A born aristocrat in manner and appearance, de Lubac studied law for a year before, aged 17, joining the Society of Jesus in Lyon on 9 October 1913.

[1] De Lubac taught at the Jesuit College at Mongré, in the Rhône, from 1923 to 1924, and then in 1924 returned to England and began his four years of theological studies at Ore Place in Hastings, East Sussex.

[3] His first book, the now-classic Catholicisme (English title of the current edition: Catholicism: Christ and Common Destiny of Man) was published in 1938, before the war.

It was intended to show the incompatibility of Christian belief with the philosophy and activities of the Nazi regime, both in Germany and also under the cover of the Vichy government in southern France, which was theoretically independent of the Reich.

All Jesuit provincials were directed to remove three of his books (Surnaturel, Corpus mysticum, and Connaissance de Dieu) and one article from their libraries and, as far as possible, from public distribution.

[6] Two months later,[c] Pope Pius XII issued the encyclical Humani generis, widely believed to have been directed at de Lubac and other theologians associated with the nouvelle théologie,[citation needed] an intellectual movement characterized by renewed attention to the patristic sources of Catholicism, a willingness to address the ideas and concerns of contemporary men and women, a focus on pastoral work and respect for the competencies of the laity, and a sense of the Catholic Church as existing in history and affected by it.

His pioneering study Exégèse médiévale (1959–1965) revived interest in the spiritual exegesis of scripture and provided a major impetus to the development of covenantal theology.

In August 1960, Pope John XXIII appointed de Lubac as a consultant to the Preparatory Theological Commission for the upcoming Second Vatican Council.

Although the precise nature of his contribution during the council is difficult to determine, his writings were certainly an influence on the conciliar and post-conciliar periods, particularly in the area of ecclesiology where one of his concerns was to understand the church as the community of the whole people of God rather than just the clergy.

[d] Paul VI, having committed to creating a Jesuit cardinal, conferred the honor on de Lubac's junior colleague Jean Daniélou instead.

In the years after Vatican II, de Lubac came to be known as a "conservative theologian", his views completely in line with the magisterium – in contrast to his progressive reputation in the first part of his life.