Search results for ""catholic university of america press""

From publisher lists to bestseller lists, Catholic literature is thriving today. ""Between Human and Divine"" is the first collection of scholarly essays published on a wide variety of contemporary (post 1980) Catholic literary works and artists. Its aim is to introduce readers to recent and emerging writers and texts in the tradition. Each of the fifteen essays presents an informative critical perspective on a given work or works, and each addresses the questions: What, specifically, makes this a work of Catholic literature? How does it both fit into and help shape the Catholic literary tradition? In the broad and diverse range of works represented in this book, readers will find a veritable treasure trove of contemporary Catholic writing. Genres covered include fiction, poetry, and literary non-fiction, and authors include those from the United States, England, Ireland, Spain, Canada, Australia, and Japan. This collection will appeal not only to literary scholars but to all readers interested in the intersection of religion and literature in general and in Catholic literature in particular. ""Between Human and Divine"" furthers the study of the fascinating ways that religion, culture, social change, and tradition are shaped by the imaginative process. It also contributes to scholarship in the area by extending the parameters of the Catholic literary tradition into the present, demonstrating that such literature is flourishing today even if its subject matter, thematic concerns, and writing techniques show new and intriguing shifts in direction. This is an introduction to recent and emerging Catholic literary works and artists.

Read more less

Flourishing from the inland cities of Syria down through the Tigris and Euphrates valley, Syriac speakers in late antiquity created a new and often brilliant expression of Christian culture. Although the origins of their traditions are notoriously difficult to trace, authors of fourth-century Syrian communities achieved sophisticated forms of expression whose content little resembles the Christian culture of their neighbours to the west. From the fourth through the seventh centuries they achieved religious works of great beauty and complexity.Increasing interest in Syriac Christianity has prompted recent translations and studies. To Train His Soul in Books explores numerous aspects of this rich religious culture, extending previous lines of scholarly investigation and demonstrating the activity of Syriac-speaking scribes and translators busy assembling books for the training of biblical interpreters, ascetics, and learned clergy. Befitting an intensely literary culture, it begins with the development of Syriac poetry--the genre beloved by Ephrem and other, anonymous authors. It considers the long tradition of Aramaic and Syriac words for the chronic condition of sin, and explores the dimensions of the immense work of Syriac translators with a study of the Syriac life of Athanasius. Essays consider the activity of learned ascetics, with a proposal of the likely monastic origin of the Apocalypse of Daniel; the goal and concept of renunciation; and the changes rung by Syriac-speaking ascetics on the daily reality of housekeeping. Also included in the volume are two essays on the influence of Syriac literary culture on Greek traditions, and in turn ascetic life. Finally, an original poem in Syriac demonstrates the continuing vitality of this culture, both in its homeland and in the Diaspora.These essays seek to extend and honour the work of renowned scholar and pillar of the Department of Semitic and Egyptian Languages at the Catholic University of America, Sidney H. Griffith.

Read more less

Early in the 1930s, a number of French Catholic and secular philosophers debated the question of the meaning, even the very possibility, of Christian philosophy. Positions articulated during these debates provided intellectual background to debates about nature and grace, and the interaction of philosophy and theology that informed theological debate before and during the Second Vatican Council. These questions continue to be raised in theological debate today. This selection of previously untranslated documents from the French debates about Christian philosophy provides a long-needed complement to available English-language literature on the subject. These documents show that the debates were highly complex, involved multiple sides, and prompted development of certain participants' positions. Four of Maurice Blondel's contributions are included, as are selections by Gabriel Marcel, Etienne Gilson, Fernand Van Steenberghen, among others. A detailed historical introduction provides much-needed background to these intertwined debates. The editor's thematic outline of seventeen different participants' positions and engagements includes but also goes beyond the selections translated in the volume. It provides a full and balanced treatment of the numerous participants, and sets the complex intellectual context for understanding the positions, issues, and main personalities of the debate. A chronological bibliography of literature comprising and commenting on the debates and their issues is also included and will serve as an invaluable aid to further scholarship.

Read more less

Virgil Nemoianu's book starts from the assumption that, whether we like it or not, we live in a postmodern environment, one characterized by turbulence, fluidity, relativity, commotion, uncertainty, and lightning-fast communication and change. One question raised under these circumstances is whether we have thus entered an age of 'posthistory', one radically different from whatever happened in the past 10,000 years or so, or whether our present continues to be understandable by the methods of the philosophy of culture. The other important question is whether inside the postmodernist turmoil we can discover islands of stability, durability, continuity, and coherence. In answering such questions Nemoianu provides examinations of a political, religious, and aesthetic (particularly literary) nature. The book draws the conclusion that relativity and skeptical uncertainty themselves require such components of coherence and stability to prevent postmodernity from turning into uniformity and predictability. To the extent that most, or even all, things are considered carriers of truth, their opposite (the cultural identities) must also be granted the very same privilege. The 'adversarial' islands are engaged in a complex network of relations with their tempestuous surroundings, thereby ironically vindicating them by contrast. Hope is emphasized as the prominent and fundamental virtue of our time, and as the bridge connecting past, present, and future. The epilogue of the book suggests a tentative and subjective model of a defensive 'philosophical garden' which might help the reader imagine how to find appropriate protection - by isolation and creative interaction at the same time - in a world of chaos and disorder.

Read more less

Edith Stein was one of the important early phenomenologists. A German-Jewish philosopher, Discalced Carmelite nun, martyr, and saint who died in Auschwitz, Stein participated in the early 20th century revival of scholasticism and was much admired by John Paul II. ""Thine Own Self"" focuses on Stein's later writings and in particular her magnum opus, ""Finite and Eternal Being"". Although completed in 1936, Stein's book was not published at the time because of the new laws against non-Aryan publications, and the work sat completed but unread until after World War II. The recent availability of this book in English makes a substantive scholarly analysis of this major text particularly timely. ""Thine Own Self"" investigates Stein's account of human individuality and her mature philosophical positions on being and essence. Sarah Borden Sharkey shows how Stein's account of individual form adapts the Aristotelian-Thomistic tradition in order to account for evolution and more contemporary insights in personality and individual distinctiveness. Borden Sharkey explains how Stein's theory of individuality and individual forms is tied to her understanding of essence and being, and she compares Stein's distinctive metaphysical positions to those of Thomas Aquinas, John Duns Scotus, and Edmund Husserl. In addition to expositing Stein's metaphysical positions, Borden Sharkey argues that, although Stein's account of individual forms is both more contemporary and more adequate than John Duns Scotus' haecceitas, it is nonetheless problematic. The book concludes by defending a more Aristotelian-Thomistic understanding of form - albeit one that must be re articulated in light of contemporary and Steinian critiques.

