As this short book's title indicates, its main goal is to inform readers about Henri Werling SJ (1879-1961), a Jesuit missionary priest whose life and ministry were largely spent in Estonia. The research and writing of the book were initiated by the Documentation Centre for Human Migrations (CDMH) at Dudelange in Luxembourg with the aim, it would appear, of drawing attention to the missionary migrations of a remarkable citizen of the Grand Duchy. The authors trace Werling's life from his upbringing among the wealthy Luxembourg bourgeoisie, his education in Catholic schools and Jesuit institutions, to his novitiate and training as a missionary priest in Germany and Poland, his ministry in Eastern Prussia and then finally, in Estonia. From autumn 1923 he served as Catholic parish priest in Tartu, struggling with the complexities of local multilingualism among parishioners who did not have a common language and where he needed to understand Estonian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Latgalian, Russian and Polish in order to communicate with them all. His dedication to studying Estonian led to translations of prayers and the Scriptures, with his translation of the entire New Testament being at the printer's when Soviet troops occupied the country during World War Two. He lived through successive occupations and bombings in Tallinn, only to be arrested in August 1945 and deported to the Perm region of Russia where he survived until his release in spring 1954. After his return to Estonia, he lived at Esna until his death in February 1961. Despite his Luxembourg family's attempts to repatriate him, he was determined to remain faithful to his post and he is buried in Tallinn's Liiva cemetery.
The book weaves together archival material from many different, although predominantly Roman Catholic, sources: the archives of the Swiss and German provinces of the Society of Jesus, the archives of the Holy See in Rome, archival correspondence from the Mother House in Olomouc, Czech Republic of the Catholic nuns who served in Estonia alongside Werling, as well as material made available to the authors by the Estonian historian and Catholic priest, Vello Salo, and by the National Archive of Estonia. Nevertheless, despite this wealth of primary source material and Werling's intrinsically fascinating life, we actually get very little feel for the man himself or the events of his life.
One reason for this is that the authors rarely allow Werling to speak with his own voice. Although they tell us that he left long descriptions of his lengthy journeys on foot to visit scattered Catholic parishioners on Estonian islands such as Saaremaa, or to Petseri where he was fascinated by the monastery, the homes and way of life of the nearby villagers, none of these descriptions are actually quoted in the book. We likewise hear nothing about any inner struggles he may have had during his novitiate, training, parish ministry and conflicts with colleagues. Apart from a little correspondence with the Czech nuns whose parcels of food, medicines and books kept him going amidst severe winters, loneliness and illness, lack of access to materials about Werling's life after his deportation to Russia, also mean that this potentially illuminating period is merely outlined and we get no real sense of how Werling fared. Thus we hear almost nothing of Werling's 'many good thoughts' which the title of the book promises: his inner motivations, his lived experience of Estonia and its people, his Jesuit spirituality are more or less passed over in silence.
Another reason for Werling remaining a rather stiff, two-dimensional figure in the book is that we hear almost nothing from those who knew him, apart from the complaints of a few colleagues about his inability to relate to others which leave us with the impression that perhaps he was not as remarkable as his biographers would like him to have been. Despite claims in the Introduction that a biography is justified as in post-colonial studies individuals have agency which allows them to influence their lot, the authors seem unaware that the post-colonial writing of missionary history involves painting a picture of 'mission from below', listening to the voices of those whose everyday life and culture bore the impact of the mission and its perpetrators. We do not hear the voices of those he ministered to in what must undoubtedly have been colourful, multilingual and multicultural parish communities in Tartu in the 1920s, and in Tallinn and the Estonian islands in the 1930s. We hear nothing about whether he collaborated with native speakers while making his biblical translations, the reasons for his dissatisfaction with previous translations, and the reactions of his readership, all of which could potentially bring alive for the reader one of Werling's significant occupations. The events of the book take place largely against the background of the 1920s-1930s, a period of history which saw the social and cultural upheavals caused by Estonian independence and land reform, yet apart from a few details of how this affected the Catholic community, the reader is given very little idea of the rich texture of broader Estonian life at this time.
