German canon law with relation to the state (Staatskirchenrecht) enjoys great academic recognition. As a part of constitutional law it is treated in depth in all of the commentaries to the Basic Law and the Land constitutions. In addition there is an easily available literature in handbooks and textbooks which is marked by a considerable degree of consensus based the actual dispensation o f justice - especially in the Federal Constitutional Court. - The happy reunification of Germany has given old issues a new sense of actuality since the anti-religious policy of the SED led to a degree of de-Christianisation which went beyond that in the West. The current Festschrift is dedicated to one of the leading German canon lawyers. 52 essays are grouped in six chapters: 1) Biographic 2) Canon Law in Relation to the State 3) Church History and Theology 3) Canon Law 4) Philosophy of Law and Legal History 5) Public Law, Constitutional Law, European Law 6) Education, Cultura-1 History. The essays confirm the importance of the person being honoured. All of the contributors express in their different ways their debt to Heckel's corpus and make explicit their view, that an allegedly neutralsolely profane-historical approach minus the inclusion of legal history and historical theology really only serves to obscure knowledge; that the secularization of the political order is a basic condition of modern freedom. The latter is to be interpreted as the freedom to develop; that each is left to his own and that, not only equality is decreed; that secular freedom also guarantees room for Christian liberty too.

Enthalten in:
Theologische Literaturzeitung; 2000/Nr.6 Monatsschrift für das gesamte Gebiet der Theologie und Religionswissenschaft (2000)

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Serie / Reihe: Theologische Literaturzeitung

Personen: Campenhausen, Axel von Heckel, Martin (gefeierte Person)

Schlagwörter: Literaturbericht Staatskirchenrecht