Read more less

There has been a distinct trend in modern thought to be deeply suspicious and critical of the human mind's ability to gain genuine access to any reality that transcends the world or the mind. As such, much modern reflection on the mind's relationship to a transcendent God has either banished God from the realm of the cognitively accessible or found ways to evacuate God of his transcendence, and reduce God to a concept or idea in the mind. In this book, Paul Macdonald directly challenges negative modern understandings of the mind's relationship to God. ""Knowledge and the Transcendent"" advances the provocative claim that the human mind is not 'bounded' on the outside but actually remains 'open' to the world and to God. As such, the mind is able to know the world and God with varying degrees of objectivity. The author turns to the philosophical theology of Thomas Aquinas in order to explicate as well as defend important claims that Aquinas makes about human cognition as well as our knowledge of God. In this life, while we cannot know or 'see' God directly, we nevertheless can enjoy some knowledge of God by way of reason and faith, both of which are cognitive capacities for forming and holding true beliefs about God. Consequently, Macdonald argues that Aquinas, as properly interpreted, provides powerful philosophical and theological resources for rehabilitating the mind's relationship to God and thus also safeguarding our knowledge of transcendent being and truth.

Read more less

This book examines some of the salient historiographical and conceptual issues that animate current scholarly debates about the nature of the medieval contribution to modern Western political ideas. On the one hand, scholars who subscribe to the 'Baron thesis' concerning civic humanism have asserted that the break between medieval and modern modes of political thinking formed an unbridgeable chasm associated with the development of an entirely new framework at the dawn of the Florentine Renaissance. Others have challenged this hypothesis, replacing it with another extreme: an unbroken continuity in the intellectual terrain between the twelfth and the seventeenth centuries (or later). The present book seeks to qualify both of these positions. Cary J. Nederman argues for a more nuanced historiography of intellectual continuity and change that depends upon analyzing a host of contextual as well as philosophical factors to account for the emergence of the European tradition of political theory in the medieval and early modern periods. He finds that categories such as 'medieval' and 'modern' can and should be usefully deployed, yet always with the understanding that they are provisional and potentially fluid. The book opens with an introduction that lays out the main issues and sources of the debate, followed by five sets of interrelated chapters. The first section critically assesses some of the leading scholars who have contributed to the current understanding of the relationship between medieval and modern ideas. The central part of the book includes three sections that address salient themes that illuminate and illustrate continuity and change: Dissent and Power, Empire and Republic, and Political Economy. The volume closes with a few examples of the ways in which medieval political doctrines were absorbed into and transformed during the modern period up to the nineteenth century.

Read more less

Explores various issues surrounding the relationship between the papacy and the Jews in the modern age.

Read more less

In thirteen original essays, eminent scholars of the history of philosophy and of contemporary philosophy examine weakness of will, or incontinence - the phenomenon of acting contrary to one's better judgment. The volume covers all major periods of western philosophy, from antiquity through the Middle Ages and the modern period down to the present.Alfred Mele and Alasdair MacIntyre examine weakness of will from a contemporary perspective. Mele addresses the issue from the vantage point of Libertarianism. MacIntyre argues against the widespread view that actions that are out of character require special explanation, and reinterprets weakness of will as a failure to use moral lapses for moral progress. The other authors critically engage accounts of weakness of will by past philosophers: Kenneth Dorter writes on Plato, Terence H. Irwin on Aristotle, Lloyd Gerson on Plotinus, James Wetzel on Augustine, Denis J. M. Bradley on Aquinas, Tobias Hoffmann on Henry of Ghent, Giuseppe Mazzotta on Dante, Ann Hartle on Montaigne, John C. McCarthy on Descartes, Thomas E. Hill Jr. on Kant, and Tracey B. Strong on Nietzsche.The philosophical examination of weakness of will highlights central problems of action theory, such as the connections between desire, conviction, and action, between intellect and will, and between rationality and emotions. It also addresses important ethical issues such as the diversity of character dispositions, moral progress and moral education, the limits of virtue, and moral responsibility.The historical and contemporary perspectives offered in this volume will enrich current debates, not only by suggesting answers, but also by broadening the usual range of questions about weakness of will. Owing to the intimate connection of the topic with other key themes in moral philosophy, the historical and thematic studies contained in this book also provide an overview of moral philosophy as a whole.

Read more less

Among the great works of Thomas Aquinas, the ""Commentary on the Sentences of Peter Lombard"" has suffered almost total neglect among translators. Such neglect is surprising, considering that the massive Commentary - more than 4,000 pages in the last printed edition - is not only Aquinas' first systematic engagement with all the philosophical and theological topics on which he expended his energy over the span of a short career but is also characterized by an exuberance and elaborateness seldom found in his subsequent writings. Although Chenu had already drawn attention decades ago to the importance of studying this youthful tour de force for a fuller understanding of Thomas' more mature work, the ""Commentary on the Sentences"" has remained a closed book for many modern students of Thomistic and medieval thought because of its relative inaccessibility in English or in Latin.The present volume, containing all the major texts on love and charity, makes available what is by far the most extensive translation ever to be made from the Commentary with the added benefit that the better part of the translation is based on the (as yet unpublished) critical edition of the Leonine Commission. The collection of texts from all four books has a tight thematic coherence that makes it invaluable to students of Thomas' moral philosophy, moral theology, and philosophical theology. In addition, the inclusion of parallel texts from Aquinas' first (Parisian) Commentary as well as from his second (Roman) attempt at a commentary, the recently rediscovered ""Lectura Romana"", makes this edition all the more valuable for those who wish to track the internal development of Thomas' thinking on these matters.The new availability of so many rich passages from the ""Commentary on the Sentences"" will encourage and facilitate use of a magnificent resource that deserves to be better known.

