LA «DEMITOLOGIZACIÓN» DE LA IMAGEN DE DIOS EN LA ENCÍCLICA DEUS CARITAS EST DE BENEDICTO XVI.

In the nihilistic thought of the present day, or to be more exact, in postmodernism, the avoidance of the epistemological problem of God is drastically noticeable. Knowledge of God, though difficult, is always possible. But in atheism we find the thesis that it is impossible to achieve knowledge of God, simply because He does not exist. In agnosticism and contemporary relativism, the hypothesis is that nothing can be known or ever will be known of God. For the ideologies that are a product of atheism, the main work of the human being is to create a new civilization founded on political autonomy in opposition to God. The human being, on the other hand, cannot forget God without forgetting his own identity as well. In daily life he lives in tension, with an internal battle. People seek substitutes for the realities to which they are linked, but they turn out only to be pale reflections of the Absolute from which they had tried to free themselves. The proof is the development of the so-called new religions, sects, the new age movement and also other esoteric models that try to substitute Christ. In the quest for modern man, with the existentialist assertion that God is love, the Pope wants to give an answer to the doubts that have arisen in our epoch due to ideologies and diverse philosophical systems. He seems to say openly, if God is love this means that He has not died. What has worn out is the anthropomorphic thoughts and the caricatures that we have made of Him. That God is love is not one of so many images but the very foundation and the absolute criterion of all the images that come close to the living God. The present Pope, who comes from a culture in which a demythologisation of the Bible was often postulated, demythologises the face of God that our history had deformed in a profoundly serene way. Adopting a humanist language, he aims to remind us that Christ is the revealed love of God made man for love of mankind. He is a God that is love in His human aspect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]