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According to Catholic theology, God offers a gift of love, known as divine grace, to all of humanity. This gift of divine grace is the gift of redemption and forgiveness of sins from God that is offered to everyone who decides to acknowledge and accept it. Grace is central to the lived experience of many Christians. This qualitative study examined how Catholics perceive and experience divine grace using interviews that assessed perceptions of divine grace in 29 practicing adult Catholics. A grounded theory analysis resulted in themes indicating that these Catholics view God’s divine grace as a tangible gift that is undeserved though continuously offered. The participants’ experience of God’s grace is not just an abstract theological concept but an embodied aspect of religious life with which believers can interact in many powerful ways. Three characteristics of God’s divine grace (i.e., salvific grace, cooperation through free will, primacy of conscience and the afterlife) and three mechanisms to experiencing God’s grace (i.e., sacraments, prayer and meditation, saints) are presented.

This invited symposium piece on David Ruccio’s blog, Occasional Links & Commentary on Economics, Culture and Society, briefly addresses Ruccio’s treatment of Catholic theology and social thought an...

The COVID-19 pandemic that struck the world and forced Catholics to go online to celebrate the Eucharist has been the greatest logistical challenge to Catholic sacramental theology in recent times. This article aims to clarify whether technology-mediated presence or telepresence in online Masses is real and acceptable to the Roman Catholic Church especially during this time of the COVID-19 pandemic. It argues that due to the lack of updating of its sacramental theology, which is still based on scholastic philosophy, Catholic theology continues to view physical presence as the only valid way of fulfilling religious obligation despite the growing influence of telepresence in religious life. If seen from a more sociological and holistic perspective, this article contends that telepresence in digital Eucharistic celebrations is real and not “artificial,” as participants lose awareness of their immediate surroundings and become one with Christ in the virtual celebration. It further argues that the validity of telepresence in the reception of the Eucharist should not be judged solely on a theological framework that was appropriate only during the medieval and Tridentine eras. Applying the actor-network theory, it ultimately claims that technological and human networks are inseparable in today's digital culture. Thus, the digital Eucharist is as real as participating in a physical Eucharist. The Catholic Church must therefore update and redefine its sacramental theology to better respond to the needs of the times. © Common Ground Research Networks, Vivencio O. Ballano, Some Rights Reserved, (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0).

This study offers theoretical explanations and distinctions associated with the phenomenon of conscience in social work. It uses the perspective of Roman-Catholic theology, or more precisely of the Roman-Catholic Church. It briefly reflects on an anthropology of conscience and then contemplates the essence of conscience and its relationship to the truth. In the reflection on the contradiction between Christian and secularized morality (given by the renowned Swiss Catholic theologian Hans Urs von Balthasar 1905-1988), it shows the importance of conscience in the value inconsistencies of the attitudes of today’s world. Finally, based on the impulses of the apostolic exhortation of Pope Francis Amoris laetitia (2016), it reflects on practical impulses concerning the place and importance of conscience in social work.

Old Catholic theology is the theology that is characteristic of the Old Catholic Churches of the Union of Utrecht. Old Catholic Theology: An Introduction, authored by Peter-Ben Smit, an acknowledged expert in the field, outlines the main characteristics of and influences on Old Catholic theology, as well as the extant ecumenical relationships of the Old Catholic Churches. In doing so, it covers what may be called ‘mainstream’ Old Catholic theology, while paying attention to extant diversity within the Old Catholic tradition. Particular attention is given to the hermeneutical approach to theology, ecclesiology, sacramental theology and ecumenical theology. Old Catholic theology has come to be characterized by a sacramental understanding of the church. This is the result of ecumenical dialogue and the basis upon which the Old Catholic Churches engage in ecumenical rapprochement. Hermeneutics of Scripture and tradition plays an important role as well, given that Old Catholic Churches have developed their own form of a hermeneutics of communion.

Since the time of its institution, the Catholic Church has consistently and unequivocally condemned direct, intentional termination of pregnancy at any stage or abortion as a gravely immoral and sinful act and a deplorable affront to human life and dignity. However, an incomplete understanding of Catholic theology and the interplay between various internal Church structures has led some to assert either that the Church has changed her position over time or that the morality of the question hinges on the subjective beliefs and circumstances of the individuals involved. This chapter aims to clarify the philosophical, theological, and structural distinctions that give rise to this erroneous interpretation of the Church’s teaching.

The philosophy of religion constituted one of the main fields of research by Prof. Józef Herbut. He created an original version of the analytical philosophy of religion. With the use of logical means, he analysed various dimensions of religion, primarily religious language. During the last period of his work, Herbut included ecumenical issues in his philosophical research. His research on these issues consisted of two stages. During the first stage, Herbut tried to create a specific logic of ecumenism. He hypothesised that the reason for the crisis of ecumenical dialogue consists in the lack of a clearly defined goal. Using the logical set theory, Herbut constructed possible models of doctrinal unity of different denominations. These models were constructed a priori, without reference to actual dialogues. During the second stage of his project, Herbut focused on the content of Catholic and Evangelical doctrines presented in catechisms. Here, he also put forward a research hypothesis that the languages of Catholic and Evangelical theology are different because they include different philosophical assumptions. These assumptions reach back to the medieval problem of universals. The language of Catholic theology is heavily influenced by moderate realism, and the language of Evangelical theology is influenced by moderate nominalism (these are two of the four standpoints in the problem of universals). Herbut's research project is original and innovative in terms of Polish philosophical and theological literature. However, in foreign language literature it is possible to find ones analogous to Herbut's project (József Fuisz, Charles Morerod).

In his 1966 book The Church Inside Out, J. C. Hoekendijk noted that various churches allow intercommunion in what are considered abnormal situations. The traditional language that applied to such practices was for situations considered to be “in extreme.” (in extremis). Roman Catholic theology traditionally applied the notion of in extremis to situations near death where one had passed a point of no return, but Hoekendijk noted that the concept was also applied to missionary contexts and to times of social crisis. Hoekendijk went on to argue that the current social context was such a situation of in extremis that called for us to engage in ecclesiastical actions otherwise considered irregular. Following Hoekendijk’s own arguments elsewhere in the book, however, I argue that it is not the times we are living through that are in extremis. Rather, it is the nature of the Gospel itself to render any age or context in extremis.