Read more less

After the Latin translation of Aristotelian works outside the logica vetus began in earnest in twelfth-century Spain, it remained to Scholastic philosophers to assimilate the new materials. Although many individuals commented on the logica nova and on some of Aristotle's books on natural philosophy, Albert the Great is one of only a very few Scholastics to comment on the entire collection of Aristotle's biological works.This text, the "Questions concerning Aristotle's On Animals" ["Quaestiones super de animalibus"], recovered only at the beginning of the twentieth century and never before translated in its entirety, represents Conrad of Austria's report on a series of disputed questions that Albert the Great addressed in Cologne ca. 1258. "The Questions", in nineteen books, mixes two distinct genres: the scholastic quaestio, with arguments pro et contra, a determination, and answers to the objections; and the straightforward question-and-response found, for example, in "The Prose Salernitan Questions".Here, even more clearly perhaps than in his slightly later and much larger paraphrastic commentary "On Animals" ["De animalibus"], Albert adduces his own views - often criticizing other medieval physicians and natural philosophers - on comparative anatomy, human physiology, sexuality, procreation, and embryology. This translation, based on the critical edition that appeared in the "Cologne" edition of Albert's work, helps to explain the title "patron saint of scientists" bestowed upon Albert by Pope Pius XII.This work should find its audience among medievalists and historians of science and culture. More so than the massive "On Animals", it should prove useful in the classroom as an encyclopedia or handbook of medieval life.

Read more less

This modern English translation of all the surviving literary compositions ascribed to Liudprand, the bishop of Cremona from 962 to 972, offers unrivaled insight into society and culture in western Europe during the ""iron century."" Since Liudprand enjoyed the favor of the Saxon Roman emperor Otto the Great, and traveled to Constantinople more than once on official business, his narratives also reveal European attitudes toward the Byzantine Empire and the culture of its refined capital city. No other tenth-century writer had such privileged access to the high spheres of power, or such acerbic wit and willingness to articulate critiques of the doings of powerful people. Liudprand's historical texts (the ""Antapodosis"" on European events in the first half of the 900s, and his ""Historia Ottonis"" on the rise to power of Otto the Great) provide a unique view of the recent past against a genuinely European backdrop, unusual in a time of localized cultural horizons. Liudprand's famous satirical description of his misadventures as Ottonian legate at the Byzantine court in 968 is a vital source of information on Byzantine ritual and diplomatic process, as well as a classic of medieval intercultural encounter. This collection of Liudprand's works also includes his recently discovered Easter sermon, a rare early document of Jewish-Christian intellectual polemic. Readers interested in medieval European culture, the history of diplomacy, Italian and German medieval history, and the history of Byzantium will find this collection of translated texts rewarding. A full introduction and extensive notes help readers to place Liudprand's writings in context.

Read more less

The Romantic Tale of Peter Abelard and Heloise has been widely known for centuries. The legend relates in part to the letters exchanged between the two, years after Abelard had been castrated at the behest of Heloise's vindictive uncle, Fulbert. These ""personal"" letters form the basis for bestselling compilations of works by Abelard and Heloise in translation, such as the recently revised Penguin ""The Letters of Abelard and Heloise"" or the new Hackett Abelard and Heloise, ""The Letters and Other Writings"". They hold fascination for the light they shed on the relationship between the man and woman, as teacher and student, lovers, husband and wife, monk and nun, abbot and mother superior, and much more. The popularity of the ""personal"" letters has generated considerable fanfare for the publication of another set of correspondence printed under the title ""The Lost Love Letters of Heloise and Abelard"". The authorship of all these letters has been contested repeatedly, with the last-mentioned collection being the center of a present firestorm. Generally ignored have been nearly a dozen other letters or letter-like texts, unassailably the work of Peter Abelard. Jan M. Ziolkowski's comprehensive and learned translation of these texts affords insight into Abelard's thinking over a much longer sweep of time and offers snapshots of the great twelfth-century philosopher and theologian in a variety of contexts. Broadening our panorama of the twelfth-century Renaissance, the picture presented by these texts complements, complicates, and enriches Abelard's autobiographical letter of consolation and his personal letters to Heloise.

Read more less

The Chruch Confronts Modernity assesses the history of Roman Catholicism since 1950 in the United States, the Republic of Ireland, and the Canadian province of Quebec. All three locales in 1950, despite very real differences in terms of economics, politics, and demography, were characterized by an institutionally vibrant Catholicism. Attendance at Mass was remarkably high, as was the frequency with which the laity received the sacraments. Devotional activities, especially those centered on the Virgin Mary, attracted a wide range of participants. Vocations to the priesthood and religious life were sustained at healthy levels. Large numbers of children attended Catholic schools, while their parents gave at least verbal assent to Church teaching on contraception and the indissolubility of marriage. Over the course of recent decades, these three locales have grown more alike: less rural, more affluent, increasingly wedded to an ideology of pluralism. The institutional health of Catholicism in each jurisdiction has also eroded. The book's essays seek to explore this seeming decline and assess both its causes and its significance. The authors discuss trends in Mass attendance and devotions; reception of the sacraments; vocations to the priesthood and religious life; attendance at Catholic schools and colleges; and support for church teaching in the social, political, and sexual realms. By comparing these ""trajectories of decline,"" readers will better understand the forces that have contributed to the change in Catholicism in the Western nations. The authors are especially interested in the relative impact of the Second Vatican Council. The book includes two essays each on Quebec, the United States, and the Republic of Ireland and two concluding essays that take a comparative look at developments in all three locales. The contributors are R. Scott Appleby, Gregory Baum, Kevin Christiano, James D. Davidson, Michele Dillon, Michael Gauvreau, Dermot Keogh, and Lawrence Taylor.

