Pub Date : 2022-12-21DOI: 10.1163/15697320-20220062
B. Wood
This article considers the significance of the public Christianity of the British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan (1894–1986). By excavating the socially conscious faith of the Edwardian upper classes, it locates Macmillan as the advocate of a unique synthesis of Disraelian Toryism and Christian Socialism. The discussion opens with an exploration of the origins of Macmillan’s politics. Drawing on the medievalism of William Morris, the Anglo-Catholicism of Ronald Knox, and Augustinian pessimism, Macmillan arrives at a sin-sensitive politics which seeks to tame capital and the state. The argument then considers how Macmillan’s rich articulation of Toryism has the capacity to challenge contemporary British Conservatives to recover and deepen their traditions of community-spirit and social justice. In an effort to contest a narrow description of British Toryism as a purely economic theory, I argue for a generous reassessment of a profoundly religious Toryism
{"title":"The Making of Christian Toryism: The Public Faith of Harold Macmillan","authors":"B. Wood","doi":"10.1163/15697320-20220062","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15697320-20220062","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000This article considers the significance of the public Christianity of the British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan (1894–1986). By excavating the socially conscious faith of the Edwardian upper classes, it locates Macmillan as the advocate of a unique synthesis of Disraelian Toryism and Christian Socialism. The discussion opens with an exploration of the origins of Macmillan’s politics. Drawing on the medievalism of William Morris, the Anglo-Catholicism of Ronald Knox, and Augustinian pessimism, Macmillan arrives at a sin-sensitive politics which seeks to tame capital and the state. The argument then considers how Macmillan’s rich articulation of Toryism has the capacity to challenge contemporary British Conservatives to recover and deepen their traditions of community-spirit and social justice. In an effort to contest a narrow description of British Toryism as a purely economic theory, I argue for a generous reassessment of a profoundly religious Toryism","PeriodicalId":43324,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Public Theology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2022-12-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"86558140","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-12-21DOI: 10.1163/15697320-20220067
C. Pearson
{"title":"Indian Christianity and Its Public Role: Socio-Theological Explorations, edited by Patrick Gnana","authors":"C. Pearson","doi":"10.1163/15697320-20220067","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15697320-20220067","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":43324,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Public Theology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2022-12-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"74157537","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-10-18DOI: 10.1163/15697320-20220048
J. Sexton
{"title":"On the Relevant Conversation of Theology’s Relevance in the University and Society Today","authors":"J. Sexton","doi":"10.1163/15697320-20220048","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15697320-20220048","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":43324,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Public Theology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2022-10-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"80342320","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-10-18DOI: 10.1163/15697320-20220054
Simeon Theojaya
The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed global dependency on essential workers and the susceptibility of social dynamics. Essentiality is a haunting primordial issue because it is still defined by socio-economic functions rather than people’s worth as human beings. For Marx, Feuerbach’s concept of homo deus is an inversion of Christian anthropology which ends as a mere ‘theological nicety’. In response to Marx, I hold that religion is an efficient ideology that transcends abstraction. The current crisis shows that religion’s problem lies elsewhere: it can be counterproductive to social causes and hardly fit inside the limits of reason. Elaborating Lévinas’s concern over theodicy, I appeal to anthropodicy as an impetus for religious ideology to embrace vulnerability and nurture solidarity. After Lévinas, I reinterpret essentiality as a responsibility that surpasses our rationality. With the alignment of essentiality and responsibility, anthropodicy can support religious ideology to welcome the vulnerable others and encourage social responsibility.
{"title":"Essentiality and Responsibility in Times of Crises Anthropodicy beyond the Limits of Reason Alone","authors":"Simeon Theojaya","doi":"10.1163/15697320-20220054","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15697320-20220054","url":null,"abstract":"\u0000 The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed global dependency on essential workers and the susceptibility of social dynamics. Essentiality is a haunting primordial issue because it is still defined by socio-economic functions rather than people’s worth as human beings. For Marx, Feuerbach’s concept of homo deus is an inversion of Christian anthropology which ends as a mere ‘theological nicety’. In response to Marx, I hold that religion is an efficient ideology that transcends abstraction. The current crisis shows that religion’s problem lies elsewhere: it can be counterproductive to social causes and hardly fit inside the limits of reason. Elaborating Lévinas’s concern over theodicy, I appeal to anthropodicy as an impetus for religious ideology to embrace vulnerability and nurture solidarity. After Lévinas, I reinterpret essentiality as a responsibility that surpasses our rationality. With the alignment of essentiality and responsibility, anthropodicy can support religious ideology to welcome the vulnerable others and encourage social responsibility.","PeriodicalId":43324,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Public Theology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2022-10-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"80819807","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-10-18DOI: 10.1163/15697320-20220052
Stephen R. Holmes
I would like to thank my colleague Judith for her profound and expansive lecture, that I have benefitted greatly from engaging with. She starts from a definition of theology, to give an account of the place of theology within the university, emphasizing both the role of theology in establishing the possibility of academic engagement with the world through its metaphysical claims, and the unitive function of theology, using the example of interdisciplinary engagement with psychology. She moves on to narrate the difference that makes to the central functions of the university, discovery and dwelling, and finally, using eschatology as an example, to explore how this is all relevant to wider society. Judith’s references to philosophy doing at least some of the same work as theology indicate an awareness that some – within the modern Western university, perhaps most – hearers will instinctively engage her claims as if they were made in the subjunctive mood. If – but only if – the core claims of theology happen to be true, then it does bring the benefits and implications she identifies. If instead the Christian doctrine of creation is not true, for example, then the claimed metaphysical grounding of the possibility of academic engagement becomes at best of no worth, and perhaps even genuinely harmful to the mission of the university, in providing misleading hope. There is perhaps a stronger argument that is implied, but undeveloped, in Judith’s lecture – that the possibility of the university as commonly conceived depends on conditions that theology alone can guarantee. Even if developed, this would still unfortunately fail: the historical entanglement of the Western university with Christendom means that all such an argument would prove, if it were prosecuted, is that our loss of shared faith should lead to the abandonment, or at least transformation, of our idea of a university – a conclusion that many recent jeremiads lamenting the state of the contemporary university might be seen to support.
