tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11511673.post115825696052642552..comments2024-01-08T11:08:42.530-05:00Comments on in-fraction: Benedict XVI praises logostchittomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15603445266088083067noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11511673.post-67723794974508366102007-10-19T15:43:00.000-04:002007-10-19T15:43:00.000-04:00The very notion of a "Christian philosophy" arises...The very notion of a "Christian philosophy" arises from the need to understand in terms of reason just what was said in revelation. The use of a Greek word, not a scriptural word, at the Council of Nicaea, as the Pope said, indicated that under the pressure of understanding revelation, the philosophical experience could be fundamental. <BR/><BR/>Faith and philosophy are not in contradiction, but are related to grasp the whole of reality. Both are necessary. This is why pure Scripture is not enough even to understand Scripture's own positions. As Chesterton remarked at the end of "Heretics," it would be revelation, not reason, which, in the end, said that the grass is green, that reason in faith alone would affirm the ordinary things of reality that the modern philosophers could no longer comprehend. ~ Father James Schall, professor of political philosophy at Georgetown University on the Regensburg Lecture.tchittomhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15603445266088083067noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11511673.post-43915755096014289262007-09-10T16:25:00.000-04:002007-09-10T16:25:00.000-04:00Adding to what Pope Benedict says above, Charles J...Adding to what Pope Benedict says above, Charles J. Chaput, O.F.M. Cap., the archbishop of Denver, in his a homily given at the inauguration Mass for the newly founded Wyoming Catholic College, had this to say about the relationship between faith and reason. These points are taken from a post on <I>First Things</I>'s blog:<BR/><BR/>G.K. Chesterton once described lunatics as people who have lost everything but their reason. What he meant was this: When human reason cuts itself off from conscience, experience, and common sense, it subverts itself. It becomes a logical-sounding form of lunacy. The results are usually bad.<BR/><BR/> Education is an ambiguous word. It guarantees nobody’s humanity. It’s quite possible to be very well educated in a modern sense and at the same time to be shallow, smug, credulous, bigoted, and even murderous. <BR/><BR/>It’s the content, the purpose, and the result of an education that count. <BR/><BR/>But the heart of being a Catholic is not a set of ideas. It’s a person—the person of Jesus Christ. The goal of a Catholic life is meeting, loving, and following Jesus Christ. Christianity is not a social-reform plan. It’s a love story. And it’s a love story like any other real love story—it has consequences. <BR/><BR/>our faith should bear fruit in all sorts of personally and socially virtuous action. But our love for others should always nourish and be nourished by a love for God in Jesus Christ. Human reason is a tremendous and beautiful gift. But in the end, it is love—not simply reason—that makes us human. In fact, it is only love that makes human reason truly “human.” <BR/><BR/>The vocation of every Christian life is to change the world: to open the eyes of the world and to bring the world to Jesus Christ. And the role of Catholic education is to give students the zeal, the faith, and the intellectual depth to do that.tchittomhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15603445266088083067noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11511673.post-47324488828415941332007-08-24T11:45:00.000-04:002007-08-24T11:45:00.000-04:00Augustine, in both On the Trinity and the Confessi...Augustine, in both On the Trinity and the Confessions (see especially, Book 13, Chp 11, the final paragraph), repeatedly identifies the illumination of Christ as a precondition for knowledge and intellection.<BR/><BR/>In parallel with this, I'm told, is the epistemology of the Reformed apologist Cornelius Van Til, who made the Trinity the solution to the ancient problem of the one and the many. His solution was to show how the doctrine of the equal ultimacy of the persons in the Trinity provides the necessary preconditions for knowledge of any kind to begin.tchittomhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15603445266088083067noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11511673.post-31096852346171729172007-08-23T13:59:00.000-04:002007-08-23T13:59:00.000-04:00Fr. Jody, I'm flattered that you would take the ti...Fr. Jody, I'm flattered that you would take the time to comment on this post. And, you know, there is no such thing as an old post. Blogging, in my view, is akin to Rowling's penseive: memories pulled out into the objective world. I'm still, for example, chewing on a bit about Calvin's misunderstanding of the fourth commandment (by the Reformed numbering) on keeping the Sabbath which I blogged on years ago at the very beginning of this exercise. At any rate, your post.<BR/><BR/>Your knowledge of historical theology, and especially of the medieval period, is remarkable. My eyes glaze over at the very mention of Duns Scotus or nominalism. Still, didn't Aquinas hire his own translator for Aristotle? If so, that may have been the reason he didn't approach him through Averroes etc.<BR/><BR/>You are correct about the friction between philosophy and theology. And, these days, philosophy asks the questions that theology answers. Nevertheless, I tend to think that Augustine's inner teacher of <I>de Magistro</I> is probably closest to the truth of it. Looking forward to your Bonaventure quotation.tchittomhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15603445266088083067noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11511673.post-19736047517383486462007-08-23T13:42:00.000-04:002007-08-23T13:42:00.000-04:00I know this is an old post, but I wanted to commen...I know this is an old post, but I wanted to comment. I recall my medieval philosophy course from college where we talked about the whole conflict over "Latin Averoeism," an error of which even Thomas Aquinas in 1217 was condemned for (but later exonerated). These Latin Averoeists had imbibed Aristotle through the lens of Islamic philosophers such as Averroes and Avicenna and came to have a more distant view of God because of it. I wonder if Dun Scotus' voluntarism falls into that category? It would be interesting to study more about.<BR/><BR/>But the whole Averoeist controversy stands as a testament to an ongoing conflict in Christianity, I think. The basic contention of Latin Averroeism as I understand it, was that reason and philosophy are greater than or superior to faith. Of course, Benedict (I think rightly) doesn't want to make that distinction, or to subject reason to faith (more along the lines of Agustine) because faith at its best--like the God it is directed at--is supremely reasonable. But this conflict is what St. Bonaventure was involved in when he wrote one of my favorite quotes about the hierarchy of philosophy, scripture and faith... I don't have my book in front of me, but I'll find it tonight and post the quote.<BR/><BR/>And since I'm picking up my new glasses today, I should actually be able to read for a normal amount of time without my head exploding. :-pJody Howardhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14073787540447454650noreply@blogger.com