. Liturgy is located within the triangle of historical theology (the history of various liturgical traditions) and systematic theology (sacramental theology and practical theology in particular). Liturgy as a practical theological subject is not only an applied science, but also critically analyses and reflects on traditional liturgical texts and actions, as well as more recent ritual practices. Liturgical studies occupy a prominent place in the Old Catholic theology program.

Students study the most significant stages of liturgical history, dealing in detail with the times and seasons of the liturgical church year, with the theology and the design of the Eucharistic celebration and – if applicable – in dialogue with systematic theology – the theology of the sacraments. During the practical semester and clerical training program, students are also introduced to specific liturgical practices (practising and reflecting on the most significant procedures, theory and practice for special occasions, music in a liturgy and liturgical singing). Old Catholic liturgy provides students of Reformed theology the opportunity to get to know the liturgy of a Catholic tradition at an ecumenical faculty and to reflect on their Reformed liturgy against this background.

The Centre of Competence in Liturgy

The History of Old Catholicism and Universal Church History

The History of Old Catholicism (eighteenth to twenty-first centuries) is part of the Universal History of the Church.

The more detailed history of Old Catholicism includes:

• the history of the Catholic population and the ecclesiastical structures in the Netherlands after the Reformation; the further development of the Catholic Church of Utrecht as a result of the Schism between Rome–Utrecht (1723) to becoming the Old Catholic Church of the Netherlands at the end of the nineteenth century;
• the development of the protest movement against the First Vatican Council (1870) into the Old Catholic reform movement in Germany, Switzerland and the Habsburg monarchy (and its successor states
• the establishment and consolidation of Old Catholic dioceses in Europe and the United States,
• the development of a theological program with an ecumenical orientation, based on the ideal of the Early Church and formulated by liberal Catholic movements in terms of intellectual history,
• the spiritual and ritual expression of the faith from an Old Catholic or Christian Catholic perspective.

History of the Forerunner Movements

The history of the so-called ‘forerunner movements’ is considered part of Old Catholicism’s more extensive history. Current research regards these as reform movements within Catholicism. These include:

• the history of the Cistercian Convent of Port-Royal and Augustinian theology, also ‘Jansenism’, in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries
• the history of Hermesianism and Güntherianism in the nineteenth century.
• The historical precursory movements were of great significance to the Church in the Netherlands (Church of Utrecht, Old-Episcopal Clerics) and for the Old Catholicism in nineteenth-century Europe.

The Swiss Old Catholic Church

The Old Catholic Church of Switzerland is the smallest of the three Swiss national churches. Teaching and research focuse on the Old Catholic Church’s history from the nineteenth to the twenty-first century: its place in the history of liberal Catholicism and liberalism, key decisions, theological and ecclesiastical developments, the most influential personalities, international and ecumenical relations and its present form.

Developing Source Material

Indexing and developing source material in Bern is in full swing, particularly the history of Old Catholicism in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Prof. Dr. Urs von Arx began the process with the third-party funds he raised to digitize Bishop Dr. Eduard Herzog’s Kopialbücher (book copies). The preservation of source material continues under Prof. Dr. Angela Berlis, and the research base has expanded.

We plan a source edition of the correspondence between bishops Joseph Hubert Reinkens and Eduard Herzog.

Women’s History

The study of the actions, works and spirituality of women in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries who engaged with or joined Old Catholicism is of particular interest.

IAAF

The Institute of Old Catholic Theology research is linked to the International Working Group for Old Catholic Research (Internationalen Arbeitskreis für Altkatholizismusforschung (IAAF)). Under the auspices of the Institute, a biographical-bibliographical dictionary of Old Catholic figures in Switzerland and abroad is forthcoming.

Systematic theology addresses and examines the theory and practices of the Christian faith. Western Catholic tradition includes three sub-disciplines. In the:

1. Fundamental theology examines the foundational reflections of the philosophical prerequisits for faith and theology-driven practices. The focus is on whether belief in God and in his revelation in Jesus Christ can even be justified through reason and scientific methods.
2. Dogmatics is concerned with the content of faith as expressed in the Church's binding doctrinal pronouncements (dogmas) and discusses the doctrines of the various theological schools. Dogmatics concerncs the essence of God as Father, Son and Holy Spirit, God’s activity as Creator, Redeemer and Consummator, God’s devotion to people in Word, Sacrament and Church
3. Finally, ethics, which is not a core subject at the Department of Old Catholic Theology, examines how people act based on their faith, the criteria for moral judgement, and the competence to form moral opinions.

An Old Catholic perspective puts emphasis on the following aspects of systematic theology:

• the central role of the early church as a criterion for theology
• the essentially ecclesiastical character of faith
• the synodal principle, which ascribes a particularly high degree of obligation to a theological view based on consensus and arrived at through dialogue
• the idea of an open, fundamentally never-ending reception of Christian doctrine.

The main content focus that characterize Old Catholic systematic theology are how the church (ecclesiology) and the theology of the sacraments are percieved.

From the very beginning, the Old Catholic theology and the Old Catholic Church have been committed to ecumenical concerns. Ecumenical theology reflects on interdenominational dialogues’ foundations, results, goals and methods. It explores theological commonalities and differences between the separate Christian churches and – based on the perception of the churches' shared responsibility for the world – seeks ways to come closer to unity in the diversity of Christian traditions.

Lecturers and researchers from different denominations and church traditions regularly attend the Institute of Old Catholic Theology.