{"title":"Of Subjunctives and Apologetics: A Response to Judith Wolfe","authors":"Stephen R. Holmes","doi":"10.1163/15697320-20220052","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15697320-20220052","url":null,"abstract":"I would like to thank my colleague Judith for her profound and expansive lecture, that I have benefitted greatly from engaging with. She starts from a definition of theology, to give an account of the place of theology within the university, emphasizing both the role of theology in establishing the possibility of academic engagement with the world through its metaphysical claims, and the unitive function of theology, using the example of interdisciplinary engagement with psychology. She moves on to narrate the difference that makes to the central functions of the university, discovery and dwelling, and finally, using eschatology as an example, to explore how this is all relevant to wider society. Judith’s references to philosophy doing at least some of the same work as theology indicate an awareness that some – within the modern Western university, perhaps most – hearers will instinctively engage her claims as if they were made in the subjunctive mood. If – but only if – the core claims of theology happen to be true, then it does bring the benefits and implications she identifies. If instead the Christian doctrine of creation is not true, for example, then the claimed metaphysical grounding of the possibility of academic engagement becomes at best of no worth, and perhaps even genuinely harmful to the mission of the university, in providing misleading hope. There is perhaps a stronger argument that is implied, but undeveloped, in Judith’s lecture – that the possibility of the university as commonly conceived depends on conditions that theology alone can guarantee. Even if developed, this would still unfortunately fail: the historical entanglement of the Western university with Christendom means that all such an argument would prove, if it were prosecuted, is that our loss of shared faith should lead to the abandonment, or at least transformation, of our idea of a university – a conclusion that many recent jeremiads lamenting the state of the contemporary university might be seen to support.","PeriodicalId":43324,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Public Theology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2022-10-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"85719152","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-10-18DOI: 10.1163/15697320-20220053
Joshua T. Searle
The overall aim of this article is to make a theological case for Ukraine’s integration into the European family of nations. I build this case by pursuing two primary lines of argument: firstly, by demonstrating the implausibility of the common assumptions (held by many Ukrainian Christians) that Russia is more ‘spiritual’ and ‘Christian’ than ‘secular’ and ‘godless’ Europe. Secondly, I seek to make a positive case for why principles, such as human dignity and human rights, cultural diversity, democracy, justice, fairness, equality and the rule of law, are much more appropriate indicators of Christian values than nominal allegiance to religious institutions among a certain population. This article is divided into three parts. Part One identifies and critiques the salient features of the “Holy Russia” myth with illustrations drawn from various representative figures. Part Two is devoted to the defence of the European tradition in which I advance the counterintuitive argument that secular liberalism is more in continuity with orthodox Christianity than Christian nationalism. In Part Three, I apply these general points to the specific issue of Ukraine and its fate as a European nation.
