Ronald Reagan on Hans Urs von Balthasar . . .

No kidding: on June 15, 1989, President Ronald Reagan became the sixth American president to be inducted into the French Academy-- an event that went almost unnoticed in both the religious and secular press. The text of his speech, a eulogy to his predecessor, Cardinal Hans Urs von Balthasar, went completely unreported. It is entitled: "If I Had Known Von Balthasar." The text can be found in the review, 30 Days (July-August, 1989, pp. 41-42). Here are the first two paragraphs:

I did not come to talk about my entering but another's passing. On June 26 of last year, my predecessor in this academy, the Swiss theologian Hans Urs von Balthasar died, two days before he was to become a cardinal. God called Father von Balthasar to a more eternal and exalted position.
Someone once remarked that if German theolgians saw two doors, one marked "Heaven" and othe other marked "Discussion on Heaven," they would go in the second. There is no doubt in my mind which one the Swiss father would enter. He loved knowledge because it led to the Lord.

The text of Reagan's speech is also reproduced in a book by Harry E. Winter, O.M.I., Dividing or Strengthening? Five Ways of Christianity, "Appendix: Ronald Reagan's Induction Speech Into the French Academy: 'If I Had Known Von Balthasar,'" pp. 173-177.