Read more less

This book presents an engaging collection of essays exploring ""catholic"" and ""Catholic"" perspectives on American law - catholic in their claims of universal truths, and Catholic in their grounding in the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church. What emerges is a model of human freedom and flourishing that has its foundation in the transcendent vocation of each and every human person. The 2000-year-old Catholic Church played a pivotal role in the formation of the western legal culture. Does it have anything of relevance left to offer that culture in the 21st century? The contributors to Recovering Self-Evident Truths answer with a resounding yes. The opening essays present the guiding premises of the volume as a whole: human persons must be respected by governments and law because their objective dignity arises from being made in the image and likeness of God. Reasoning from these premises, the next set of essays situates the person within community, exploring the implications for the American legal system of taking seriously Catholic understanding of subsidiarity, solidarity, the common good, and the relationship between freedom and truth. The next set of essays concludes the foundational material by engaging dominant secular political and legal theory from a Catholic perspective. With the foundation set, the essays in the second half of the book explore eight specific substantive areas of the law - Contract Law, Property Law, Tort Law, Criminal Law, Labor Law, Family Law, Immigration Law, and International Law - through a Catholic lens. ""Recovering Self-Evident Truths"" is particularly timely: a majority of the justices on the United States Supreme Court are Catholic; Catholics represent a pivotal voting demographic in the American political landscape; and the issue of religion and religious values in the public square is hotly debated as some warn against a creeping theocracy. This book demonstrates that religiously founded values can serve to provide constructive proposals for building a more just society.

Read more less

Whether they were secular canonesses or beguines, tertiaries or Sisters of the Common Life, quasi-religious women in the later Middle Ages lived their lives against a backdrop of struggle and insecurity resulting, in large measure, from their ambivalent legal status. Because they lacked one or more of the canonical earmarks of religious women strictly speaking, they had to justify their unauthorized way of life and to defend themselves against association with those who had been branded unorthodox, unruly, or even heretical. Ambiguous legal status within the organized Church and the contests to which it gave rise are a constant theme in the historiography of quasi-religious women, yet there has been no full-scale study of what it meant at law to be a mulier religiosa. This book provides a thorough examination of the writings of canon lawyers in the late Middle Ages as they come to terms, both in their academic work and also in their roles as judges and advisers, with women who were not, strictly speaking, religious, but who were popularly thought of as such. It studies the ways in which jurists strove to categorize these women and to clarify the sometimes ambivalent canons relating to their lives in the community. It assesses, among other things, the extent to which lawyers proved responsive to popular as well as learned notions of what constituted religious life for women when the interests of particular clients were at stake. ""A Pernicious Sort of Woman"" will be a useful supplement to books devoted to individual quasi-religious women or to specific manifestations of female lay piety. It will be of interest to historians of Christianity and specialists in the law and women's studies as well as anyone interested in the history of religious women.

Read more less

This work explores the unrepeatability of persons, drawing out the worth and dignity of each individual person. It also explores interpersonal relation, giving an account of how persons can achieve empathic understanding of others, and where the limit of empathy is reached.

Read more less

Drawing upon his lifelong study of politics and journalism, political historian Lee Edwards offers a scholarly examination of a powerful new phenomenon in world politics-the mass media. Edwards argues in his work that the media have become as important a factor in determining the course of international affairs and the future of nations as economic prosperity, military strength, natural resources, and national will. The author calls this vital new component of world politics mediapolitik. He uses case studies from around the world to show how the mass media have influenced and even determined the outcome of major political acts. The author argues that these case studies show that the mass media can either enrich or enslave the human spirit, depending upon their moral foundation. If the media follow a liberal democratic model, as in the United States and Western Europe, they contribute to a free and just society. If they follow an authoritarian model, as in South Africa before Mandela, or a totalitarian model as in Saddam Hussein's Iraq or Fidel Castro's Cuba, they perpetuate the regime in power and deny the fruits of freedom and democracy to the people. Edwards addresses the question of how responsibly the American media, the most influential media in the world, handle their enormous power. Using the results obtained from his survey of 100 leading journalists as well as close analysis of major news stories of the last decade, the author confirms the cynicism of the American media and its deleterious effect on American politics and government. The solution, he suggests, is that American journalists must practice moral responsibility and strengthen the liberal democratic model of mediapolitik around the world.

Read more less

A book of moral and religious reflections written by a Carolingian noblewoman for her teenage son in the middle of the 9th century. Intended as a guide to right conduct, the book was to be shared in time with William's younger brother. Dhuoda's situation was poignant. Her husband, Bernard, the count of Septimania, was away and she was separated from her children. William was being held by Charles the Bald as a guarantee of his father's loyalty, and the younger son's whereabouts were unknown. As war raged in the crumbling Carolingian Empire, the grieving mother, fearing for the spiritual and physical welfare of her absent sons, began in 841 to write her loving counsel in a handbook. Two years later she sent it to William. The book memorably expresses Dhuoda's maternal feelings, religious fervor and learning. In teaching her children how they might flourish in God's eyes, as well as humanity's, Dhuoda reveals the authority of Carolingian women in aristocratic households. She dwells on family relations, social order, the connection between religious and military responsibility, and, always, the central place of Christian devotion in a noble life. One of the few surviving texts written by a woman in the Middle Ages, Dhuoda's ""Liber manualis"" was available in only two faulty Latin manuscripts until a third, superior one was discovered in the 1950s. This English translation is based on the 1975 critical edition and French translation by Pierre Riche. Now available for the first time in paperback, it includes an afterword written by Carol Neel that takes into account recent scholarship and the 1991 revised edition of Riche's text.

Read more less

In the early 1930s, Emile Brehier inaugurated a dispute regarding whether or not true philosophy could have existed during the ages of faith, the assumption being that real philosophers are untouched by faith and are, ideally, non-believers. Etienne Gilson and Jacques Maritain, among many others, entered the fray, seeking to clarify what is meant by ""Christian philosophy"". Both of these philosophers were very much in the tradition of St Thomas Aquinas, and together they might be said to have set the stage for present-day discussions of just whether and what such a thing as a Christian philosophy might be. Ralph McInerny, both a Catholic philosopher in the Thomistic tradition and a writer, recounts the historical background of what might be called the autonomy of philosophy in a properly Christian philosophy and moves to his own resolution of the conflict, differing from both Gilson and Maritain. Chiefly concerned with the implications of this debate for moral doctrine, McInerny argues for a conception of Christian ethics that relies on the distinction between the activity of philosophising and the content of philosophy. ""The Question of Christian Ethics"" should be a valuable text for scholars working in the area of Aquinas's moral theory and in the area of natural law theory as well as for professors and students who cover this territory in both undergraduate and graduate courses.

Read more less

Dom Combe presents the reader a sharply focused profile of a dedicated and extraordinary woman of the 20th century, Henry James'sister-in-law, independent in spirit and passionately devoted for more than 60 years to the cause of Gregorian Chant and its liturgical implementation. Drawing on her voluminous correspondence, he traces the main events of her life following her conversion in 1904 to the Catholic Church. From these letters emerges the clear image of a fiercely strong-willed and gracious woman who pursued her ideals with relentless zeal.