REV. TADEUSZ ZADYKOWICZ – was born in 1968 and graduated from the Major Seminary of the Archdiocese of Bialystok and the Catholic University of Lublin (KUL). He obtained his Habilitation of Theological Sciences degree with a specialization in Moral Theology. Since 2001, he has conducted research and teaches at KUL’s Institute of Moral Theology. He is currently a professor in the Department of Fundamental Moral Theology and serves as the Director of the Institute of Moral Theology. Rev. Zadykowicz belongs to the following academic societies: the Scientific Society of KUL (2002-), the Society for Moral Theology (1999-), the Scientific Society of Lublin (2003-), the European Society for Catholic Theology (2004-), and the Francis de Sales Scientific Society (2008-). His primary research interests include: the morality of religious life; the contemporary context of religious and moral life; the biblical and cultural premises of morality; the role of personal examples in the Christian moral life; the morality of researchers and conducting research.

The concept of “dissent” is of recent coinage and narrow use in Catholic theology. However, since rereadings of Catholic tradition through the lens of cultural studies have revealed its constitutive plurality, we are faced with a profound tension between a critical description of ecclesial polyphony and the normative ideals of unity and consensus. This interdisciplinary reappraisal of tradition raises far-reaching theological questions: Do we necessarily have to refer to inner-ecclesial polyphony as “dissent”? Does “dissent” silently rely on (and thus reinforce) established hierarchies of authority in the church? What could be counterhegemonic frameworks that resist entrenched power/knowledge regimes in the church? In which ways could “dissent” be reconceived to allow for a constructive approach to inner-ecclesial plurality? Once we raise questions such as these, we begin to see that Catholic theology lacks adequate models for a reflection of ecclesial polyphony in its full complexity. This roundtable addresses this lacuna: it offers critical case studies of historical and contemporary forms of “dissent” within the church, and it engages the theological and ecclesiological issues at stake.

In light of the fecundity and diversity of Catholic theology since Vatican II, a 2012 report of the International Theological Commission (ITC) identified perspectives, principles, and criteria—distinctive family traits—of Catholic theology, what Pope Benedict XVI called its “genetic code”: primacy of the Word of God; the faith of the Church as its source, context, and norm; the science of faith; drawing constantly on the canonical witness of Scripture; fidelity to the Apostolic Tradition; attention to the sensus fidelium; responsible adherence to the ecclesiastical magisterium; practiced in collaboration with the whole company of theologians; in dialogue with the world; giving a scientifically and rationally argued presentation of the Christian faith; integration of plurality in the intellectus fidei; and sapiential. This article marks the 10th anniversary of the ITC report by offering a critical commentary on the criteria, examining the possibilities, limitations, and tensions inherent in each, and the ongoing relevance of these criteria for contemporary Catholic theology. It argues that although the aim of the ITC report is not to promote uniformity but to avoid fragmentation, and its framework is an ecclesiology of communion, when the interpretative possibilities of theology are discussed, the report tends to retreat from these possibilities and adopt a restrictive emphasis on conformity. The article then examines what Pope Francis (2013–) says about the characteristics of Catholic theology and the role of theologians in his major documents and his addresses to faculties of theology. It argues that Francis makes a distinctive contribution to consideration of what is “authentically” Catholic theology, and may offer a less restrictive understanding of such theology for the diverse academic, cultural, and ecclesial contexts in which Catholic theologians find themselves.

The article presents the fundamental ecclesiology of the contemporary Catholic theologian Salvador Pie-Ninot (*1941). The text shows the way in which he solves the question of the credibility of the Church and the attitudes of private Christianity with its negative attitude towards the Church (believing without belonging). Pie-Ninot underlines that the credibility of the Church is dependent on revelation and that the character of faith is ecclesial. He interconnects the last two councils: the concept of the Church, whose divine character is approachable by man (via empirica, the way of experience) as it is taught by the First Vatican Council, with the ecclesial stances of the Second Vatican Council, which reduces the emphasis on the attributes of the Church in favour of revelation, the person of Jesus Christ and a personal relationship to him. Pie-Ninot then offers the way of testimony, which includes the outer (for example, apostolic tradition) and inner form of churchly reality (personal life according to the demands of the Gospel) and perceives the Church as a privileged space of God’s revelation and salvation.

When Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses to the door of the Wittenberg Castle Church on 31 October 1517, he did so in protest at abuses in Catholic theology and practice. Contemporary times, too, call for protest. The first “protest” concerns the revitalization of education and an increased commitment to intellectual excellence. The second “protest” concerns a recovery of Luther as a figure of protest. While scholars have tamed Luther's dangerous doctrines, the popular imagination still perceives him as an urban legend who spoke truth to power. An expansive notion of scholarship on Luther is required in order to approach a Luther who continues to inspire people around the world. The third “protest” is a critical protest of Luther's religious intolerance, specifically his anti-Judaism. Christian theologians must acknowledge Luther's anti-Judaism as central to his theology and radically revise this legacy to promote justice in inter-religious relations.

In this essay, I will argue that a political theology of human work can provide the sacramental principle underlying the theology of labor. This principle could complement the foundations of Catholic social teaching, since the sacramental aspects of work have not been made very explicit in the ethical framework of the Church's theology of work. The view of labor as the active participation in God's future is an important aspect of such a theology. In order to serve as a foundation for faith-based labor organizing, I will claim that it needs to be complemented by a sacramental view of labor as art, a labor-aesthetic that undergirds a labor-ethic, in which labor itself becomes a sign and instrument of the way the Church becomes God's work in the world. First, I will sketch an outline of some of the major positions on labor in modern Catholic theology. Then, I will draw on the writings of the British poet and painter David Jones to explore a sacramental view of human work, arguing that a sacramental view of work could support the Church's social criticism of laborer's circumstances.