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Pub Date : 2022-10-18DOI: 10.1163/15697320-20220047
C. Pearson
{"title":"Editorial: ‘Real Places’","authors":"C. Pearson","doi":"10.1163/15697320-20220047","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15697320-20220047","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":43324,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Public Theology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2022-10-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"83383657","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-10-18DOI: 10.1163/15697320-20220057
M. Kenney
{"title":"When Did We See You Naked? Jesus as a Victim of Sexual Abuse, edited by Jayme R. Reaves, David Tombs, and Rocio Figueroa","authors":"M. Kenney","doi":"10.1163/15697320-20220057","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15697320-20220057","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":43324,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Public Theology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2022-10-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"73129683","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-10-18DOI: 10.1163/15697320-20220051
Oliver D. Crisp
Professor Wolfe has provided an eloquent and appealing account of the relevance of the study of Christian theology in the modern university, characterizing it in good Thomist fashion as the study of God and all things in relation to God – a very expansive vision of the theological task indeed. She then goes on to explain how Christian theology still has a place in the modern university, and, to my mind, there is little to disagree with in the vision she casts. Nevertheless, it is a particular vision of the theological task, and one that will not be acceptable to all those who practice theology today, let alone those critics of the place of theology in the modern university. In my response to Professor Wolfe’s lecture, I want to draw attention to two issues. First, I want to say something about what we might call the shared task of Christian theology – that is, the core concerns, if there are any such, that most theologians think of as part-and-parcel of theology rightly pursued. Second, I want to say something about why this shared task may still be a suitable pursuit for those at work in the modern university. I think of these remarks as, in many respects, friendly additions to Professor Wolfe’s presentation, rather than as criticisms of it.
{"title":"Theology and the University: A Reply to Professor Wolfe","authors":"Oliver D. Crisp","doi":"10.1163/15697320-20220051","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15697320-20220051","url":null,"abstract":"Professor Wolfe has provided an eloquent and appealing account of the relevance of the study of Christian theology in the modern university, characterizing it in good Thomist fashion as the study of God and all things in relation to God – a very expansive vision of the theological task indeed. She then goes on to explain how Christian theology still has a place in the modern university, and, to my mind, there is little to disagree with in the vision she casts. Nevertheless, it is a particular vision of the theological task, and one that will not be acceptable to all those who practice theology today, let alone those critics of the place of theology in the modern university. In my response to Professor Wolfe’s lecture, I want to draw attention to two issues. First, I want to say something about what we might call the shared task of Christian theology – that is, the core concerns, if there are any such, that most theologians think of as part-and-parcel of theology rightly pursued. Second, I want to say something about why this shared task may still be a suitable pursuit for those at work in the modern university. I think of these remarks as, in many respects, friendly additions to Professor Wolfe’s presentation, rather than as criticisms of it.","PeriodicalId":43324,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Public Theology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2022-10-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"82768483","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-10-18DOI: 10.1163/15697320-20220049
Judith Wolfe
To ask the question of the relevance of Christian theology, we first have to ask what Christian theology is. At its simplest and widest, as Thomas Aquinas put it (or nearly), it is the study of God and all things in relation to God.1 In particular, it is the attempt to understand, probe and build on the basic Christian confession of one God in three persons, revealed in Jesus Christ, the incarnate Son. This definition outlines a particular subject matter: theologians ask questions about the doctrine of God, the doctrine of Christ, the doctrine of salvation; they ask questions about the Scriptures in which their convictions are rooted, and other texts in which they are transmitted. At the same time, the definition both demands and enables a particular way of asking questions, because God, of course, is not simply an object of enquiry; if he is anything, he is the source and end of all being. As Kierkegaard showed so meticulously, humans’ relations with God are necessarily subjective and personal, because God defies objectification.2 To assume an ‘objective’, disengaged standpoint from which to investigate God’s existence and character therefore misses an essential part of what one seeks to understand, namely that there is no such standpoint. And so theologians ask (always tacitly, and sometimes explicitly): – What object or objects does our enquiry have in view? – Who does the enquiring, and how are they related to these objects? – What form does knowledge or understanding take within this relationship? – How is such knowledge acquired, expressed, and transmitted?
{"title":"The Relevance of the Study of Christian Theology in the University and Society Today","authors":"Judith Wolfe","doi":"10.1163/15697320-20220049","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/15697320-20220049","url":null,"abstract":"To ask the question of the relevance of Christian theology, we first have to ask what Christian theology is. At its simplest and widest, as Thomas Aquinas put it (or nearly), it is the study of God and all things in relation to God.1 In particular, it is the attempt to understand, probe and build on the basic Christian confession of one God in three persons, revealed in Jesus Christ, the incarnate Son. This definition outlines a particular subject matter: theologians ask questions about the doctrine of God, the doctrine of Christ, the doctrine of salvation; they ask questions about the Scriptures in which their convictions are rooted, and other texts in which they are transmitted. At the same time, the definition both demands and enables a particular way of asking questions, because God, of course, is not simply an object of enquiry; if he is anything, he is the source and end of all being. As Kierkegaard showed so meticulously, humans’ relations with God are necessarily subjective and personal, because God defies objectification.2 To assume an ‘objective’, disengaged standpoint from which to investigate God’s existence and character therefore misses an essential part of what one seeks to understand, namely that there is no such standpoint. And so theologians ask (always tacitly, and sometimes explicitly): – What object or objects does our enquiry have in view? – Who does the enquiring, and how are they related to these objects? – What form does knowledge or understanding take within this relationship? – How is such knowledge acquired, expressed, and transmitted?","PeriodicalId":43324,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Public Theology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2022-10-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"75067171","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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