Read more less

Jerome's Commentary on Galatians is presented here in English translation in its entirety. The introduction and notes situate the Commentary in its historical, exegetical, and theological contexts and also provide extensive coverage of ancient and modern scholarly debates about the interpretation of Paul's epistle.

Read more less

St.Cyril of Alexandria is best known for his role in the Christological disputes of the fifth century. In recent years, however, scholars have turned their attention to Cyril the exegete. Cyril wrote extensive commentaries on nearly every book of the Bible; in fact, two-thirds of his extant corpus is devoted to biblical interpretation. Yet, despite this strong interest in Cyril as theologian and biblical interpreter, his activity as the Patriarch of Alexandria remains obscure. Doctrinal treatises and biblical commentary reveal little of the daily pastoral duties that occupied Cyril during his years as leader of one of ancient Christianity's most important sees. This new translation of Cyril's ""Festal Letters"" will help fill these gaps. Twenty-nine in all, these letters cover all but three of Cyril's years as bishop. In Alexandria, festal letters functioned primarily as a vehicle for announcing the beginning of Lent and the proper date for the celebration of Easter. They also served an important catechetical purpose by providing the patriarch with an annual opportunity to present his flock with a pastoral version of the theological issues that found more formal and complex expression elsewhere. Thus, Cyril's ""Festal Letters"" offer the modern reader a glimpse into the issues that Cyril himself considered important enough to proclaim to the entire diocese and a sample of how he prepared these ideas for reception by a less sophisticated audience. These letters illuminate other aspects of the ancient church in Alexandria, including that church's complex relationship with the Jews and other religious groups, as well as the ways in which the ascetical movement wound its way into the patriarch's pastoral program. In short, Cyril of Alexandria's ""Festal Letters"" provides modern readers with a rare opportunity to enter the daily reality of the church in ancient Alexandria.

Read more less

Most contemporary theologies of Holy Orders consider priesthood mainly in its diocesan context and most contemporary theologies of religious life do not consider how ordained ministry functions when it is internal rather than external to religious life. Understanding the Religious Priesthood provides a history and theology of religious priesthood that contributes to our understanding of this vocation’s identity and mission. It uncovers what religious priesthood shares with diocesan priesthood and non-ordained religious life and what makes it different from both those other vocations.Christian Raab begins by tracing the history of religious priesthood from its origins in the early Church to the eve of the Second Vatican Council. He demonstrates that religious priests often faced questions about how to reconcile their two callings, but that they also provided answers in their theologies and spiritualities of priesthood and religious life. Meanwhile, they made key contributions to the Church’s life and mission. Raab then investigates the teachings of the Second Vatican Council on priesthood and religious life. Observing that the Council presented priesthood according to a diocesan typology and presented religious life without sacerdotal associations, he argues that the lack of imagery of religious priesthood contributed to a post-conciliar vocational identity crisis among religious priests. He then seeks to remedy this lacuna by appealing to the biblical images for religious priesthood Hans Urs von Balthasar offered in his theology of vocations. Raab argues that Balthasar’s imagery is a promising way forward for understanding the identity and mission of religious priesthood. In a final part, Raab provides a substantial theological articulation of religious priesthood which illuminates its liturgical signification, ecclesial mediation and mission, and ministerial identity. Here he draws not only from Balthasar but also from Pope John Paul II, Yves Congar, Jean-Marie Tillard, Brian Daley, and Guy Mansini to construct his profile.

Read more less

As a peritus at Vatican II and by the end of his life arguably the world's leading Mariologist, René Laurentin has earned the privilege of republication of a work of considerable value for any theologian who aims for comprehensiveness of Catholic theological perspective, historically and systematically. Laurentin's orthodox, yet highly original treatment displays his command of all of the relevant biblical, patristic, medieval and modern texts up to and including the entire proceedings of the Second Vatican Council, as well as the whole range of related historical and theological scholarship. His proposal to pursue Mariological speculation along two tracks – first, "from above," following the course of doctrinal development from biblical revelation to the VCII era, and second, "from below," considering Mary's own life (walking in her footsteps, as it were), from before the Annunciation to the Parousia – provides a clear, accessible structure for the work, yielding rich theological and spiritual fruit. Not only are all the major Marian doctrines and their developments handled with the greatest sensitivity, from the Virgin birth to the modern promulgations of Immaculate Conception and Assumption, but Laurentin's approach in his second part opens the way to a human-psychological treatment of motherhood, still solidly bolstered by traditional Christian anthropology. Regarding Mary's status as Mother of God, Laurentin's discussion of the Theotokos exhibits his deep ecumenical commitments, as much as his specific attention to Mary's soteriological role as a sticking point for Protestantism. One of the most striking qualities of the work is Laurentin's deft integration of his evident scholastic formation into an overarching vision thoroughly at ease with the phenomenological ("personalist") and existential currents in which he also inevitably swam throughout his education and professional scholarly occupation. As a result, the work can be read and appreciated instinctively, as it were, as much by the eclectic contemporary theologian, influenced by the likes of Heidegger, et al, as by the Thomist.

Read more less

What does episcopal fraternity and communio look like? This central question is explored through the erudition and experience of Archbishop Anthony Fisher, Catholic Archbishop of Sydney, Australia. Unity in Christ, based upon a series of addresses given to the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) at their Special Assembly in 2022, delves into the themes associated with episcopal unity. By surveying the Christian tradition, beginning with the scriptures and then through various periods (Apostolic generation, patristic, scholastic, Vatican II, recent post Vatican II developments such as synodality) a coherent picture of episcopal togetherness is presented. What becomes clear is that unity among Christ's disciples and their successors is not simply an ideal but rather a constitutive element of their office. They are called to love as Christ loved, expressed above all through genuine friendship with one another. The consequences of this fraternity and communio have implications in areas such as spirituality, preaching and fraternal correction, among others. This second feature, the implications of episcopal fraternity and communio, are explored through Archbishop Fisher's twenty years of experience as a bishop of the Catholic Church. By providing concrete examples of lived episcopal fraternity and communio, Fisher offers a glimpse into both the challenges and fruits of living out Christ's call that ""they might all be one"" (Jn 17:21).

