Franz Xaver von Baader

Franz Xaver von Baader (born March 27, 1765, Munich, Bavaria [Germany]—died May 23, 1841, Munich) was a Roman Catholic layman who became an influential mystical theologian and ecumenicist.

Abandoning a profitable career as a mining engineer in 1820, he turned his attention to a study of politics and religion. His earlier efforts to achieve ecumenical and political unity contributed to the formation in 1815 of the Holy Alliance, a security pact among Russia, Austria, Prussia, and France. This alliance sought to inaugurate a community of Christian nations resolved to prevent the recurrence of large-scale conflicts. Although the alliance eventually failed, Baader has subsequently been considered one of the founders of modern ecumenical activity.

In 1826 he was appointed professor of philosophy and speculative theology at the new University of Munich. There, with other Roman Catholics who had formed the “Munich circle,” he founded the journal Eos (Greek: “dawn”). Baader’s mystical philosophy, often expressed through obscure aphorisms and symbols, sought to correlate the realm of reason with the realms of authority and revelation. Economically and politically conservative, he viewed the ideal state as a community ruled by a universal, or catholic, church, although he rejected the papacy as an essential ingredient in church governance.