This article investigates the possibility of communicating racialized suffering in meaningful and transformative ways among the triracial hierarchy now present in the U.S. The author argues that a theological tool, an analogia vulneris (analogy of the wound), may assist us to resist the gravity of the abyss of Whiteness into which we are drawn. The author suggests that the Catholic principle of analogical speech about God may be reoriented to enable individuals and groups to communicate and to create community through their wounds. The author engages with sociology and the history of racial formation in the U.S. to describe how Whiteness functions as an idolatrous space to be resisted. The author concludes that an analogia vulneris may enable “Whites” and “Honorary Whites”, in particular, to foster a historical-critical religious racialized consciousness and to create paschal communities of resistance to Whiteness that are glimpses of Christ’s wounded, resurrected Body.

En la actualidad la presencia de la teología católica en las universidades públicas españolas, - independientemente de la enseñanza de teología católica y pedagogía religiosa que se imparte en las facultades de educación dentro de los grados de maestros -, viene marcada por dos presencias muy significativa. Una de ella, viene a través de la creación de una cátedra de teología dentro del marco universitario (Cátedra de Teología en la Universidad de Granada; Cátedra de las Tres Religiones en la Universidad de Valencia; Cátedra de Teología y Ciencias de la Religión “Ignacio Ellacuría” en la Universidad Carlos III de Madrid), cuyo fin es buscar la ocasión de que la teología ofrezca su peculiar luz de conocimiento, partiendo del convencimiento de que los elementos más significativos de la tradición religiosa generan sentido y propuestas que pueden entrar en diálogo honesto con otras disciplinas. La otra presencia es más significativa y viene establecida por la Universidad de Murcia, pues en ella, se reconoce a la teología como una disciplina propia, con materia propia y como consecuencia otorgándose por la universidad a dicho reconocimiento académico una titulación oficial. Esto es como consecuencia de la relación establecida entre el Instituto Teológico de Murcia OFM y Universidad de Murcia. El presente trabajo tiene como objeto presentar la nueva presencia de la teología católica en el marco académico de la Universidad de Murcia como referencia del proyecto integrador de Bolonia. Nowadays the presence of Catholic theology in Spanish public universities, leaving aside Catholic theology and religious education courses taught in the Faculties of Education within the education degrees, is marked by two very significant presences. One of them directly relates to the creation of chairs of theology: the Chair of Theology at the University of Granada, the Chair of the Three Religions at the University of Valencia, and the Chair of Theology and Religious Studies “Ignacio Ellacuría” at the University Carlos III in Madrid. The main purpose of these chairs is to highlight the special way with which theology looks at the production of knowledge, on the assumption that the most significant elements of religious traditions make meaning and generate proposals that may come into an honest dialogue with other disciplines. The other presence is more significant and is implemented at the University of Murcia, which recognizes theology as a discipline itself, with its own contents. Consequently, this university issues official qualifications, a fact that is made possible because of the relationship established between the OFM Theological Institute of Murcia and the University of Murcia. This work intends to explore the new presence of Catholic theology within the academic framework of the University of Murcia in reference to the Bologna Process.

O presente texto busca apresentar as posições de diferentes correntes de pensamento quanto à tributação. Iniciando a confrontação entre as correntes ao longo da história, pela apresentação da corrente da teologia católica; seguido de como a lei natural responde à questão da moralidade nos impostos, assim como a visão escolástica sobre o problema, o pensamento dos liberais clássicos e da escola austríaca, e por fim, no intuito de colocar a questão na contemporaneidade, buscando responder se a cobrança de imposto é justa ou não.

Mainline Protestant theologians constructed new definitions of conscience in the 1960s and 1970s by appropriating Catholic sources. Protestant theologians, after previously seeing Catholics as suppressors of conscience, had come by the 1970s to acknowledge the Catholic Church's expertise on the theology of conscience. While the Second Vatican Council and the ecumenical movement provided a backdrop for the exchange of ideas on conscience, they were not the driving force behind the Protestant engagement with Catholic perspectives. Rather, theologians like C. Ellis Nelson (a Presbyterian who taught at New York's Union Theological Seminary) turned to Catholic sources after becoming intensely critical of Protestant teachings on the autonomy of conscience. Increasingly, Protestants dismissed their own conceptions of conscience as inadequate, prompting a search for new sources with which to develop a positive theology of conscience. Both groups found themselves studying psychology and psychoanalysis to apply their findings to conscience. Psychology proved a gateway to Catholic theology. Protestants found that the Catholic theology of conscience—particular its emphasis on formation—helped them to construct new understandings of conscience.

Since Pope Franziskus, there is an approach between Protestant and Catholic theology exactly in the gaze on sexual-ethical questions. However, this “new” proximity stands in continuity with the Catholic thinking, because it is not simply about the appeal on a purely subjective and quite private conscience in the positions of Pope Franziskus and of renewed moral-theological teachings. Also Protestant theology always has faced fidelity in love and partnership under God’s assistance - within all human fragility and limitedness. More clearly than it, however, the theology in Catholic tradition has described exactly this solidity of Christian experience in the modes of obligation and objective bonding. Freedom and personal responsibility must be evaluated in many areas of modern society in a new manner today. In the ecological ethics the self-linkage to standards is discussed, which orientate the own lifestyle on the natural balance for to safeguard human life in community with the nature, for example. In the formation of love and family, it needs the freely approved relationship at objective social and biographical contexts, which enable succeeding relationship basically.

