Erich Przywara and Postmodern Natural Law


Book Description

Graham McAleer’s Erich Przywara and Postmodern Natural Law is the first work to present in an accessible way the thinking of Erich Przywara (1889-1972) for an English-speaking audience. Przywara’s work remains little known to a broad Catholic audience, but it had a major impact on many of the most celebrated theologians of the twentieth century, including Hans Urs von Balthasar, Karl Rahner, Edith Stein, and Karl Barth. Przywara’s ground-breaking text Analogia Entis (The analogy of being) brought theological metaphysics into the modern era. While the concept of "analogy of being" is typically understood in static terms, McAleer explores how Przywara transformed it into something dynamic. McAleer shows the extension of Przywara’s thought into a range of disciplines: from a new theory of natural law to an explanation of how misunderstanding the analogy of being lies at the foundation of the puzzles of modernity and postmodernity. He demonstrates, through Przywara’s conceptual framework, how contemporary moral problems, such as those surrounding robots, Islam and sumptuary laws, Nazism (including fascism and race), embryos, migration, and body modification, among others, are shaped by the failure of Western thought to address metaphysical quandaries. McAleer updates Przywara for a new audience searching for solutions to the failing humanism of the current age. This book will be of interest to intellectuals and scholars in a wide range of disciplines within philosophy or theology, and will appeal especially to those interested in systematic and moral theology.




Journal of Moral Theology, Volume 9, Issue 2


Book Description

Charity, Justice, and Development in Practice: A Case Study of the Daughters of Charity in East Africa Meghan J. Clark Appropriation, Australia's Drinking Problem, and the Cost of Resistance in Catholic Health Services Daniel J. Fleming White Church or World Community? James Baldwin's Challenging Discipleship Jean-Pierre Fortin The Moral Impact of Digital Devices Marcus Mescher Life in the Struggle: Liturgical Innovation in the Face of the Cultural Devastation of Disaster Capitalism Daniel P. Rhodes From Indifference to Dwelling in Difference: Catholic-Muslim Marriages and Families and the Non-Hegemonic Reception of Muslim Migrants Axel Marc Oaks Takacs Augmented Reality and the Limited Promise of 'Ecstatic' Technology Criticism Luis G. Vera Book Reviews Tom Angier, ed., The Cambridge Companion to Natural Law Ethics Daniel A. Morris Gerald A. Arbuckle, SM, Abuse and Cover-Up: Refounding the Catholic Church in Trauma Kimberly Humphrey Jennifer Ayres, Inhabitance: Ecological Religious Education Steven Bouma-Prediger Hannah Bacon, Feminist Theology and Contemporary Dieting Culture: Sin, Salvation and Women's Weight Loss Narrative Stephanie C. Edwards Richard Berquist, From Human Dignity to Natural Law James Carey Brian Brock, Wondrously Wounded: Theology, Disability, and the Body of Christ Emily S. Kahm John J. Collins, What Are Biblical Values? What the Bible Says on Key Ethical Issues Patricia M. McDonald, SHCJ M. Shawn Copeland, Knowing Christ Crucified: The Witness of African American Religious Experience Stephen Okey Robert J. Daly, SJ, Sacrifice in Pagan and Christian Antiquity Chelsea King Asle Eikrem, God as Sacrificial Love: A Systematic Exploration of a Controversial Notion William P. Loewe Kevin L. Flanner, SJ, Cooperation with Evil; Thomistic Tools of Analysis Michael P. Krom Gifford A. Grobien, Christian Character Formation: Lutheran Studies of the Law, Anthropology, Worship, and Virtue Keyle Schiefelbein-Guerrero Ron Haflidson, On Solitude, Conscience, Love, and Our Inner and Outer Lives Kim Paffenroth Roger Haight, SJ, Faith and Evolution: A Grace-Filled Naturalism Taylor Wilkerson Raymond Hain, ed., Beyond the Self: Virtue Ethics and the Problem of Culture Christopher Denny Danielle Tumminio Hansen, Conceiving Family: A Practical Theology of Surrogacy and Self Kathryn Lilla Cox David Bentley Hart, That All Shall Be Saved: Heaven, Hell, and Universal Salvation Daniel Waldow Kristin E. Heyer, James F. Keenan, SJ, and Andrea Vicini, eds., Building Bridges in Sarajevo: The Plenary Papers from CTEWC 2018 Eli S. McCarthy Grant Macaskill, Autism and the Church: Bible, Theology and Community Jill Harshaw Graham James McAleer, Erich Przywara and Postmodern Natural Law Philip John Paul Gonzales Arthur J. McDonald, A Progressive Voice in the Catholic Church in the United States: Association of Pittsburgh Priests, 1966-2019 Jens Mueller Neil Messer, Theological Neuroethics: Christian Ethics Meets the Science of the Human Brain Amanda R. Alexander Michael J. Naughton, Getting Work Right: Labor and Leisure in a Fragmented World Stephanie Ann Puen Martin Schlag and Mele Domenec, eds., A Catholic Spirituality for Business: The Logic of Gift William J. Hisker Richard S. Vosko, Art and Architecture for Congregational Worship: The Search for a Common Ground Andrew Julo Jeremy D. Wilkins, Before Truth: Lonergan, Aquinas, and the Problem of Wisdom Jeremy Blackwood Curtis Paul DeYoung, et.al, Becoming Like Creoles: Living and Leading at the Intersections of Injustice, Culture, and Religion Ramon Luzarraga Christiana Zenner, Just Water: Theology, Ethics, and Fresh Water Crises. Rev. Ed. James W. Stroud 218