A further reason for Werling remaining a rather shadowy figure is that in the lengthy second chapter which covers the 1920s-1930s, we lose the thread of his life amidst the ups-and-downs of the development of the Catholic mission in Estonia. The chapter provides a useful summary of the significant figures and monastic orders involved in this process: the sending of a papal visitor at the initiative of Pope Benedict XV in 1921 in the light of the new Estonian government's openness to the presence of the Roman Catholic Church, the ensuing decision to entrust Estonia to Jesuit missionaries owing to the lack of necessary priests, the appointment of Fr Eduard Profittlich as apostolic administrator in May 1931 and as Archbishop in December 1936, the arrival of Capucin fathers as reinforcements in the 1930s and their ministry in Tartu which meant Werling was transferred to Tallinn, the establishment of two houses for Czech nuns in Pärnu and Tartu.
Yet while there is much detailed information about who was appointed where and when, the narrative suffers from a lack of setting these details into broader contexts. The authors rely on archives from Catholic institutions and so again we hear no reaction to these activities either 'from below', nor from a sideways viewpoint through Lutheran or Orthodox eyes, nor from the secular press. Various eastern-rite priests and nuns wander in and out of the narrative with little indication of where they have appeared from, nor the significance of the frictions with Latin-rite clergy and nuns which they cause. Although we gradually become aware that the tiny Catholic minority in Estonia largely consists of Polish migrants, there is no mention at all of the earlier history of Roman Catholic presence in the form of the crusading Teutonic Order in mediaeval times and the reemergence of Catholic communities in the late 18th century. So the significance of the frequent allusions to the openness of Estonian Lutherans to attending Catholic Mass owing to the vestiges of Catholicism which have remained among them, would probably be lost on many of the book's readers. The book presents the Catholic minority in Estonia as struggling to make its voice heard among the majority Lutheran community and an Orthodox community which had been upheld by the Tsarist government. While there may be much truth in this, it fails to do justice to the alienation of many Estonians from religion in general in the late imperial period, the renewed confidence enjoyed by the Catholic Church in the Russian Empire after the 1905 Religious Toleration Act, and the way that both Lutheran and Orthodox churches were facing the same struggles over indigenizing themselves among the Estonian-speaking population not so long before, and during the very time on which the book focuses.
From the point of view of scholars researching Baltic Orthodoxy, the sections of the book which will be of greatest interest are those devoted to mission among the Orthodox population, and those which focus on what the book refers to as 'the grand project of Rome to win Russia to the Catholic faith, in order to restore the unity of the Church' (29). The book sets the Estonian mission in the context of the broader policy towards the Christian East of Popes Benedict XV (1914-22) and Pius XI (1922-39) who, in response to the collapse of the Russian and Ottoman empires, sought the reunion of the Eastern Churches with Rome and created in 1917 the Pontifical Oriental Institute with its mission of educating both Eastern and Western Christians about the Christian East. The book gives some details of the Institute's representative Francis McGarrigle opening negotiations concerning the union of the Estonian Apostolic Orthodox Church with the Holy See with Konstantin Päts, and later his brother Fr Nikolai Päts, while at the grassroots level Henri Werling is credited with being given the opportunity to preach the union in Orthodox churches. The authors attribute the failure of negotiations primarily to Rome's fear that the motives for union on the Estonian side were purely financial, although they do also admit that internal dissension between the different Catholic clergy and orders meant the project was doomed to failure. This section is just one example of where the book's reliance on Catholic archives and viewpoints needs balancing out to provide a more rounded picture of the Estonian Orthodox Church's approaches to both the Anglican Church and the Ecumenical Patriarchate during this complex period, and the viewpoints of the Estonian Orthodox clergy on the union with Rome which has been discussed and documented in recent scholarship.
In short, the book is as it claims in the Introduction, 'une premiere approche' 'a first attempt' which neither does justice to the truly remarkable life of Henri Werling, nor gives a balanced and critical account of the Catholic mission in Estonia in the interwar period. It nevertheless points to the need for a serious monograph which would draw Werling's life into a comprehensive study of the Roman Catholic community in Estonia both in this period, and more broadly throughout the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries.
Review by Alison Kolosova