Catholic teaching is emphatic on the need to “guarantee adequate [health] care to all,” as Pope Benedict XVI has stated. America has been slower than other advanced countries in progressing towards this goal. Reasons for this delay can be found in certain attitudes that have long been present in American culture, and have been reinforced by the wave of libertarianism (free-market ideology) that swept the world in the late twentieth century. Catholic theology and social/economic teaching can help us understand the flaws in these attitudes, which involve fundamental philosophical and theological principles, but which are far from academic, since they have serious and very practical consequences. In the light of Catholic teaching, we can look towards a sounder understanding of healthcare needs and effective ways of meeting them. Lay Summary: This article argues that access to healthcare, at least up to the level of basic necessity, falls under the heading of distributive justice. It is a human right owed by the community to each of its citizens. And since rights entail obligations, this right entails an obligation upon each citizen to contribute, as circumstances permit, to the costs, which need to be shared equitably; they cannot be met simply by each individual providing solely for oneself. Also discussed are the problems of excessive costs in healthcare administration and in pharmacological research, as well as harmful tendencies in private-sector firms to over-reward top management and to target maximum (rather than adequate) profits.

Christian churches have played crucial but diverse roles in public debates over homosexuality in Africa. In contrast to the vocal and explicit homophobia witnessed in many Pentecostal-Charismatic Churches (PCCs), homosexuality has until recently been an overwhelmingly silenced issue in the Acholi region of Northern Uganda, and an almost complete non-issue in the local Catholic Church. This article suggests that while this silence in part relates to the temporal proximity of the Northern Ugandan war, the absence of LGBTI (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex) activism in the region, and the hesitance of mainline churches to talk about sex, it is also embedded in what are considered to be customary Acholi understandings of sexuality. Offering an analysis of Acholi Catholic teaching on peace and the family, the article suggests that Catholicism has entrenched heteronormative patriarchy in Acholi society. However, as illustrated by the unpopularity of church weddings, the norms that govern sexuali...

The purpose of this article is to restate, with added emphasis, what has been accomplished in the past in order to better understand the positive elements in African traditional religions and to challenge traditional Christian theology. This work is a restatement of the continued need to deepen the avenues of dialogue with African traditional religious teachings and values, paving way for a more formal recognition of African theology from within traditional Christian circles in the West. This article raises a greater awareness of and draws attention to Christian theology, in order to explore more creative ways to engage in dialogue with African traditional religions. This work is undertaken with the hope of creating a greater awareness towards a more formal recognition, study and understanding of African theology in relation to Catholic theology. This article argues that an evolving African theology can mutually enrich Catholic theology and practice, using specific examples of similarities, while, at the ...

The first time I visited this topic was back in 2015, when I was invited to a debate at El Escorial with one of the leading Spanish feminists [...]

This article focuses on the intersections between theological knowledge and the use of the Internet to access study resources for students studying Catholic theology at tertiary institutions. In the 21st century, the use of the Internet to access electronic resources (ERs) is gaining momentum as a tool for obtaining needed information among theology students, to support many aspects of their learning activities. This is mainly because of the proliferation of online theological libraries, as well as the fact that theology students ought to resist the easy path of uncritical passivity and select reliable data from other resources, and welcome it without merely imposing their critical theological opinions and views. Recent literature indicates that the hierarchical nature of Catholic doctrine needs not to exclude openness to the more rhizomatic approaches to knowledge structures that students’ independent accessing of online ER represents. This intersection in learning theology requires a theoretical paradigm shift for adult theology students which can contribute greatly to the enlargement of the theology students’ academic horizon and enriches their minds for an open theological dialogue and discussion with different theological opinions and views.

Diverse religious worldviews and values construe foundational defenses of life, health, and wellbeing through the richness of their traditional texts, symbols, and rituals, offering a “thick description” of human meaning and purpose that empowers comprehensive ethical direction. The values and commitments that shape a Catholic energy ethic flow from the doctrine of creation, which views all relationships within a covenantal economy of creation and salvation. A Catholic theology of energy is theocentric, oriented to God’s plan of creation, salvation and the wellbeing of creation. A Catholic energy ethic is covenantal, acknowledging that humanity’s unique dignity confers mutual rights and responsibilities to all persons as brothers and sisters. A Catholic energy ethic is social, recognizing that the integral development of persons occurs in the integral ecology of family, community, society, and earth.

This article emulates the new stance of Professor Michael Hand on faith schools. He illustrates how theological criteria could be used to inform and guide curriculum aims in a way that avoids indoctrination and the perils of faith-based education. This approach is adopted vis-a-vis Catholic education in order to sketch out what a non-confessional theory of Catholic education might look like. It is argued that a central feature of Catholic theology, as presented by the leading theologian Karl Rahner, is a recognition of the centrality of mystery in human existence. This theological insight is applied to the curriculum and it is used to provide a theological justification for a non-confessional account of Catholic education.

Introduction A spirit of hope and renewal characterizes recent Catholic theology, reawakened and energized by the fiftieth anniversary of the Second Vatican Council and the new leadership of Pope Francis. After the council, national Catholic conferences convened to extend the renewal movement, though some of these movements attracted little attention beyond their country of origin. One of the forgotten treasures of the post-Vatican II Church is a document focused on hope and renewal, "Our Hope: A Confession of Faith for This Time" ("Unsere Hoffnung: Ein Bekenntnis zum Glauben in dieser Zeit"). Promulgated in November, 1975, by the Joint Synod of the Dioceses in the Federal Republic of Germany and drafted by fundamental theologian Johann Baptist Metz, "Our Hope" is the first official document from the Catholic Church in Germany to address the history of Nazi Germany and the Shoah. (1) In the post -Shoah context of the document, "Our Hope" asks whether the heart of the Church's teaching--the focus on Christ's suffering and the cross--has also taught indifference to the suffering of others, especially the Jewish people. (2) But, as the Vatican started slowing down or resisting the reform movements soon after the close of the council, "Our Hope" and Metz were seen as moving the Church and theology in the wrong direction. Under the leadership of Pope Francis, such resistance seems to be lifting, and renewal is beginning again. Working in a spirit of hope in God, the synod engaged serious self-examination, critique, repentance, and change. These first steps by the West German Church produced some genuine theological recentering in light of the Shoah. In this new time of renewal, and in view of the fortieth anniversary of "Our Hope," I argue that these theological revisions should not be resisted or neglected as harmful to the Church; rather, they should be reintroduced to the living witness of the Church and experienced now--as they were then--as bearers of new hope and new meaning in the life of the Church. Vatican II met barely two decades after the end of World War II. The world was still reeling from the suffering and death of the war, just beginning to confront the extent of the atrocities committed against the Jewish people in the Shoah, and just starting to worry about the conflict growing in Vietnam. Confronting this context, in Gaudium et Spes (the "Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World") the Church identified itself as a community so deeply connected to humankind and to human history that participating in the modern world embodies--not endangers--the meaning of Christian life. The Church's solidarity with the world calls it to take up "The joys and hopes, the grief and anguish of the people of our time, especially those who are poor or afflicted" (no.1), in order "to save and not to judge, to serve and not to be served" (no. 3). (3) For the Catholic Church in West Germany, responding to the call of Gaudium et Spes meant confronting the "joys and hopes, the grief and anguish" of the modern world from within the country where National Socialism took root and where the war and its atrocities began. "Our Hope" is still remembered by the Catholic Church in Germany. When the German bishops spoke out again about the Shoah on the fiftieth anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz concentration camps in "Opportunity to Re-examine Relationships with the Jews" (1995), they quoted extensively from the central witness and self-critique of the Church in "Our Hope" (4)--but the work of the Church to remember and to reflect theologically on the Shoah still has a long way to go. The passing years should be used to increase prayerful reflection on this history, not to forget it. Metz and the synod argued that we become more human by remembering (and more inhuman by forgetting) the suffering and death of others. (5) "Our Hope" certainly had a central and enduring effect on the development of Metz's theology. …