Beyond Kant and Nietzsche


Book Description

The Christian Humanist ideas of six Catholic scholars who were based in Munich during the first half of the 20th century are profiled in this volume. They were all interested in presenting and defending a Christian humanism in the aftermath of German Idealism and the anti-Christian humanism of Friedrich Nietzsche. They were seeking to offer hope to Christians during the darkest years of the Nazi regime and the post-Second World War era of shame, guilt and reconstruction.




D. G. Leahy and the Thinking Now Occurring


Book Description

This book offers a critical introduction to the work of American philosopher D. G. Leahy (1937–2014). Leahy's fundamental thinking can be characterized as an absolute creativity in which all creating is "live"—a happening occurring now that manifests a supersaturated polyontological actuality that is essentially created by the logic that characterizes it. Leahy leaves behind the categorial presuppositions of modern thought, eclipsing both Cartesian and Hegelian subjectivities and introducing instead an essentially new form of thinking founded in a nondual logic of creation. The new thinking delineates the absolute unicity of existence as a creative interactivity beyond all traditional dichotomies (such as one vs. many, unity vs. plurality, identity vs. change): a fully "digitized" actuality that is nothing but newness, which inherently implies nothing but change. Through this new form of thinking, change itself is revealed to be the very essence of reality and mind. Any reader looking for a quantum leap beyond the thrall of modern and postmodern fixations is invited to hear and apprehend this new thinking that refuses to be conditioned by paradigms, categories, species, genera, walls, bridges, boundaries, or abstractions: an essentially free thinking that embodies creative novelty itself.




On Tragedy and Transcendence


Book Description

From the time of Plato's proposed expulsion of the poets, tragedy has repeatedly proposed a challenge to philosophical and theological certainties. This is apparent already in early Christianity amongst leading figures during the patristic age. But this raises the question: Why was the theme of tragedy still accepted and deployed throughout the history of Christianity nevertheless? Is this merely an accident or is there something more substantial at play? Can Christian theology take the tragic seriously? Must Christianity ultimately deny the tragic to be coherent, or might it be able to sustain its negativity? Some like George Steiner, David Bentley Hart, and John Milbank have doubts about such a coherency, but others think differently. This book aims to examine this debate, laying out the lines of disagreement and continuing tensions. Through a critical examination of the work of Donald MacKinnon and the eminent Christian thinker Rowan Williams, the book aims to show that there is a path for reconciling the claims of Christian orthodoxy and the experience of tragedy, one that is able to maintain a metaphysical foundation for both real transcendence and unfolding historicity, without denying either.




