His Eminence Jean-Marie Cardinal Lustiger with His Holiness Pope John Paul II
He was a French prelate of the Roman Catholic Church. He was the Archbishop emeritus of Paris, having served as archbishop from 1981 until his resignation in 2005. He was elevated to the cardinalate in 1983.
Lustiger was born Aaron Lustiger in Paris, to the Polish Jews Charles and Gisèle Lustiger, whose family had settled in France before World War I. When the Germans occupied France in 1940, he was sent to live with a Christian family in Orléans. He and his sister Arlette converted to Catholicism and were baptized by the Bishop of Orléans, Jules-Marie Courcoux, on August 21, 1940. His parents were deported, and his mother died in the Auschwitz concentration camp; his father, who was displeased with the baptisms, survived.
Lustiger was educated at the Sorbonne, where he graduated in arts, and at the Institut Catholique de Paris. He was ordained to the priesthood on April 17, 1954 by Bishop Émile-Arsène Blanchet, rector of the Institut Catholique de Paris. From 1954 to 1959, he was an aumônier (chaplain) at the Sorbonne, and for the next ten years, the director of Richelieu Centre, which trains university chaplains. From 1969 to 1979, he was pastor of Sainte-Jeanne-de-Chantal, in the XVIe arrondissement of Paris.
On November 10, 1979, Lustiger was appointed Bishop of Orléans after a 15-month vacancy. He received episcopal consecration on the following December 8 from François Cardinal Marty, with Archbishop Eugène Ernoult of Sens and Bishop Daniel Pézeril serving as co-consecrators. He was promoted, on January 31, 1981, to Archbishop of Paris. Lustiger was created Cardinal Priest of Santi Marcellino e Pietro by Pope John Paul II in the consistory of February 2, 1983; one year later, on November 26, he was named Cardinal Priest of San Luigi dei Francesi. He became a member of the Académie Française in 1995.
A first-rate communicator, Lustiger was particularly attentive to the media and developed Catholic radio and television channels. Lustiger also created a new seminary for the training of priests, by-passing the existing arrangements. Opinions
Like all the senior prelates appointed by Pope John Paul II, Lustiger upholds papal authority in these areas of theology and morals: "There are opinions and there is faith," he said in 1997. "When it is faith, I agree with the Pope because I am responsible for the faith."
Lustiger was an outspoken opponent of racism and anti-Semitism, be it because of his background or because of his faith. He has been strongly critical of Jean-Marie Le Pen, leader of the French National Front. He has compared Le Pen's anti-immigrant views with Nazism. "We have known for 50 years that the theory of racial inequality can be deadly...It entails outrages," Lustiger has said. "The Christian faith says that all men are equal in dignity because they are all created in the image of God."
Lustiger avoided all reference to his liberal predecessor Guy Riobe when installed as bishop of Orléans. When appointed to Paris he encouraged a certain number of liberal clergy to return to the lay state. He was infuential in the appointment of his moderate conciliar auxiliary Georges Gilson to the see of Le Mans replacing senior clergy with men closer to his views. He pursued the official policy of ecumenism but gave an address highly critical of Anglicanism when welcoming Archbishop Robert Runcie to Notre Dame. In 1981 the French minister of education Savary proposed a reduction in state aid to private education. Lustiger organised a mass rally in protest at Versailles. Shortly afterwards the Mauroy government fell. In 1995 Lustiger played a key role in the deposition of Jacques Gaillot, bishop of Évreux. Gaillot was appointed to the titular see of Partenia. Lustiger, a strong believer in priestly celibacy, as Ordinary for eastern-rite Catholics resident in France prevented the deployment of married priests.
Lustiger in his presentation of traditional Catholic sexual morality generally succeeded in avoiding heated debate of these issues.
While supporting the actions of the curé of St. Bernard-de-la-Chapelle in accepting the protracted sit-in of a group of illegal immigrants in 1996, Lustiger subsequently showed less sympathy to such occupations.
Lustiger is the only Catholic prelate in modern times who was born (and is still considered) Jewish, a fact which has inevitably made him a controversial figure. He says he is proud of his Jewish origins and describes himself as a "fulfilled Jew" (he is said to be the only Catholic prelate who speaks Yiddish fluently). On becoming Archbishop of Paris, he said: "I was born Jewish and so I remain, even if that is unacceptable for many. For me, the vocation of Israel is bringing light to the goyim. That is my hope and I believe that Christianity is the means for achieving it." (In this statement Lustiger was using the word "Israel" in the sense of "the Jewish people" and not as a reference to the State of Israel.)
Remarks like this give offence to some Jews, who say that Lustiger has no right to call himself a Jew, despite the fact that under halakha (Jewish religious law) he is still a Jew even after having been converted to another religion. Others argue that "Jewish" is also an ethnic designation as well as a religious one, and that Lustiger is entitled to call himself a Jew in this sense too. They point out that he was classed as Jewish under the anti-Semitic laws of Nazi Germany and Vichy France. His strong support for the State of Israel, which is at odds with the Vatican's officially neutral position, has also won him some support from Jews.
In 1998, Lustiger was awarded the Nostra Aetate Award for advancing Catholic-Jewish relations by the Center for Christian-Jewish Understanding, an interfaith group housed on the campus of Sacred Heart University, a Catholic university at Fairfield, Connecticut in the United States. The Anti-Defamation League, a Jewish civil rights group, protested the award, saying it was "inappropriate" to honour Lustiger, who was born a Jew but left the faith. "It's fine to have him speak at a conference or colloquium," said the league's national director Abraham Foxman. "But I don't think he should be honored because he converted out, which makes him a poor example."
On February 11, 2005, Lustiger's retirement was accepted and André Vingt-Trois, a former auxiliary bishop of Paris who had become Archbishop of Tours, was named to succeed him as Archbishop of Paris.
Lustiger was a favorite of Pope John Paul II, partly because of his Polish background and partly because he staunchly upheld the Pope's conservative views in the face of much hostility from liberal Catholic opinion in France and general French anticlericalism. This led to some speculation that Lustiger would be a candidate to succeed John Paul II, but he always refused to discuss any such possibility. He was, however, one of the cardinal electors who participated in the 2005 papal conclave that elected Pope Benedict XVI
from Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Marie_Lustiger