Between 1983 and 2010, the canon law of the Roman Catholic Church permitted Latin Rite Catholics to defect “by a formal act.” This canonical innovation differed sharply from the church’s longstanding approach to the question of membership, and it was ultimately repealed by a motu proprio of Pope Benedict XVI, who cited both pastoral and legal reasons for eliminating the formal act of defection. Prior to the pope’s action, however, thousands of Catholics in multiple countries used the formal act of defection as a means to solemnize their departure from the church. This essay reviews the history of the formal act of defection and presents the results of the first published survey of U.S. Latin Rite diocesan administrators concerning defection. A majority of dioceses in the survey received requests from members wishing to defect; some continue to grant these requests today, notwithstanding Pope Benedict’s decree to the contrary. The phenomenon of defection exposes tensions within Catholic theology and practice concerning membership, tensions that are also felt between official teachings and the ordinary theology of many Catholics inasmuch as church categories concerning membership do not map effectively onto quotidian Catholic experience. These results contribute to a fuller understanding of deconversion from Catholicism.

While an individual Quebecquois thinker, such as James Taylor, has become a ‘household name’ in religious studies (and the philosophy of religion), the broader narrative of religion in Quebec and i...

MultipleEl articulo analiza algunos estudios sobre la sociedad occidental. La describen como «secular»/«postsecular» y la caracterizan por la «incertidumbre». Situados en este horizonte, y desde una perspectiva de teologia catolica, se argumentara la necesidad de fomentar «espacios de accion» que posibiliten una personalizacion de la experiencia religiosa y favorezcan asi la promocion humana y social. Se ofreceran claves antropologicas y epistemologicas para mostrar que, entre estos «espacios de accion», se encuentra el testimonio cristiano personal y comunitario. La conclusion tendra caracter propositivo, senalando algunas categorias idoneas para la traduccion de dichas claves a la vida social EnglishThe article analyzes some studies on western society. They describe it as "secular" / "postsecular" and characterize it by "uncertainty." Located on this horizon, and from a perspective of Catholic theology, the need to promote "action spaces" that allow a personalization of religious experience and thus promote human and social promotion will be argued. Anthropological and epistemological keys will be offered to show that, among these "spaces of action", there is personal and community Christian witness. The conclusion will be propositive, pointing out some suitable categories for the translation of these keys to social life

This is a pope I want to agree with. He behaves and writes empathetically and behaves with what seems like huge care and humility, which goes a long way. Within the confines of Catholic theology, he comes across as a reformer, perhaps even a radical, disavowing the pomp of the Vatican and, from the outside at least, trying to build bridges with those who may have felt alienated from the church in preceding years.

While the Catholic theology of gender places great emphasis on the gendered body, it tends to be overly abstract and simplistic. A more realistic theology of gender must be centered on actual women in the midst of their lives. This essay reflects on what a Catholic theology of gender can learn from Hindu women’s everyday rituals—which transform women’s bodies and channel power ritually through women to their families and society—in conversation with mujerista theology (Latina and Hispanic women’s theology). Ultimately, Tiemeier aims to reconstruct a broader ritual theology that decenters the male hierarchy, recenters the sacred on the gendered body engaged in the world, and expands the Catholic sacramental imagination into the ritual of everyday life.

Several European countries were unable to match student numbers with labour market demand during the nineteenth century. The causes of this mismatch may be found in the organisation of higher education and the funding of students. Drawing on a variety of sources, this paper compares financial support available to Reformed and Catholic theology students in The Netherlands, to examine how differences in student funding affected enrolment and labour-market patterns. While low tuition fees increased access to the public universities, generous student financing provided by numerous parties caused a structural oversupply of Protestant theology students. The private Catholic colleges instead selected students and applied grants specifically to encourage graduation, consequently balancing students more closely with labour-market demand. This relative success of regional colleges over national universities mirrors the primary education history literature on the benefits of local coordination and resource allocation.

