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Author: R. Jared Staudt Publisher: Emmaus Academic ISBN: 1645851699 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 450
Book Description
To contemporary minds, the notion of justice toward God is seldom considered and often foreign. Far more discussed is how God might either undermine or motivate social justice. The Primacy of God by R. Jared Staudt offers an important intervention. With the aid of St. Thomas Aquinas, Staudt argues that it is vital for both contemporary society and contemporary Catholic theology to return to the traditional view of God as the one to whom all human and social action must be ordered and to recover the virtue of religion as the virtue which orders all other virtues to God. Not only does Staudt helpfully remind readers of the ancient philosophical and biblical notion of worship as a dictate of the natural law, he also illuminates the way in which Christian liturgy, as an enactment of Christ’s high priesthood, is the great fulfillment of natural and biblical worship. Accordingly, Staudt secures religion as essential for the virtue of love. This brings Staudt to criticize modern theologians like Karl Barth, who claimed that religion is inherently idolatrous, as well as Karl Rahner, who claimed that love of neighbor is the highest moral act. Staudt also considers the question of religious truth in light of the plurality of religions, soliciting the assistance of Hans Urs von Balthasar and Joseph Ratzinger, as well as the way in which religion relates to the development of culture, engaging the great Catholic social historian Christopher Dawson. The Primacy of God is a much-needed work that ought to set the agenda for Catholic theology in the twenty-first century.
Author: R. Jared Staudt Publisher: Emmaus Academic ISBN: 1645851699 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 450
Book Description
To contemporary minds, the notion of justice toward God is seldom considered and often foreign. Far more discussed is how God might either undermine or motivate social justice. The Primacy of God by R. Jared Staudt offers an important intervention. With the aid of St. Thomas Aquinas, Staudt argues that it is vital for both contemporary society and contemporary Catholic theology to return to the traditional view of God as the one to whom all human and social action must be ordered and to recover the virtue of religion as the virtue which orders all other virtues to God. Not only does Staudt helpfully remind readers of the ancient philosophical and biblical notion of worship as a dictate of the natural law, he also illuminates the way in which Christian liturgy, as an enactment of Christ’s high priesthood, is the great fulfillment of natural and biblical worship. Accordingly, Staudt secures religion as essential for the virtue of love. This brings Staudt to criticize modern theologians like Karl Barth, who claimed that religion is inherently idolatrous, as well as Karl Rahner, who claimed that love of neighbor is the highest moral act. Staudt also considers the question of religious truth in light of the plurality of religions, soliciting the assistance of Hans Urs von Balthasar and Joseph Ratzinger, as well as the way in which religion relates to the development of culture, engaging the great Catholic social historian Christopher Dawson. The Primacy of God is a much-needed work that ought to set the agenda for Catholic theology in the twenty-first century.
Author: Paul J. Wadell Publisher: Wipf and Stock Publishers ISBN: 1606083694 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 167
Book Description
Thomas Aquinas was a man with a strategy -- not a strategy to assist us in good decision-making or a strategy to help us resolve our problems of conscience, but a strategy to work toward our personal transformation in light of God's love for us. Aquinas has traditionally been represented as a man whose ethics are overly rational, excessively formal, and too scholarly to be of much use in contemporary society. The Primacy of Love gives us a fresh look at his ethical thought and invites us to become part of his vision of the moral life as partners in God's perfect love. Author Paul Wadell gives special attention to the role of the passions, affections, and emotions in our moral life and creates a richly humane and compelling study written in a clear and accessible style. The Primacy of Love is a modern map for our own moral journey that is not so much something to study, but a way of life in which to participate. To follow this journey is to take up an adventure that will involve you from the center of your being and will change you forever.
Author: Mother Mary Christa Nutt, R.S.M. Publisher: Emmaus Academic ISBN: 1645853926 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 447
Book Description
What is it about the practice of obedience to God that makes it significant for human happiness and sanctity? And how should the obedience proper to vowed religious life be understood relative to the responsibilities of conscience and personal freedom? In the present day, religious obedience is often viewed either as a negative cramping of personal autonomy by an external authority, or as a positive submission to law that somehow assures one’s fidelity, but the common thread for both perspectives is a distinctly modern approach to obedience characterized by legalism and voluntarism. In Free for Christ, Mother Mary Christa Nutt, R.S.M., proposes a different approach to religious obedience that foregrounds virtue-based moral agency rooted in metaphysics and the mystery of God, examining obedience not simply in relation to commands and laws but as a spiritual, philosophical, and theological reality—one that situates the human person in relation to God, the Church, and those others who share this religious life. Taking her starting point from Thomas Aquinas, Nutt examines obedience as a dimension of prudence and worship, that is, as a way that the human being can become relative to God as first source and final end, and thus as a way that the grace of Christ can take deeper root as a path to authentic freedom and interiority. From this ground of Thomistic metaphysics and ethics emerges a theological anthropology of obedience closely tied to Aquinas’s teaching on providence and religion.
