Catholic theologian David Schindler exposes the inadequacy of the theology of liberalism in regard to human freedom and "worldly" automomy, while suggesting how "communion" transforms and protects freedom and autonomy in the culture.

Heart of the World, Center of the Church: Communi Ecclesiology, Liberalism, and Liberation

Schindler, David L.

Religion & Spirituality

ISI Books

Today, thirty years after the Second Vatican Council, there can be little doubt that the notion of communio ("communion") is at the center of Catholicism's renewed understanding of the Church. In Heart of the World, Center of the Church David L. Schindler shows that communio is also at the heart of the Church's worldly mission. Invoking God's spousal relation to the world, Schindler argues that the Church's answer to the question of worldly freedom is nothing less than its own communio. Yet the claim that the Church promotes the "legitimate autonomy of earthly realities" by penetrating the world with its own intimate reality is hardly a matter of arcane speculation. Heart of the World, Center of the Church develops its thesis in critical dialogue with Western (especially Anglo-American) liberalism, whose ascendancy especially after the events of 1989 poses a host of urgent questions for the Church. Examining liberalism in politics, economics, and the academy, Schindler exposes its inadequate theology of human freedom and "worldly" autonomy, while suggesting how communio both transforms and protects freedom and autonomy in their varied cultural expressions. In the spirit of Pope John Paul II's call for a "new evangelization," Schindler contributes to what the Pope himself has strongly reaffirmed as "the positive value of an authentic theology of integral human liberation" (Centesimus Annus, 26).

Heart of the World, Center of the Church: Communio Ecclesiology, Liberalism, and Liberation

William. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company

Metaphysical study of God, love, technology, and culture in modern society Reality most basically and properly considered, says David L. Schindler, is an order of love ― a gift that finds its objective only in an entire way of life. Love is what first brings things into existence, and everything exists in, through, and for love. With this understanding of reality, Schindler explores how modern culture marginalizes love, regarding it at best as a matter of piety or goodwill rather than as the very stuff that makes our lives and the things of the world real. Schindler examines how Western civilization’s fixation with technology ― especially its displacement of experience with experiment and its privileging of knowing and making ― has undermined its capacity to build an authentic human culture. Schindler sees this as a technological age not simply because of technological advancements but because of the way we think as the result of our technological orientation. He shows, within the context of politics, economics, science, and cultural and professional life generally, that God-centered love is what gives things their deepest and most proper order and meaning.

Ordering Love: Liberal Societies and the Memory of God

Christian Books & Bibles

Christian Living

Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.

Pope Paul VI characterized the Second Vatican Council’s Declaration on Religious Freedom -- Dignitatis Humanae -- as one of the greatest documents of Vatican II. It is also perhaps the most intensely debated document of the Council; both the drafting of the Declaration of Religious Freedom and its reception have been marked by deep disagreements about what this teaching means for the Church. In this book David Schindler and Nicholas Healy promote a deeper understanding of this important document. In addition to presenting a new translation of the approved text of the Declaration, Freedom, Truth, and Human Dignity makes available for the first time in English the five drafts of the document that were presented to the Council bishops leading up to the final version. The book also includes an original interpretive essay on Dignitatis Humanae by Schindler and an essay on the genesis and redaction history of the text by Healy.

Freedom, Truth, and Human Dignity: The Second Vatican Council's Declaration on Religious Freedom (Humanum)

History

Healy Jr., Nicholas J.

World

Expressed in the encyclicals and books, in speeches and sermons, the thought of Pope John Paul II has enriched the Church in many ways. In this volume, scholars examine central aspects of the thought of John Paul II and explore its significance for the contemporary Church.

The Legacy of Pope John Paul II: His Contribution to Catholic Thought

Hittinger, Russell

Smith, William B.

Koterski, Joseph W.

Crosby, John E.

Catholicism

Herder & Herder

Referring to creation as generous is not common. We normally associate notions of generosity and gift in the created order with human being and action, imputing such notions to other creatures and the whole of creation often only in a "poetic" sense. Once we center the reality of all things in God as a loving Creator, however, we become disposed to see everything, in its very givenness, as gift―a reality that participates from its depths, in analogical ways, in God's generosity, such as to make possible a deepened look also at the problem of evil. The Generosity of Creation has a twofold purpose in this light. The four chapters of Part I spell out what this God-centeredness implies for our understanding of the cosmos in various contexts: first, the "paradigmatic" meaning of the child and childlikeness for a civilization rightly ordered in terms of gift; second, ecology considered in terms of a "liberation theology" guided by "integral human development"; third, the unity between "ideas" and "reality" as a necessary condition for "preserving nature as the pre-sacrament, and the Church as the sacrament, of the Word of God's Love"; fourth, human freedom conceived primarily as a response to the good and a desire for God, in contrast to the would-be neutral or indifferent freedom characteristic of liberal societies. Part II explores the metaphysical foundations for speaking of creatures as "generous": gifts from God that participate, each according to its own nature, in God's giving. The exploration unfolds in dialogue with theologian Michael Waldstein, in relation to the anthropology of John Paul II and the metaphysics of Thomas Aquinas.

The Generosity of Creation

Humanum Academic Press

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