Gijsen was born in Oeffelt. He would be ordained a priest on April 6 1957. He obtained a doctorate in Church History, focusing his thesis on Joannes Augustinus Paredis. During the NationalPastoral Council in Noordwijkerhout from 1966 until 1970, Gijsen was one of the opponents to the direction the council was taking. The council was choosing for a more liberal interpretation on the documents promulgated by the Second Vatican Council, in particular the interpretation of Lumen Gentium. This was in contradiction to the view held by the pope. Many view his stance on the council of Noordwijkerhout as one of the reasons, if not the reason Gijsen would later be appointed bishop of Roermond.
appointed Gijsen as bishop of Roermond on February 13 1972, with co-consecrator being Bernardus Johannes Alfrink. The reaction to his appointment was one of outrage. The liberal Dutch Catholics of the episcopacy were heartbroken, a pain which was broadcast in the media. Among his soon-to-be colleagues, he was an unknown factor. Cardinal Alfrink even went to Rome to contest the appointment, but instead was told he had to co-consecrate Gijsen. This increased the outrage the laity was expressing over his appointment, as this was seen as a way to force the cardinals hand. This would increase the divide between the Dutch laity and the Catholic hierarchy. During his episcopacy, Gijsen would try as much as he could to overturn the changes made at Noordwijkerhout. In 1993 he resigned for health reasons. During this sickness he was the titular bishop of Maastricht.
After a few years at the titular see as bishop of Maastricht,, Gijsen's health improved. In Roermond, he had already been succeeded by bishop Frans Wiertz but in Reykjavik, the diocese with few priests for an enormous area, happened to have been vacant for two years, due to the rather sudden death of the American bishop, Alfred Jolson. Bishop Gijsen moved from the heavily Catholic Dutch diocese to Reykjavik, where the Catholic population is very small and rising solely due to immigration. Gijsen remained bishop in Iceland for another ten years. On October 30, 2007, the Pope Benedict XVI accepted the resignation from the pastoral government of the Diocese of Reykjavík, presented by Joannes Gijsen, in accordance with canon of the Code of Canon Law. Since then the bishop lived in Sittard as pastor of the Carmelite Sisters. In Reykjavik, he was succeeded by the Swiss-born bishop Pierre Bürcher.
Death
Gijsen died in Sittard on 24 June 2013, aged 80. He died only 2 months after another Dutch bishop, Muskens, died. In 2014 two complaints against Gijsen for sexual abuse dating from the period 1958–1961 were deemed valid by the complaints commission of the Catholic Church. The determination that complaints were valid was the first time against a Dutch bishop. Gijsen's successor in the diocese of Roermond, Frans Wiertz, apologized for Gijsen's behaviour.