Read more less

Bruno, a cleric who served the archbishop of Magdeburg and subsequently the bishop of Merseburg during the course of the 1060s to the 1080s, composed one of the most important historical works treating the tumultuous period in the history of the German kingdom in the second half of the eleventh century. Bruno's main focus in his Saxon War is the civil wars that engulfed the German kingdom from the mid 1060s through the end of the 1080s. However, as a historian of contemporary affairs, Bruno also offers crucial insights regarding the so-called Investiture Controversy, which Bruno treats largely as a political conflict between a tyrannical German ruler and the Saxons with some papal intervention, social conflict within the German kingdom, as well as the development of economic and military institutions.Unlike his contemporary Lampert of Hersfeld, Bruno was closely connected to the foremost leaders of the Saxon resistance against King Henry IV, and provides unique insights regarding their plans, hopes, and fears. Bruno also provides nearly two dozen full-text copies of letters that were sent by the main participants in the intra-German conflict as well as ten letters from Pope Gregory VII, four of which do not appear in any other source including the papal register.An additional important feature of Bruno's history is that he treats military matters in an extraordinarily detailed manner, and is the most important narrative source for understanding the conduct of war during the second half of the eleventh century. Bruno's detailed treatment of military matters is based upon his very extensive contacts with leading military figures, as well as his own personal observations regarding the numerous battles that punctuated the struggle between the Saxons and their erstwhile ruler.In sum, Bruno offers both unique perspectives and unique information about a crucial period in both German and European history, which make this text valuable not only for scholars, but also for a broader audience interested in the political, religious, and particularly military history of the eleventh century. This will be the first English translation of this work.

Read more less

What are values? How do we come to know them? How are values re­lated to morality? How is it possible to act against one´s better knowl­edge? How can one become blind to values? How important is requit­ed love for human happiness? These are just some of the questions to which Dietrich von Hildebrand offers profound and original responses. He arrives at these answers not primarily by a critical discussion of oth­er thinkers (classical or modern) but by turning to the “things them­selves,” that is, to the reality of moral life. Von Hildebrand’s keen sense for categorization, crucial distinctions, and systematic philosophizing does not reduce the rich and complex sphere of moral phenomena to a few abstract principles or rules. On the contrary, it allows the reader of his works to see the moral data with new clarity and explicitness.Although von Hildebrand’s importance as an early phenomenol­ogist and a moral philosopher has been generally recognized for de­cades, The Moral Philosophy of Dietrich von Hildebrand is the first full-fledged monograph on von Hildebrand’s moral philosophy available to date. Despite this pioneering effort, its aim is not to treat all the themes belonging to this area with equal depth and breadth. Rather, it focuses on the themes indicated by the aforementioned questions and relates them according to their inner systematic links rather than according to how and when they appear in von Hildebrand’s works. It also engag­es von Hildebrand in a critical dialogue, particularly with the ethics of Plato and Aristotle. This book will serve as a very good introduction not just to von Hildebrand´s moral philosophy but to his thought in general.

Read more less

Luigi Taparelli, SJ, 1793-1862, in his Theoretical Treatise of Natural Right Based on Fact, 1840-43, presents a neo-Thomistic approach to social, economic, and political sciences grounded in an integral conception of the human person as social animal but also as rational truth seeker. His conceptions of social justice and of subsidiarity are fundamental to modern Catholic social teaching (CST). His work moves away from traditionalist-conservative reaction in favor of an authentically human, moderately liberal, modernity built on the harmony of faith and reason. He zealously deconstructs laissez-faire liberal ideology and its socialist progeny in scores of articles in the Civiltà Cattolica, the journal that he co-founded in 1850. His arguments figure prominently in the Syllabus of Errors (1864) of Pius IX. Though a moderate liberal himself, his reputation as anti-liberal reactionary and defender of Papal temporal sovereignty is the chief reason why Pope Leo XIII later sought to quiet Taparelli's contribution to the foundations and pillars of modern CST that began with the restoration of Thomistic philosophy in Aeterni Patris (1879), and the ""magna carta"" of modern Catholic social teaching, Rerum Novarum (1891). Pius XI relies heavily on Taparelli's concept of subsidiarity in Quadragesimo Anno (1931), and sought to advance interest in Taparelli studies. However, Taparelli's eclectic philosophical orientation and writing style have been a considerable stumbling block. In this present book, Taparelli's ideas are evaluated both for their philosophical character but also in their historical context. Taparelli's theories of the just society and ordered liberty, are as timely nowadays for reasoned political and ethical discourse as ever. The book includes an appendix of translated portions of the Theoretical Treatise of Natural Right Based on Fact that relate to subsidiarity.

Read more less

Robert Wood's aim in Being and Cosmos is to reestablish a speculative view of the cosmos that goes back to the ancient Greeks and that corresponds to the holism of contemporary physics. There are two sets of problems in contemporary thought that militate against any such attempt. Most widespread is scientific reductionism in biology and neuroscience that explains awareness in terms of the mechanisms that underlie it. The second is the widespread attack in philosophy itself on speculative holism by deconstruction and anti-foundationalism. In Being and Cosmos, the tack against both is to make explicit the character of the mind that sees and thinks, that actively takes up commitment to the truth available in the disciplines involved. The basic ground of this position rests upon the functioning of the notion of Being that opens up the question of the character of the Whole and the human being's place in it. Thus position the treatment of the notion of Being as foundation and as orientation toward the Whole between the attack on reductionism and on deconstruction and anti-foundationalism. Wood concludes with a multidimensional sketch of an evolutionary view of the cosmos whose initial phases contain the potentialities for life, sensibility, and intellect as cosmic telos. The holism of contemporary physics has to be reconfigured in terms of this observation. Both reductionists and dualists should know that matter itself has to be re-minded and that mind itself matters.