Author: R. Michael Dunnigan Publisher: Emmaus Academic ISBN: 1645853349 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 511
Book Description
The Second Vatican Council’s declaration Dignitatis Humanae marks a significant advance over prior magisterial teaching about the right to religious liberty, yet the nature of this advance has long been subject to controversy. Is it a true development, conserving and extending what came before? Or does it instead chart a new course entirely, rejecting and replacing the older teaching? In Religious Liberty and the Hermeneutic of Continuity, R. Michael Dunnigan takes up these pressing questions and offers a careful examination of how the claims of Dignitatis Humanae relate to the magisterial precedents set by the papacy in the nineteenth century. With precision and nuance, Dunnigan analyzes the object, scope, and foundation of the right to religious liberty itself, and his analysis culminates in the proposal that the “right” endorsed by Vatican II is not identical with the “rights” condemned by previous popes. Beyond establishing the claims of Dignitatis Humanae as a true development of prior teaching, Dunnigan shows that its contribution to the question of religious liberty has not yet received full appreciation. Indeed, Dunnigan demonstrates how the Vatican II declaration reaffirms, reinforces, and even revivifies prior magisterial teaching on religious liberty through its emphasis on human integrity, which emerges as a foundational but often overlooked principle of continuity.
Author: John L. Nepil Publisher: Emmaus Academic ISBN: 1645853314 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 379
Book Description
Starting in the early to mid-nineteenth century, Catholic theology witnessed a profound retrieval of patristic reflection on the interrelationship of the Virgin Mary and the Church. This dynamic reached a doctrinal high point with the declarations of Vatican II and Pope Paul VI concerning Mary as “type of the Church” and “Mother of the Church,” and it also provided the impetus for further theological exploration of the deeper unity of the Mother of Christ and his mystical body. In A Bride Adorned, John L. Nepil examines how this interrelationship has been formulated in modern theology in terms of perichoresis, a notion of unconfused reciprocity or interpenetration drawn from Christology and Trinitarian theology first applied to Mary and the Church by the nineteenth-century German theologian Matthias Scheeben. In the first part of the study, Nepil treats the foundations of this formulation, outlining its historical background and creative articulation by Scheeben. The second part tracks developments of Scheeben’s insight in the thought of twentieth-century theological luminaries Charles Journet, Hans Urs von Balthasar, Louis Bouyer, and Leo Scheffczyk, each of whom distinctively articulate the shared conviction that neither Mary nor the Church can be understood apart from each other. The third part draws out the far-reaching doctrinal and pastoral implications of this deepened account of the Mary–Church relation, establishing its vital importance for ongoing theological and ecclesial renewal. Through his careful engagement with these figures, Nepil shows how Mary and the Church are to be understood as two realizations of a single mystery. This vantage on Mary and the Church sheds new light on the vision of the Council Fathers at Vatican II, and it charts a course for the Church’s flourishing via a return to her Marian heart.
Author: Robert Barron Publisher: Emmaus Academic ISBN: 164585308X Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 538
Book Description
With contributions from some of today’s most significant theologians, Engaging Catholic Doctrine is an expression of gratitude to Matthew Levering for his generous collegiality and tireless work to chart a sure path for contemporary Catholic doctrine. Essayists significantly advance the work of Matthew Levering in the areas of Aquinas as a biblical theologian, the doctrine of the Trinity, the significance of sacrifice for authentically Christian worship, the recovery of virtue in moral theology, the theology of Joseph Ratzinger, and much more. In addition to celebrating and honoring Levering’s work, this volume offers new contributions in some of the key areas of theological research today. Matthew Levering is the James N. Jr. and Mary D. Perry Chair of Theology at Mundelein Seminary and serves as the co-editor of both Nova et Vetera and the International Journal of Systematic Theology. He completed an M.T.S. from Duke University and a Ph.D. from Boston College. A leading proponent of Thomistic ressourcement, he has authored over thirty books and edited or co-edited thirty more on topics in dogmatic, moral, spiritual, and historical theology. These include a nine-volume work of Catholic Dogmatics, as well as: Christ’s Fulfillment of Torah and Temple, Scripture and Metaphysics, Participatory Biblical Exegesis, The Betrayal of Charity, Did Jesus Rise from the Dead?, An Introduction to Vatican II as an Ongoing Theological Event, The Theology of St. Augustine, Dying and the Virtues, The Oxford Handbook of the Trinity, and Newman on Doctrinal Corruption.
