Lonergan and Ratzinger on person and relation

I had the impression that Lonergan would be totally caught up in the Thomist definition of person. He does give a great deal of space to it, in his Latin works of the 1960s, and he does say that Richard of St Victor's definition is "merely of historical interest," but I was happy to see several openings. As for example when he lists the various phases in the history of the term person: the term; the metaphysical definition; the gnoseological definition; and then the personalist-existentialist attempts. Then he says: we need to take what is good from the phenomenological and personalist-existentialist attempts, without abandoning the metaphysical definition. So integration.

And then, in Method in Theology, I think he truly enters into something new, that might be called the sought after integration of phenomenology, personalist existentialist thinking and what was still valid in the old.

So that is promising.

And perhaps Ratzinger's contribution might not be so strange after all.

And De Smet.

And there is also McPartlan.

So there is hope for person and relation. 

Person and relation

Jose Kuttianimattathil has asked me to contribute to a Festschrift for Dominic Veliath. The topic suggested is Person and Relation - perhaps because of the Brahman and Person book. I have been collecting matter, mostly from the encyclopedias, on Person, before tacking De Smet and Lonergan.

Something very surprising and unexpected has turned up: Ratzinger criticizing both Augustine and Aquinas for sort of excluding the idea of relation from the definition of the human person - or not allowing the idea of relation, which pervades the concept of divine persons in God, its full and proper generality. Person as intrinsically relational, or, as Zizoulas, an Orthodox theologian, says: Being as Communion.

This makes things interesting and even exciting. What might Lonergan and De Smet, both of whom are soundly Thomist and, as far as I know, do not depart from Thomas, what might they have to say to the provocations of Ratzinger?

Unfortunately, I have not been able to find anything more substantial in Ratzinger than his “Zum Personverständnis in der Dogmatik” (1966), published as  “Zum Personbegriff in der Theologie" in  Dogma und Verkündigung (1973, 4th ed. 2005) and in English translation as "On the Understanding of ‘Person’ in Theology" in Dogma and Preaching: Applying Christian Doctrine to Daily Life (2011). 

Uttam Kamble

Tony George mentioned two important books by Uttam Kamble (who gave a talk long ago, during the Youth Adhiveshan held in Divyadaan - at that time he was Editor of the Nashik edition of Sakala). The books:

Vata tudavatana
Ai samjhuna ghetana [Or: aai samjun ghetana. Translated as Ilanda's Story].

Bhaurao Bagul

I have just posted in Indian Christian Writings a note on Prof. Nazareth Misquitta, Principal of St Joseph's College, Rajodi, Virar. I want to note here that Prof. Misquitta is also an expert on Bhaurao Bagul, a Dalit writer, perhaps the Father of Dalit Literature in Marathi. Misquitta holds a doctorate on Bagul from the Mumbai University. He has published several books on Bagul.

The natural and the supernatural in the religions

Joaquim’s paper Jacques Maritain e la mistica natural Indiana,” a reworked version of the article we printed in DJPE, makes very clear the position of Maritain: Christian mysticism is supernatural; Indian mysticism is really an experience of the self, and purely natural. However, he does admit that there could be ‘mixtures’ – mystical experiences that have ‘touches’ of the supernatural. How, I have to read further to understand.
I was asking myself: how does this position compare with that of Lonergan? Perhaps this way. In his earlier writings, Lonergan would talk of natural, relatively supernatural and absolutely supernatural solutions to the problem of evil. In his later position, he would take the clear (Christian) stand that the actually realized dispensation is absolutely supernatural. He would go further and state that the absolutely supernatural gift of God’s love is given to all, and therefore is available / given in all religions. He would say clearly that, in their positive moments, all religions are fruits of the gift of the Spirit.
I am thinking now that even in his earlier position, on the hypothesis / faith assertion that the actually realized dispensation is the absolutely supernatural one, he might have envisaged such a position. It is not said, and he does not say clearly, that any religion is natural. Hoever, he does talk / imply that Islam has no place for the supernatural mysteries. But then the mysteries regard the content of faith, perhaps? That position, in that case, would not really exclude the possibility of a truly supernatural gift of God’s love given even in Islam.

Gandhi and Lonergan

In the context of Richard Howards and Joanna Swanger's forthcoming book, Gandhi and the Future of Economics: Imaginary Dialogues between Gandhi and Some Indian Intellectuals, I was thinking of a future dialogue between Gandhi and Lonergan. If Lonergan could contribute a spine of hardcore economic theory to Gandhian intuitions, we might have a viable alternative to support obvious good will (I am thinking here of Singh). I was thinking this morning: here is a government whose survival depends on controlling the prices; yet it seems unable to do it. So perhaps it does not know how to. What if someone were to say how? What is an economic science focused on prices were barking up the wrong tree? What if we need to recognize productivity as the generator engine of economic growth, distinguish two types of product, and systematically work out its implications?

From substance to subject in Christ

Another anomaly: from substance to subject in Christ Jesus (see Lonergan, "Existenz and Aggiornamento," 1964), or from the vegetative living of being temples of the Spirit, members of Christ, adoptive children of the Father, to conscious living, spontaneous living, deliberate living, which is growth in prayer. [Lonergan, "The Mediation of Christ in Prayer," Philosophical and Theological Papers 1958-1964, CWL 6 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1996) 179.]

The anomaly is this: does not Lonergan say elsewhere, and most of the time, that the gift of God's grace is itself conscious, even if not known?