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This article is an attempt to isolate and describe the philosophical aspects of Pope Francis's theory of ecological spirituality and compare them with Thomistic thought, as developed by Polish philosophers in modern times. This is something philosophers have already noticed, because this type of spirituality is about man's relationship with the most generally understood reality, i.e. himself, nature, culture and religion. Our examination of both positions will reveal numerous analogies as well as some differences in their understanding of nature, the human person, culture (ethics) and religion, which at least partly can be explained by the ambiguity of some papal formulations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article addresses the contemporary challenge to the modern vision of man as a subject. It shows that this kind of thinking has become a postmodern dominant view, and by taking into account several philosophical accounts it explains how one should understand the idea of the „death of a man" and what its consequences are. In the first part, the author shows that the modern creation of the subject for a particular kind of sovereign, that is the ruler of himself and the world, consequently leads to his own „death". The author argues that the death of such a subject has in a way been provoked by the very advocates of subjectivity and their idea of the deification of the subject, making him absolutely independent, autonomous, uninhibited. In the second part of the paper, the author explains what is entailed by the postmodern idea of the "death of a man" with reference to philosophers such as Nietzsche, Heidegger, Sartre, Derrida, and Foucault. He argues that each of these philosophers, by abandoning metaphysics and questioning the modern understanding of subjectivity, proposes the vision of a man who ceases to be „jakis", somehow determined, permanently present, defined. According to such a view, man becomes instead completely undefined. Lastly, the author shows following Foucault the essential features of the culture in which we live as the result of accepting certain postmodern assumptions when thinking about man. Hence, he speaks of a „nondialectic culture", „the culture of good functioning" and the „culture of resistance". [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Old Testament reveals the truth about God's creation of everything from nothing. Christianity has accepted this revelation and Christian thinkers have further developed this concept. The Christian Neoplatonist Eriugena, in particular, considered the creation and nothingness out of which God made everything. Interpreting the biblical description of creation in the context of his own philosophical system, Eriugena came to the conclusion that nothingness is the perfect fullness of the goodness of God, who created all the qualities of human nature. A perfect creature was created in a perfect man. The error resulting from an unreasonable choice caused man to get rid of perfection and exist in an imperfect form. The concept of creating everything from nothing in a human being seems to be a prelude to Eriugena's reflections on the incarnation of the eternal Logos - the Word - God the Son, which makes it possible to return to the state of perfection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents some reflections and thoughts of a contemporary Polish theologian, art historian and poet, Janusz Stanislaw Pasierb (1929-1993), concerning the Man-God relationship. In the pages of his masterpieces, especially those poetic, the author records the history of meetings between God and human beings; the history of departures, returns, visitations, sudden revelations, and indeed meditative concentration. It can all be perceived - and so it has been done - in the categories of mystique, which features mankind's "breaking through" into the light of God's presence. According to the intellectual and priest from Pelplin, a human being, as well as the world and reality - at least to some degree - seem to be rooted in a mystical experience, discovered to be the sanctified space of a potential contact with the transcendental Creator. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]