Read more less

Is there still a distinct Irish identity in America? This highly original survey says yes, though it’s oftŸen an indirect one. True, the age of heroic immigration is over, and today the term “Irish-American” almost always means an American of Irish descent. If the Irish long ago ceased to be America’s largest ethnic group, they’ve nonetheless stayed among the most visible (not least because St Patrick’s Day has been adopted by the nation at large). But for all the external trappings of Irishness, the terms, traditions, and nuances of that identity stay elusive.Irish-American Autobiography opens a new window on the shiŸing meanings of Irishness over the twentieth century, by looking at a range of works that have never before been considered as a distinct body of literature. Opening with celebrity memoirs from athletes like boxer John L. Sullivan and ballplayer Connie Mack—written when the Irish were eager to put their raffish origins behind them—later chapters trace the many tensions, oŸen unspoken, registered by Irish Americans who’ve told their life stories. New York saloonkeepers and South Boston step dancers set themselves against the larger culture, setting a pattern of being on the outside looking in. Even the classic 1950s TV comedy The Honeymooners speaks to the urban Irish origins, and the poignant sense of exclusion felt by its creator Jackie Gleason. Catholicism, so key to the identity of earlier generations of Irish Americans, has also evolved. One chapter looks at the painful diffidence of priest autobiographers, and others reveal how traditional Irish Catholic ideas of the guardian angel and pilgrimage have evolved and stayed potent down to our own time. Irish-American Autobiography becomes, in the end, a story of a continued search for connection—documenting an “ethnic fade” that never quite happened.

Read more less

Intestine Enemies: Catholics in Protestant America, 1605—1791, is a documentary survey of the experience of Roman Catholics in the British Atlantic world from Maryland to Barbados and Nova Scotia to Jamaica over the course of the two centuries that spanned colonization to independence. It covers the first faltering efforts of the British Catholic community to establish colonies in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries; to their presence in the proprietary and royal colonies of the seventeenth century where policies of formal or practical toleration allowed Catholics some freedom for civic or religious participation; to their marginalization throughout the British Empire by the political revolution of 1688; to their transformation from aliens to citizens through their disproportionate contribution to the wars in the latter half of that century as a consequence of which half of the colonies of Britain’s American Empire gained their independence. The volume organizes representative documents from a wide array of public and private records—broadsides, newspapers, and legislative acts to correspondence, diaries, and reports—into topical chapters bridged by contextualized introductions. It affords students and readers in general the opportunity to have first-hand access to history. It serves also as a complement to Papist Devils: Catholics in British America, 1574– 1783 (The Catholic University of America Press, 2014), a narrative history of the same topic.

Read more less

“Learned ignorance,” the recognition that God is beyond us and our knowing capacities is the theological concept for which Nicholas of Cusa is most famous. Despite God’s apparent absence Nicholas offers original ways to think about God that would unite his presence with his absence. He called these proposals “conjectures” (coniecturae). Conjecture and conjecturing are central to the methodology of Nicholas’s philosophical theology and to his thinking about human knowledge.By using concrete examples from the everyday life of his times as symbolic imagery Nicholas makes what we say about God imaginatively available and theoretically plausible. He called such conjectural symbols “aenigmata” (= “symbolic or ‘enigmatic’ conjectures”) because they partially clarify and likewise point to an exact truth that is beyond us. Novel and imaginative, Nicholas’s conjectural examples break with the traditional medieval Aristotelian examples and provide further evidence of his role as a figure bridging medieval and Renaissance thought.Following his earlier book, Reading Cusanus (The Catholic University of America Press, 2003), Clyde Lee Miller here examines and comments on the meaning of “conjecture” in Nicholas of Cusa. The Art of Conjecture: Nicholas of Cusa on Knowledge explores what Nicholas meant by conjecture and its import as demonstrated in his treatises and sermons. Beginning with Nicholas’ On Conjectures, Miller analyzes a series of conjectural symbols and proposals across Nicholas’s less frequently discussed texts and recently published sermons. This early Renaissance thinker offers an original and ground-breaking way of framing speculation in philosophical theology and more generally in philosophy itself.

Read more less

Among the illustrious writers of the early Church, Saint Jerome (345-420) had a way with words few could equal. To honor the 1600th anniversary of the death of this patron saint of librarians and Scripture scholars, the Catholic University of America Press is releasing The Quotable Jerome, a well-organized collection of memorable wisdom from this early witness to Catholic truth.While Jerome is known for acerbic wits, editor Justin McClain shows that much of the time, Jerome's writings are instructive and even inspiring. Homilists will easily be able to find what Jerome said on any number of topics--Scripture, the Trinity, the sacraments, persecution, heresy, divine revelation, or chastity--just to name a few. All citations are clearly sourced if the reader wants to pursue the longer passage in question.“I am upset because I am human; I control my tongue because I am a Christian. Anger surges up in my heart, but I do not give vent to it.” - Homilies on the Psalms, Homily 10, Psalm 76 (77) (FOTC 48)“The doer of evil has, indeed, killed his own soul; but the heretic—the liar—has killed as many souls as he has seduced.” - Homilies on the Psalms, Homily 2, Psalm 5 (FOTC 48)“The Church does not consist in walls, but in the truths of her teachings. The Church is there where there is true faith.” - Homilies on the Psalms, Homily 46, Psalm 133 (134)“To err is human, but to lay snares is diabolical.” - Dogmatic and Polemical Works, The Apology Against the Books of Rufinus, Book Three, paragraph 33 (FOTC 53)“So much for what Scripture says; learn now what it means.” - Homilies on the Psalms, Homily 15, Psalm 82 (83) (FOTC 48)

Read more less

Robert of Arbrissel (d. 1117) once named Cluny among the chief holy places of Christendom—just after Bethlehem, Jerusalem, and Rome. When Peter the Venerable (d. 1156) became the ninth abbot of Cluny in 1122, Cluny had thousands of monks in the mother abbey and her daughter cells, along with hundreds of affiliated houses and dependencies in England, Germany, Spain, Italy and the Holy Land. As a fierce advocate for Cluny against its detractors (which included the redoubtable Bernard of Clairvaux), Peter defended his Order at the same time that he reformed its customs.Peter the Venerable’s extensive literary legacy includes poems, a large epistolary collection, and polemical treatises. The first of his four major polemics targeted a Christian heresy, the Petrobrussians (Against the Petrobrusians); the rest took aim at Jews and Saracens. Catholic University of America Press has published his Against the Inveterate Obduracy of the Jews. This present volume will make available in their entiretyPeter the Venerable’s twin polemics against Islam—A Summary of the entire heresy of the Saracens and Against the sect of the Saracens—as well as related correspondence. These works resulted from a sustained engagement with Islam begun during Peter’s journey to Spain in 1142–43. There the abbot commissioned a translation of sources from the Arabic, the so-called Toledan Collection, that include the Letter of a Saracen with a Christian Response (from the Apology of [Ps.] Al-Kindi); Fables of the Saracens (a potpourri of Islamic hadith traditions); and Robert of Ketton’s first Latin translation of the whole of the Qur’an. Thanks to Peter’s efforts, from the second half of the twelfth century Christians could acquire a far better understanding of the teachings of Islam, and Peter may rightly be viewed as the initiator of Islamic studies in the West.