An account of the major influences on Professor Leonard Swidler as an ecumenist and protagonist of interreligious dialogue and his long-term membership in TUDOR, the Temple University Department of Religion (1966-), is very much in order. When the chair of TUDOR offered me a position as a full professor there, a title I had been awarded at the Catholic University of America some three years before, I knew that if I accepted the offer 1 would know only two of my new academic colleagues. One was Swidler, a layperson with a university degree in theology from the Catholic state faculty of the University of Tubingen. I knew from the grapevine and a few of his publications that there was such a man and that he had come the year before from the faculty of Pittsburgh's Duquesne University. He and I had never met, but I knew of his publishing record even in his thirties on matters touching on the life of the Catholic Church, membership in which we had in common. He turned out to be my close friend at Temple University from day one. Identifying him as my sole academic co-religionist upon my arrival in Philadelphia is not quite accurate. I was hired by a department committed to teaching about the world's major religions--but dispassionately with respect to the religion to which each department member was committed. I began my teaching duties in a company of five that included T. Patrick Burke, an Australian Catholic who held a doctorate in Catholic theology from the state faculty of Munich (the other person I had known previously); Samuel Laeuchli, a Swiss who had studied under Karl Barth but who, upon coming to the United States, had earned a degree from Union Theological Seminary in New York City; Robert Gordis, a congregational rabbi who had edited Conservative Judaism's revision of its prayer book; Maurice Friedman, who had served on the faculty of Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, Westchester County, NY, who was a specialist in the writings of Martin Buber; and Swidler. A year or so later, there were two additions to the burgeoning faculty--Jacob Agus, a European-born congregational rabbi in a Baltimore suburb, who represented liberal Judaism; and Isma'il al-Faruqi, a native of Jaffa in Palestine who, upon immigration to the U.S., had enrolled in the Harvard Divinity School to learn what he could of Christian faith and practice, but who shortly transferred to the department of philosophy at Indiana University, where he earned a Ph.D. Most influential of all on the department's aims and purposes was the man who assembled the others: Bernard Phillips, a Jew of Minneapolis whose doctorate in philosophy was from Yale University. As a result of his wide reading habits he had become acquainted with the basics of Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism and was teaching courses at the University of Delaware calculated to reduce the ignorance of undergraduates there of the religions practiced by many millions outside North and South America. When Temple University--founded by Philadelphia Baptist minister Russell Conwell and named for his church, the Baptist Temple--became an institution of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania in the early 1960's, its president and later chancellor, Millard Gladfelter, knew he had to close down Temple's small mission seminary for reasons of church-state conflict. (The Conwell School of Theology moved to South Hamilton, MA, to merge with Gordon Divinity School, forming in 1970 the Gordon-Con well Theological Seminary.) Being a committed Lutheran, Gladfelter was unwilling to see religion study leave the campus, so he inaugurated a religion department of the kind described above, leaving Phillips to retain any seminary faculty member of his choice for the TUDOR staff. One other development that had an influence on Swidler's teaching was the symposium arranged by Burke while on the faculty of St. Xavier College in Chicago (Religious Sisters of Mercy) to bring a number of European theologians who had been periti, skilled advisors to bishops at the recently adjourned Second Vatican Council. …

The aim of this paper is to demonstrate that Czech Catholic theology was developing promisingly specifically in the first half of 19th century, when the periodical Journal for Catholic Clergy (Casopis pro katolicke duchovenstvo) began to be published. Only publications dealing with fundamental-theological topics, which is the field of interest of its author, are focused on in the paper. The content of the publications is briefly evaluated and compared with the contemporary status of theological knowledge.

Growth in Christianity has spurred the appearance of the subfield of world Christianity, whose assumptions increasingly shape scholarship on Christianity. What I term the world-Christian turn, which is often linked to mission studies, yields more comprehensive approaches to the Christian past, connecting local histories of Christian communities to larger-scale historical movements and producing innovative comparative perspectives on Christianity past and present. In Catholic theology, this turn has encouraged new comparative and contextual theologies. Yet support for Christian mission and the world-Christian turn need not go together. Two cases in point: comparative theology tends to eschew mission while the work of Joseph Ratzinger, Pope Benedict XVI, is suspicious of some impulses behind the world-Christian turn and their potential for undermining Christian mission. Such cases notwithstanding, I argue that missiology is a promising resource for the field of world Christianity.

This article maintains that knowledge of the literature on multicultural education and social justice pedagogy is indispensable for white college professors who desire to teach effectively about racial justice concerns. In exploring this literature, I have noticed that many publications either articulate theory or reflect on concrete classroom strategies, while relatively few deploy theory to evaluate specific attempts at teaching for justice. This seems to me a gap worth filling. Speaking as a white, conventionally trained, Catholic theologian, I begin by explaining why I deem it appropriate to employ antiracist pedagogy. I then demonstrate that the literature on multicultural education and social justice pedagogy is essential to this effort by utilizing both types of literature, theoretical and practical, to analyze my own strategies and goals to date. Throughout, I discuss white antiracist theological pedagogy not as an accomplished fact, but as an emerging endeavor. See a companion essay in this issue of the journal (Anna Floerke Scheid and Elisabeth T. Vasko, “Teaching Race: Pedagogical Challenges in Predominantly White Undergraduate Theology Classrooms”), and responses by the authors of both essays, also published in this issue of the journal (“Responses: Toward an Antiracist Pedagogy”).

The author asks whether the criteria for Catholic theology presented by the International Theological Commission's Theology Today (2011) are meant to constitute “walls” that seal out or “windows” that open to the rich reality of God's dialogue with humanity through creation and history. Careful exegesis leads the author to conclude that the document, while including restrictive paragraphs, intends to open up perspectives for a legitimate plurality of theologies within the living tradition of the Catholic Church. The article ends with a nuanced evaluation and highlighting of the document's strong and weak points.

Catholic educationalists frequently have to wrestle institutionally and personally with the dilemmas posed by competing theological positions expressed by the magisterium and professional theologians. Many are left bewildered about what to teach and communicate on important matters. This article deals with the characteristic emphases expressed by these two constituencies concerning the means and meaning of ‘liberation’, with specific reference to liberation theology. I suggest that the problems which this issue has promoted are only partly assuaged by the recent publication of the International Theological Commission, Theology Today: Perspectives, Principles and Criteria. While the document sets out some helpful criteria about the nature of contemporary Catholic theology, ambiguities and complexities remain. Nevertheless, what Catholic educationalists are left with after their involvement with this debate, is a healthy recognition of key hermeneutical issues that continue to reside at the heart of Catholi...