Author: John R. Betz Publisher: Emmaus Academic ISBN: 1949013871 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 671
Book Description
The Prologue of the Gospel of John identifies Jesus Christ as the eternal Word or Logos of the Father, who became flesh for the salvation of the world. Yet the world that Christ saves is his world from the beginning, for he is also the Logos of creation, the one “through whom all things were made” (John 1:3). This divinely revealed claim has profound implications not only for theology but also for metaphysics, whose relation to Christian doctrine was undermined over the course of the twentieth century, such that the Christian faith has become an increasingly private affair rather than a credible account of reality and an invitation to participate more fully in it. With Christ, the Logos of Creation, John Betz seeks to recover a Christ-centered, analogical metaphysics and to establish the indispensability of such metaphysics for Christian theology and the Christian vision of reality. In Part I, he dispels the fog of confusion about analogical metaphysics and addresses the ecumenical issues posed by Karl Barth’s famous rejection of the analogia entis. Part II demonstrates how analogical metaphysics helps to explain Christian doctrine and sheds new light on the interrelationship between individual doctrines, including Trinitarian theology, Christology and soteriology, and theological anthropology. In Part III, Betz explores how this analogical perspective can aid in resolving a number of theological disputes, including the metaphysical relationship between nature and grace and the issue of divine humility. Finally, Part IV outlines further directions toward a fully Christological metaphysics that is proportionate both to the challenges of modern theology and the reality of our life in Christ the Logos.
Author: David H. Delaney Publisher: Emmaus Academic ISBN: 1645853594 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 445
Book Description
In numerous works both before and after his papal election, John Paul II offers ample reflection on the themes of personhood, relationality, and sexual complementarity, but while he advances a clearly articulated theology of femininity and motherhood, as in his apostolic letter Mulieris Dignitatem, he might seem to offer no equivalent treatment of masculinity and fatherhood. In Viri Dignitatem, David Delaney seeks to surface and systematize the rich but often overlooked theology of masculinity and fatherhood that is found dispersed throughout John Paul II’s writings, demonstrating its essentiality for understanding his larger anthropology. In the first part of the study, Delaney treats the foundations of this anthropology, establishing John Paul II’s thought on personhood, relation, and human action. Building on this, the second part considers sexual differentiation, drawing out from John Paul II’s teaching on the body, femininity, Mary, and the Church his corresponding perspective on masculinity, which is itself rooted in nuptial complementarity and the revealing work of Christ. The third part focuses on John Paul II’s theology of fatherhood, which Delaney presents as both a natural and spiritual vocation that is based on the Fatherhood of God as this is manifested and imaged by the incarnate Son. Finally, the fourth part provides a synthetic assessment of this theology of masculinity and fatherhood, showing its coherence and addressing contemporary criticisms and misinterpretations. At a time of accelerating crises of sexuality, the family, and fatherhood, Delaney’s Viri Dignitatem provides a welcome and important elaboration of John Paul II’s teaching on the dignity and vocation of man.
Author: Luke Wilgenbusch Publisher: Emmaus Academic ISBN: 1645853373 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 205
Book Description
In contemporary considerations of purgatory, there is increasing ecumenical agreement among Catholics, Orthodox, and Protestants about the need for spiritual purification and healing before a soul can enter into the glory of God’s presence in heaven. Yet for the broader tradition of the Church, this account of what souls require from God is paired with a complementary account of what God, in his justice, requires of the soul, including satisfaction of its “debt of punishment” (reatus poenae). Although the transformative and retributive aspects of purgatory are often seen today as being at odds with one another, Fr. Luke Wilgenbusch proposes in Saved as through Fire to recover their proper and traditional harmony. Taking Thomas Aquinas as his primary guide, Wilgenbusch identifies and explores the full array of the consequences of sin—both immanent and extrinsic—that purgatory resolves. Through an attentive retrieval of Aquinas’s teaching on sin, its effects, and its remedy in Christ, Wilgenbusch clarifies how purgatory indeed heals and purifies souls from their guilt and disordered attachments, and how it simultaneously serves as a form of punishment and a means of satisfaction, enabling souls to contribute, in union with Christ, to the restoration of the divine order of creation damaged by their sin. Beyond shedding valuable light on the doctrine of purgatory, the integrated vantage on purification, punishment, and satisfaction provided by Saved as through Fire holds promise, too, for a better understanding of the Church’s practices of penance, reparation, and the offering of indulgences.