Pro EcclEsia Vol. XXVi, No. 2 159 CREATOR SPIRITUS Paul Hinlicky on Pneumatology, Ecclesiology, and the Life of Holiness Michael Plekon It is rare today that a theologian sets about producing a thorough sys- tematic theology, but Paul Hinlicky is just that rare and gifted theologian. Just a few introductory remarks are necessary. I have had the privilege of knowing Paul for twenty years and more, and also his family. I had much correspondence with him years back and a memorable month of Orthodox-Lutheran dialogue he set up while teaching at the theological faculty of Comenius University in Bratislava. I revere that moment as one of profound ecumenical fellowship in which not only did we give papers, discuss, and debate, but we also traveled extensively in Slovakia to impor- tant sites of both churches. And we prayed—daily. But we also ate and drank, truly sacramental sharing, particularly of the homemade wine of the sub-Carpathian region around Svaty Jur. I also need to say that while we once were fellow pastors in the Lutheran Church in America and then the ELCA, I subsequently moved to the Orthodox Church in America where I have been a priest for twenty years. I was an external reader on his daughter Sarah’s doctoral dissertation on Elisabeth Behr-Sigel, the great theologian of the Orthodox Church in France. I was able through another friend to have Sarah and Elisabeth meet before Elisabeth’s death. Elisabeth said to me that though an Orthodox Christian most of her adult life, she never stopped being a Lutheran—she had actually served as a lay pastoral assistant in the 1920s in rural parishes. I want to say the same is true of my- self. Like Elisabeth, her friend Fr. Lev Gillet, and Thomas Merton, I have tried to reunite the churches in my own persona, life, and work. Michael Plekon, Professor, Sociology/Anthropology, Baruch College, City University of New York, 55 Lexington Avenue, New York, NY 10010. E-mail: mjplekon@aol.com