This article presents a reassessment of the Hindu-Christian dialogue in its relationship with modernity. The focus is on a group of Western Catholic clergymen who relocated to India, specifically during 1940-70, and became involved in the Hindu-Christian dialogue. The article traces the reasons for these Catholics’ relocations to their dissatisfaction with modernity and the predominance of rationality in the West, as well as their aversion to modern scientific thought. It emphasises the dual character of the interfaith dialogue, and the struggles of this group of clergymen to overcome modernity, whereby a modern Weltanschauung was the obstacle along the path to reshaping Catholic theology and establishing a fruitful interfaith dialogue with Hinduism. Although they did not pursue a common agenda and had different goals, these pioneers of interfaith dialogue came to consider such a dialogue with Hinduism as regenerative, as a means of revitalising Western thought, of balancing the modern excesses of a Western civilisation increasingly dominated by technology, and of transcending the rationalised culture of the modern West to achieve higher consciousness.

The language of “People of God,” which exemplifies the radical shift in ecclesiology found in the documents of the Second Vatican Council, not only has gained a predominance of use in contemporary Roman Catholic theology, it provides a vocabulary with which to explore the identity of the Roman Catholic laity, particularly as they relate to the scripturally-grounded titles of “King,” “Priest,” and “Prophet.” This article considers the implications of this identity in contrast to the Institutional ecclesiology with which it competes in the conciliar documents as well as in many official statements since Vatican II. Viewing these titles from their roots in Hebrew and Christian Scripture opens new avenues of empowerment for the laity and for transforming the whole Church.

This paper investigates the interconnection between moral theology and legal thought in the work of Adrian of Utrecht (1459-1523). It is shown that early modern Catholic theology as it was practised at the University of Louvain cannot be properly understood without reference to the scholarly disputes in the law faculties. The legal character of practical theology draws on a long tradition that reaches back at least to the late medieval manuals for confessors. The legal nature of Adrian of Utrecht's moral theology, in particular, will be illustrated through an analysis of the sixth among his Quastiones quodlibeticae (1515). In the context of a discussion on the question of whether statutory provisions are binding in conscience, Adrian develops compelling ideas about the use of equity as a tool for the interpretation of laws. He then applies this general theory to the interpretation of the precept of fraternal correction. © 2013 Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden. ispartof: Tijdschrift voor Rechtsgeschiedenis-Revue d Histoire du Droit-The Legal History Review vol:81 issue:3 pages:573-593 status: published

The article examines the history and doctrinal comprehension of the phenomenon of water baptism in the Catholic tradition. It shows the origins of the traditional understanding the baptism as a sacrament, where the grace is transmitted; it demonstrates the history of the formation the “ex opere operato” formula. Author underlines the contradictory position, role and place of faith for a person, who accepts grace. The text highlights the main discussions on the understanding of this sacrament. The author emphasizes the importance of new trends in the works of contemporary Catholic theologians, who transfer the emphasis in the understanding of baptism from its instrumental to the existential action. Such shift beyond instrumental understanding allows moving attention from the legal aspects of the legality and validity of the sacrament to the periphery and removing many practical questions arising from the primitive perception the baptism as a magical act. The article also analyzes the internal contradiction of baptism as a sacrament of faith in the situation of infant baptism, who are baptized “by the faith of others” (the godparents or the Church as a whole)

The author argues that social activist Catholic priests such as John J. Egan and Geno Baroni created a Catholic War on Poverty through Catholic civil rights organizations that included the National Catholic Conference of Interracial Justice and the development of community antipoverty organizations. Informed by the theology and social teachings of the Second Vatican Council, Egan, Baroni, and others saw the national War on Poverty as an extension of the civil rights movement. Their efforts led to the eventual formation of the Campaign for Human Development, the Catholic Church's official antipoverty organization that continues to fight poverty in the twenty-first century.Keywords: Baroni, Geno; Black Manifesto; Campaign for Human Development; Egan, Msgr. John J.; War on PovertyHistorical scholarship of the War on Poverty has flowered in recent years after decades of historians' collective neglect. Studies by several scholars have challenged the way that historians have thought and written about the War on Poverty, particularly in terms of race and gender. In addition, some of that scholarship has sought to expand scholars' thinking about the time frame of the War on Poverty. Most scholars who have written about the War on Poverty discuss its beginnings in the early 1960s and its end in the mid to late 1970s. Some scholars, however, have argued that the War on Poverty has endured to the present day. Borrowing from the term the long civil rights movement coined by Jacquelyn Dowd Hall, a few of these scholars have used the term the long war on poverty to describe antipoverty efforts that continued beyond the 1970s.1One aspect of the War on Poverty that has been little explored to this point, despite this flowering of historical scholarship, is the central role of religion. Scholars such as James Findlay and David Chappell have deftly explored the fundamental role of religion in the civil rights movement.2 In addition, scholars like John McGreevy have examined the complex relationship between Catholicism and the black freedom movement.3 However, the equally vital role of religion in the War on Poverty has remained unexamined for the most part. Some exceptions to this scholarly void include Kenneth Heineman's 2003 article in The Historian on Catholic social activism and the War on Poverty in Pittsburgh, and Susan Ashmore's 2003 essay on Catholic antipoverty efforts in Mobile, Alabama.4 The author's intention is to build on the work of Heineman and Ashmore by exploring the development of a national Catholic War on Poverty, from its beginnings in the National Catholic Conference for Interracial Justice (NCCIJ) through its maturation in the Catholic Campaign for Human Development (CHD). The essay will explore the Catholic War on Poverty in part through the careers of two priests: Geno Baroni and John J. Egan. Baroni and Egan were the two most significant of a group of activist clerics dubbed by one scholar as "community organization priests."5 In the process of exploring the activism of Baroni and Egan, issues can be addressed such as the connections between the civil rights/black power movements and the War on Poverty; the influence of an evolving Catholic theology on Baroni, Egan, and the organizations they created; the ways in which Catholic social activism and the War on Poverty intertwined; and the implications of a Catholic War on Poverty for the relationship between church and state in American society.America's War on Poverty began officially when President Lyndon Johnson signed the Economic Opportunity Act on August 20, 1964. The act created the Office of Economic Opportunity (OEO), which provided federal funds to community action agencies that fought poverty at the local level. Community action was the key strategy of the legislation-communities were to include "maximum feasible participation of the poor" in their local antipoverty wars. The ideas of inclusion and empowerment of the poor were the most controversial aspects of the War on Poverty and key elements for the involvement of Catholic social activists in antipoverty efforts. …