Read more less

The presentation of the life and work of any great thinker is a formidable task, even for a renowned scholar. This is all the more the case when such a historical figure is a saint and mystic, such as Friar Thomas Aquinas. In this volume, Fr. Jean-Pierre Torrell, OP, masterfully takes up the strenuous task of presenting such a biography, providing readers with a detailed, scholarly, and profound account of the thirteenth-century theologian whose works have not ceased to draw the attention of both friend and foe! In this volume, Fr. Torrell, an internationally renowned expert on St. Thomas, speaks to neophytes and experts alike: for those new to Thomas's works, he paints an engaging human portrait of Friar Thomas in his historical context; for specialists, he provides a rigorous scholarly account of contemporary research concerning Thomas's life and work. This new edition of Fr. Torrell's widely-lauded text involved significant revision, expansion, and bibliographical updates in light of the latest scholarship. The Catholic University of America Press is pleased to present such an eminent specialist's mature synthesis concerning Friar Thomas Aquinas.

Read more less

The Catholic University of America Press is pleased to announce a new series, Early Modern Catholic Sources, edited by Ulrich L. Lehner and Trent Pomplun. This series – the only one of its kind – will provide translations of early modern Catholic texts of theological interest written between 1450 and 1800. The first volume in this series is On the Motive of the Incarnation, the first English translation of the seventeenth-century Discalced Carmelites at the University of Salmanca treatise on the motive of the Incarnation. Originally intended for students of their order, it became a major contribution to broader theological discourse. In this treatise, they defend the assertion that God intended Christ’s Incarnation essentially as a remedy for sin, such that if Adam had not sinned Christ would not have become incarnate, and that, at the same time, God intended all other works of nature and grace for the sake of Christ at their end. The Salmanticenses’ position thus combines elements of the Franciscan and Dominican traditions, stemming from the thought of Blessed John Duns Scotus and Saint Thomas Aquinas. This treatise is an exhaustive effort to show how the Scotistic emphasis on the primacy of Christ as the first willed and intended by God can be articulated within a Thomistic framework that acknowledges the contingency of the Incarnation on the need for redemption. In addition to the translation, the volume will include a brief introduction and extensive notes for theologians, historians, and students.

Read more less

Patience and Salvation in Third Century North Africa: A Christian Latin Reader features the entirety of Tertullian's To Martyrs and The Passion of Perpetua and Felicity, with selections from Cyprian's On the Good of Patience and a short appendix on Augustine's Commentary on Psalm 121.6. The Latin text has facing vocabulary and theological, historical, philosophical, and grammatical notes.In the first three centuries, Roman Carthage produced some of the earliest literature composed originally in Latin by Christians. Tertullian's Ad Martyras (197); Passio Perpetuae et Felicitatis (203), and Cyprian's De Bono Patientiae (256) all embody the force of this new genre of Latin literature. With this literature, we see a variant of Latin often denoted "Christian Latin." Christian Latin featured linguistic elements marked by characteristics of biblical Latin, later Latin, as well as vulgarisms.In addition to converging philologically, Tertullian, the author of the Passio, and Cyprian align themselves in topos: they all ask the question of how one can endure torment and anxiety in this world. Patience (patientia), derived from the verb for "to suffer" (patior), is a virtue that allows one to endure troubles, anxieties, and physical pains with the hope of eternal happiness and salvation in heaven. In this Reader, the student will find three different literary perspectives on this theme. The book also draws parallels to the works of Seneca and Cicero on patience and suffering.

Read more less

Whether to enlarge your general education, improve your English, or just because you are curious about the society that has had such a lasting influence on our history, our language, our thoughts, and our culture, you should and can learn Latin.Tamara Trykar-Lu’s charming and delightful introduction to Latin, From Puella to Plautus, Volume II, is designed for intermediate to advanced Latin study, at the high school or college level, either with the aid of a teacher and classroom or simply for personal enjoyment and enrichment. In this volume, the reader is introduced more broadly to the subjunctive mood, as well as a broad range of applications of the ablative, accusative, genitive, and dative cases. A wide variety of reading material is presented, including excerpts from the Carmina Burana, the writings of Catullus, the poetry of Ovid, the life of Saint George as told in de Voragine’s Golden Legend, the eruption of Mount Vesuvius from the account of Pliny the Elder, and Seneca’s story of the murder of Cicero. There follows an extensive summary of the grammar and syntax encountered in both volumes. Last, as a capstone, the reader can enjoy reading and understanding Plautus’s comedy Aulularia in the original Latin.Each chapter ends with a brief outline of some aspect of Roman culture, such as housing, fauna and flora, games, crafts, water supply, and cooking—with recipes. And last but not least there are informative tidbits, drawings, cartoons, jokes, riddles, crossword puzzles, and, of course, pictures distributed throughout the book. For while foreign-language study should be logical, coherent, and rigorous, it need not be heavy-handed or pedantic, and certainly not dull. Ideal for use in courses or for brushing up your language skills, From Puella to Plautus, Volume II is a lively and engaging book about the Latin language and life in the Roman Empire.

Read more less

In this collection of essays published by the American Maritain Association, leading philosophers address the project of civilizational renewal including its ethical, political, aesthetic, and religious dimensions. The authors provide a variety of perspectives, both critical and hopeful, concerning such questions as the common good, moral truth, the virtues, culture, art and the beautiful, Christian morality and metaphysics, and the vocation of a Christian intellectual.

Read more less

The essays in this volume, indebted in great part to Jacques Maritain and to other Neo-Thomists, represent a contribution to an understanding of beauty and the arts within the Aristotelian-Thomistic tradition. As such they constitute a different voice in present-day discussions on aesthetics.

Read more less