Saturday 24 November 2012

Faith and simplicity

Under the rubric 'faith and simplicity' Ratzinger cites abundantly from The Imitation of Christ, St Francis of Assisi, and Holy Scripture itself.
Let it be our highest study to become absorbed in meditation on the life of Jesus Christ. (The Imitation of Christ I, 1, 3)
Even if you knew by heart the whole Bible and the sayings of all the philosophers, what would it profit you without the love of God and his grace? (I, 1, 10)
Everyone has a natural craving for knowledge, but of what avail is knowledge without the fear of God? (I, 2, 1)
An unlearned person who serves God is surely better than a learned one who proudly searches the heavens while neglecting himself. (I, 2, 2)
Give up your excessive desire for learning. Therein are to be found only illusion and inner emptiness. (I, 2, 5)
Francis, who refers to himself as simple and ignorant, without knowledge and ignorant:
Let us be on our guard against the wisdom of this world and the prudence of the flesh; for the fleshly spirit tries by all means to have the word but it is little concerned with carrying it out; it seeks not for inner religion and sanctity, but for that which will be seen by men. (from the so-called First Rule)
And Scripture:
1 Cor 1:21-25, with its roots in Jesus' praise of the simple: I bless you Father, Lord of heaven and earth  for hiding these things from the learned and the clever and revealing them to mere children... (Mt 11:25)

Ratzinger, Principles of Catholic Theology: Building Stones for a Fundamental Theology. Tr. Mary Frances McCarthy. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1987. Part 3: The Formal Principles of Christianity and the Method of Theology. Ch. 2: The Anthropological Element in Theology. A. Faith and Education. 335-6.



Teilhard's influence on Vatican II

Teilhard's influence on Vatican II: see Wolfgang Klein, Teilhard de Chardin und das Zweite Vatikanische Konzil (Paderborn: Schoeningh, 1975). Cited in Ratzinger, Principles of Catholic Theology: Building Stones for a Fundamental Theology. Tr. Mary Frances McCarthy. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1987. Part 3: The Formal Principles of Christianity and the Method of Theology. Ch. 2: The Anthropological Element in Theology. A. Faith and Education. 334n3.

Friday 23 November 2012

The Christian faith and truth

“Martin Buber has pointed out that, for Christian faith, the act of conversion and, with it, the act of ‘holding as true’ are fundamental. However much we may criticize his reflections in other respects he is undoubtedly right when he says that affirmation – saying Yes – is a constant element of Christian faith; that it is true that Christian faith, in its most basic form, has never been a formless trust but always a trust in a particular Someone and in his word – that is, an encounter with truth that must be affirmed in its content. Precisely this marks its unique position in the history of religion.” [325.] [Though I would have thought Judaism and Islam share this uniqueness in different ways.]

(Ratzinger, Joseph. Principles of Catholic Theology: Building Stones for a Fundamental Theology. Tr. Mary Frances McCarthy. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1987. Part 3: The Formal Principles of Christianity and the Method of Theology. Ch. 1. Questions about the Structure of Theology. B. The Church and Scientific Theology.)

An assumption of the 'enlightened'

"Absolutism is an invention, an inner consequence, of the Enlightenment. Advised by enlightened minds and himself at the pinnacle of the Enlightenment, the king knew the needs of the unenlightened people better than they did themselves. Therefore, he canceled their freedoms and the rights of the social classes that limited his powers in order thus to give full sway to the demands of that reason of which he was the representative. The absolutist / claim to power is not, as it were, a relic of the Middle Ages; it is a product of the Enlightenment and is represented symbolically by the Sun King." (324-5)

(Ratzinger, Joseph. Principles of Catholic Theology: Building Stones for a Fundamental Theology. Tr. Mary Frances McCarthy. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1987. Part 3: The Formal Principles of Christianity and the Method of Theology. Ch. 1. Questions about the Structure of Theology. B. The Church and Scientific Theology.)

Is this not the temptation of our Indian upper classes - the temptation to think of the simple rural folk as unenlightened, as unable to think and judge and decide for themselves? The unspoken assumption: Let the missionaries work in the towns and cities where we, enlightened people, know how to resist their guile. Let them not work in the villages where they run the risk of converting poor, unsuspecting people.


Thursday 22 November 2012

Reversing the counterposition


Perhaps an example of Ratzinger engaging in developing a position / reversing a counterposition:

Before taking a position, Ratzinger pauses to shed light on the problem as a whole. The problem: differences re the object of theology.
These differences are linked to a variety of methodological orientations and to different concepts of the goal to be attained.
Concisely characterized by the key words of the 13th century controversy:
1. Thomistic view: theology is a scientia speculativa.
2. Franciscan: scientia practica.
See how current these are: the post-conciliar key words orthodoxy and orthopraxis.

But now a controversy that would have been inconceivable in the Middle Ages. If the word orthopraxis is pushed to its radical meaning [this is dialectic! Developing positions, reversing counterpositions] it presumes that no truth exists prior to praxis; truth can be established only on the basis of correct praxis. Praxis creates meaning out of and in the face of meaninglessness. [Very Nietzschean.] On this count, theology is merely a guide to action, which by reflecting on praxis continually develops new modes of praxis. “If not only redemption but truth as well is regarded as ‘post hoc’, then truth becomes the product of man. At the same time, man, who is no longer measured against truth but produces it, becomes himself a product.” [How?] “Granted, the most extreme positions occur but rarely.” [This is clearly a developing of a position; and if it is a counterposition, probably the attempt to show how it must be reverse. An extending ad absurdum of a position to reveal it as a counterposition. But: counterposition or error here? A counterposition is a truth clothed in a faulty or defective context.] [318.]

(Ratzinger, Joseph. Principles of Catholic Theology: Building Stones for a Fundamental Theology. Tr. Mary Frances McCarthy. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1987. Part 3: The Formal Principles of Christianity and the Method of Theology. Ch. 1. Questions about the Structure of Theology. A. What is Theology?)

Evangelization of the intellect, more or less

"The Catholic religion not only transformed the world of community and the world if interiority  It has assumed the mission of transforming the world of theory as well. And if it's attempt to do that, you mustn't be a phony and try to pass something else off in place of it. You have to meet theoretical exigences...." (Lonergan, CWL 22:322 Regis 1962)

Wednesday 7 November 2012

The notion of dogmatic development

New in Coelho, "Bernard Lonergan's Universal Viewpoint and its Transcultural Possibilities," ed. Cloe Taddei-Ferretti 228: the 'notion of dogmatic development' (see the Way to Nicea) as a further determination of the theologically transformed universal viewpoint and the notion of levels and sequences of expression.

Earlier, of course, there is the 'notion of speculative development' (see Gratia Operans).

Both are diachronic, whereas the technique of psychological introspection is synchronic.

The notion of the universal viewpoint is both synchronic and diachronic. The two notions listed above are further specifications of the notion of the universal viewpoint.