John D. Early, Maya and Catholic Cultures in Crisis. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2012. 512 pp.The second half of the 20th century saw monumental changes in both the political landscape of Latin America and the global institution of the Catholic Church. Maya and Catholic Cultures in Crisis is an ambitious book that seeks to document how the encounter between local Maya communities and the pastoral agents of the Catholic Church contributed to these changes and the implications that this encounter had for the practice of Catholicism in Chiapas, Mexico and Guatemala. As an anthropologist with long-standing interest and experience in Mesoamerica and a former Catholic priest, John Early is well situated to examine the ideological, social, and religious shifts that have taken place in the region since the 1940s.Early's previous book, The Maya and Catholicism: An Encounter of Worldviews (2006), examined Mayas' encounter with Catholicism from the colonial period through the early Republican period. In that book, Early argued that a Spanish ideology of social purity tempered direct colonial control of indigenous communities, giving the latter a modicum of social autonomy through which they developed a uniquely Maya vision of Christianity that retained key elements of their pre-Colombian worldview, the chief of which was the idea of sustaining a covenant of mutual reciprocity between the realms of humanity and of the divine. Maya religiosity further flourished during the 19th century when Republican policies severely curtailed the Catholic clergy's activities in Mexico and Guatemala.If they had largely been leftto their own devices until then, by the middle of the 20th century changing economic and political conditions forced rural Mayas into newly volatile national landscapes. The cumulative effect of population growth, state policies promoting modernization, and an economy that increasingly emphasized export commodities was that Maya communities began to experience a severe economic crisis precipitated by the loss of control over land. As this crisis came to a head in the 1940s and 1950s, Catholic clergy were once again permitted to take an active missionary role in Maya communities, and in doing so, came to face numerous social and theological challenges. Maya and Catholic Cultures in Crisis focuses on how non-Maya Catholic clergy and Maya laity responded to the political, social, and spiritual crises that followed this renewed contact.The book is divided into nine sections (30 chapters) that document various aspects of this encounter. Parts I and IX offer a general introduction and conclusion to the research, respectively. Part II lays out key aspects of the Maya worldview, argues for why its core elements were retained despite colonial domination, and contextualizes the crises Maya communities faced due to the land crisis. Central to Early's argument is the notion that by mid-century, material conditions were such that people's faith in the sustaining "Maya covenant" (20) had been shaken, leading to a "crisis of culture" (82) which prompted some to seek out alternative understandings of the world and their place in it. This coincided with the Catholic Church's renewed evangelizing efforts, which are the subject of Part III. The Church initially sought to (re-)introduce orthodox Tridentine Catholicism, but its missionaries soon found that this approach was untenable due to the material problems that their target communities faced. Thus, they began to couple their missionary efforts with development projects in what came to be called Catholic Action. These programs also instituted the framework for increased involvement from a Church-sanctioned lay leadership (catechists) that could counter the influence of traditional Maya priests.The experiences of Catholic Action's pastoral agents fed into larger shifts within Catholic theology. Part IV traces how these theological changes were discussed and instituted globally (the Second Vatican Council), regionally (the Second Latin American Bishop's Conference in Medellin), and locally (diocese and parishes). …

The teachings of the Roman Catholic Church on marriage and the family have been developed with very little consultation with women for whom these teachings have great importance. This article focuses on these teachings from the close of the Second Vatican II in 1965 to 2015 and the Synod session on marriage and the family. It briefly discusses the Church’s understanding of marriage from the Patristic era to the Council of Trent and then analyses the development of the theology of marriage in Vatican II, Humanae Vitae , the 1968 encyclical on contraception, Pope John Paul II’s theology of marriage and the Synod sessions called by Pope Francis in 2014 and 2015, including his Apostolic Exhortation Amoris Laetitia issued in 2016. Where are the voices of women, especially African women, in shaping Catholic theology of marriage?

Historians and theologians are just now concluding observance of the fiftieth anniversary of the Second Vatican Council. As that event begins to cross over the invisible line that separates the present from the past, it is entirely appropriate that scholars take stock of its meaning. Few would deny its significance for the Catholic Church itself, an importance that derives in part from the fact that it was a rare and unusual occurrence. When it convened in the fall of 1962, the last general council of the church had been held almost one hundred years before, and the last general council before that had been three hundred years earlier. When an event happens only a couple of times over the course of four hundred years, something big is likely to come of it. Within the Catholic Church, Vatican II obviously had tremendous impact, initiating major changes in religious practice and also in some important understandings of theology. In practice, the changes were evident for all Catholics to see, every time they went to Mass on Sunday. The altar had been pulled away from the back wall of the church, and the priest stood behind it, facing the congregation and speaking in their own language, rather than the Latin of centuries. The people were expected to respond aloud to his invitations to prayer and, alarmingly to some, they were even expected to sing, though many stoutly resisted all encouragement that they do so. In theology, the Council brought the reformulation of some traditional concepts and understandings. Others are more qualified to speak of this than I am (I am a historian, not a theologian), but the council’s adoption of the “People of God” as the governing metaphor for the church had tremendous significance. Here was a fundamentally democratic rather than hierarchical definition, a new way in which the church talked about itself. Words and images really do matter. The premier American historian of the Council, John O’Malley, S.J., has written that the real “revolution” of Vatican II was as much rhetorical as anything else. The pastoral language of the Council’s documents and their “soft” style conveyed deep meaning. The use of “horizontalwords,” of “humility-words,” of “interiority-words”—here was the key to grasping the real meaning of the gathering for Catholics. 1