The Wisdom of Our Ancestors


Book Description

In The Wisdom of Our Ancestors, the authors mount a powerful defense of Western civilization, sketching a fresh vision of conservatism in the present age. In this book, Graham McAleer and Alexander Rosenthal-Pubul offer a renewed vision of conservatism for the twenty-first century. Taking their inspiration from the late Roger Scruton, the authors begin with a simple question: What, after all, is the meaning of conservatism? In reply, they make a case for a political orientation that they call “conservative humanism,” which threads a middle way between liberal universalism and its ideological alternatives. This vision of conservatism is rooted in the humanist tradition (that is, classical humanism, Christian humanism, and secular humanism), which the authors take to be the hallmark of Western civilizational identity. At its core, conservative humanism attempts to reconcile universal moral values (rooted in natural law) with local, particularist loyalties. In articulating this position, the authors show that the West—contra various contemporary critics—does, in fact, have a great deal of wisdom to offer. The authors begin with an overview of the conservative thought world, situating their proposal relative to two major poles: liberalism and nationalism. They move on to show that conservatism must fundamentally take the form of a defense of humanism, the “master idea of our civilization.” The ensuing chapters articulate various aspects of conservative humanism, including its metaphysical, institutional, legal, philosophical, and economic dimensions. Largely rooted in the Anglo-Continental conservative tradition, the work offers fresh perspectives for North American conservatism.







Church of the Ever Greater God


Book Description

In Church of the Ever Greater God, Aaron Pidel offers the first major English-language study of the ecclesiology of Erich Przywara, S.J., one of the most important Catholic theologians of the twentieth century. As Pidel shows, Przywara’s idea of analogia entis, or analogy of being, shaped his view of ecclesiology. According to this theory, every creature is made of various tensions or polarities in its being. Creatures flourish when these tensions are in equilibrium but transgress their creaturely limits when they absolutize one polarity over the other. Pidel demonstrates how Przywara used the concept of analogia entis to describe the structure and rhythm of the Catholic Church. In Przywara’s view, the Church, too, is essentially constituted by her tensions or polarities, and the members of the Church conform to that analogical tension to varying degrees of fidelity. Przywara claims that analogia entis not only describes the Church as she is but also can be used as a criterion for discerning the spiritual health of the Church by helping her to see where her equilibrium has become imbalanced. Pidel maintains that Przywara thought that the biggest risk to the Church’s analogical equilibrium in the last century was a de-emphasis of the typically Ignatian ideas of reverence for the Divine Majesty and missionary extraversion. Przywara’s vision of the Church is presented as a corrective to this one-sided imbalance. In drawing attention to Przywara’s metaphysically informed and deeply Ignatian ecclesiology, Pidel’s study will appeal not only to scholars of Przywara but also to all those who study ecclesiology and Catholic theology more broadly.




So What's New About Scholasticism?


Book Description

In So What’s New about Scholasticism? thirteen international scholars gauge the extraordinary impact of a religiously inspired conceptual framework in a modern society. The essays that are brought together in this volume reveal that Neo-Thomism became part of contingent social contexts and varying intellectual domains. Rather than an ecclesiastic project of like-minded believers, Neo-Thomism was put into place as a source of inspiration for various concepts of modernization and progress. This volume reconstructs how Neo-Thomism sought to resolve disparities, annul contradictions and reconcile incongruent, new developments. It asks the question why Neo-Thomist ideas and arguments were put into play and how they were transferred across various scientific disciplines and artistic media, growing into one of the most influential master-narratives of the twentieth century. Edward Baring, Dries Bosschaert, James Chappel, Adi Efal-Lautenschläger, Rajesh Heynickx, Sigrid Leyssen, Christopher Morrissey, Annette Mülberger, Jaume Navarro, Herman Paul, Karim Schelkens, Wim Weymans and John Carter Wood reconstruct a bewildering, yet decipherable thought-structure that has left a deep mark on twentieth century politics, philosophy, science and religion.




Causation and Responsibility


Book Description

The concept of causation is fundamental to ascribing moral and legal responsibility for events. Yet the relationship between causation and responsibility remains unclear. What precisely is the connection between the concept of causation used in attributing responsibility and the accounts of causal relations offered in the philosophy of science and metaphysics? How much of what we call causal responsibility is in truth defined by non-causal factors? This book argues that much of thelegal doctrine on these questions is confused and incoherent, and offers the first comprehensive attempt since Hart and Honoré to clarify the philosophical background to the legal and moral debates.The book first sets out the place of causation in criminal and tort law and outlines the metaphysics presupposed by the legal doctrine. It then analyses the best theoretical accounts of causation in the philosophy of science and metaphysics, and using these accounts criticises many of the core legal concepts surrounding causation - such as intervening causation, forseeability of harm and complicity. It considers and rejects the radical proposals to eliminate the notion of causation from law byusing risk analysis to attribute responsibility. The result of the analysis is a powerful argument for revising our understanding of the role played by causation in the attribution of legal and moral responsibility.