Frits De Lange | Protestant Theological University, The Netherlands (original) (raw)
Papers by Frits De Lange
International Journal of Public Theology, 2015
Th e modern life course is described as a 'choice biography.' Rationality and control, ... more Th e modern life course is described as a 'choice biography.' Rationality and control, and life planning and self-management are central notions. Instead of rejecting the notion categorically, this article opts for a more balanced approach. Th e Protestant tradition shares central characteristics with choice biography, as Calvin, Edwards, and Bunyan show. However, there are dissimilarities as well. Fundamental in 'choice biography' is its lack of transcendence. Modern individualism threatens to collapse into one-dimensional secularism and egoism. In retrieving Kierkegaard's legacy, the notion 'choice biography' might undergo a critical re-appraisal. In his philosophy, we find both the absolute value of the individual's choices, and a plea for transcendence.
Tsotsi The South African winner of an Academy Award, ‘Tsotsi’, deals with the hard life of a gang... more Tsotsi The South African winner of an Academy Award, ‘Tsotsi’, deals with the hard life of a gang member in a township – ‘a place without hope, where life has no meaning and survival is the only thing that matters’, as the movie-trailer tells us. His life changes however, as soon as after hijacking a car he discovers a baby on the backseat and takes it home with him. Until then he is leading a life of despair, violence and rivalry, in which he tries to forget the traumas of his past and has no hope for the future. Orphaned at early age, (his mother died on AIDS) he survives by robbing and killing. In one scène, after an outbreak of heavy violence after he was asked about his past, one of Tsotsi’s gang members explains to a rival thug that ‘Tsotsi never went to school. He doesn’t understand decency.’ Then he asks the rival: ‘Do you know about that, Fela? Decency? Can you even spell it?’ It is a key scène in the movie. Decency stands for dignity, the sense of human worth as self-respe...
The Bible is a defenseless book. Time and again it has allowed itself to be misused in order to g... more The Bible is a defenseless book. Time and again it has allowed itself to be misused in order to gloss over human evil and provide it with a religious sanction. Slavery, colonialism, apartheid, exploiting nature, the oppression of women, the death penalty, war – they have all been sanctioned as ‘willed by God’ using the Bible. What makes the Bible so susceptible to abuse and how can we resist this? Is it really a question of abuse, or does the Bible itself give rise to doubtful practices? Do we really need the Bible, when choices have to be made in contemporary matters? Why would we want to ‘appeal’ to Scripture? Can it be a guide in matters of good and evil?
In our high modern society the human life course increasingly seems to become a matter of individ... more In our high modern society the human life course increasingly seems to become a matter of individual construction. Traditional institutional frameworks of education, marriage and family, work and retirement, selfevident until far into the 20th century, more and more are loosing their regulating normative function. In the organization of the life course a process of de-institutionalization is occurring. How people organize their life over time is no longer embedded in a compelling network of social expectations, but seems to be object of personal choice. Sexual identity, marriage, getting and raising children, work and career, care, education – they seem to have become life style options. Shall I become hetero or homosexual, shall I live together in a LAT relationship or marry, or shall I stay single? Do I opt for an ambitious career for which I’m prepared to set everything aside, or do I want to live more broadly, with lots of free time, filled with voluntary work or social responsi...
Being raised in a Reformed family in the roaring sixties of the last century, the fifth of the Te... more Being raised in a Reformed family in the roaring sixties of the last century, the fifth of the Ten Commandments has left me with mixed feelings. 'Honour thy father and thy mother' (Exodus 20: 12) was used in church and at home, in and out of season, to prevent rebellious youngsters to emerge from their parents' authority. Children should not strive for independence and autonomy, but obey their parents, was the message. The fifth commandment was considered as a legitimization of the contested authority of educators in the nuclear family. Recent exegesis of the Ten Commandments, however, clearly takes distance from this interpretation. Actually, the focus of the fifth cornmandment is not on parental authority but on filial du ties for elderly parents. 'The command .. . is not about the obligation of (young) children to submit to parental authority, but is directed to adult persons, those who in the patriarchal society are family heads. They, the (oldeSl) sons, when the...
Invited by the family Jonker to say a few words in memory of Willie Jonker on behalf of the Theol... more Invited by the family Jonker to say a few words in memory of Willie Jonker on behalf of the Theological University Kampen, I was kindly asked to do it in Dutch, the language Willie Jonker learned fluently the moment he arrived in 1968 in Kampen as professor in practical theology, because as he said with a bit of irony 'die studente daar kan maklik 'n mens se intelligensie aan jou Nederlandse taalvermoe meet'.
International Perspectives on Aging
Old age can be considered a radicalization of the human condition. In this phase of life, its fun... more Old age can be considered a radicalization of the human condition. In this phase of life, its fundamental relationality is experienced in its extremes; in its dependency and loneliness as well as in the intensification of personal relationships of love and friendship. In dominant discourses of modernity, relationality competes with – or is at the most additional to – autonomy, understood as individual independence. By contrast, this chapter develops a responsive understanding of human life which comprises both individual agency and dependency in their dynamic interplay.
Journal of Population Ageing
‘Ageing is a disease, disease is suffering, and suffering should be minimized.’ Old age as an equ... more ‘Ageing is a disease, disease is suffering, and suffering should be minimized.’ Old age as an equivalent of suffering to be eliminated, is a well-known scheme of thought in contemporary culture. This ‘suffering from old age’ argument, however, as is argued in the first section of this article, obscures and denies the reality and complexity of the human condition and the place of suffering in it. Old age is to be understood as the radicalization and intensification of the human condition. Suffering in old age, as argued in the second part, can therefore best be conceived in terms of existential threats to the integrity of the self. It entails the embodied experience of the broken dialogue between the self and the world, often perceived as a lack of control and as loss. Suffering, perceived in this way, seems to be permanent to the human condition. It induces the search for meaning. In the context of unavoidable suffering, a ‘presence approach’, instead of an interventionist attitude, is required.
Journal of Pastoral Theology, 2015
NTT Journal for Theology and the Study of Religion
In 2013 the World Council of Churches adopted the pilgrimage theme for its policy in the coming y... more In 2013 the World Council of Churches adopted the pilgrimage theme for its policy in the coming years. In this article the implications of the WCC’s use of the pilgrim metaphor is explored and analyzed. It is argued that, in order to present themselves credibly as involved in a Pilgrimage of Justice and Peace, Christian faith communities should embody ‐ at least ‐ the demanding virtues of hope, humility, and the relativization of self-identity.
STJ | Stellenbosch Theological Journal
Die dood en die sin van die lewe deur Van Niekerk, Anton A2017, TafelbergISBN 9780624075332
STJ | Stellenbosch Theological Journal
In this article, the changing geography of care for the elderly in today’s society is mapped out ... more In this article, the changing geography of care for the elderly in today’s society is mapped out in (1) its consequences for the meaning of “home” for frail elderly and (2) for the distribution of care responsibilities. Two current ideas that are criticized are that (1) home is always the best place to be (and therefore also the preferred place to receive care), and (2) that one has stronger ethical obligations to people who live in one’s neighbourhood, because of their proximity. Together with the so-called ethics of care, care is considered a fundamental societal practice, and the distribution of caring responsibilities a primary ethical question. Care responsibility, it is argued, is never a natural given, but must be negotiated in every situation and different context anew. In following moral philosopher Robert Goodin, the article concludes that responsibility in long-term relationships between frail parents and adult children not proximity is decisive for assigning responsibili...
Journal of Reformed Theology
Pro Ecclesia: A Journal of Catholic and Evangelical Theology
Health and Social Care Chaplaincy, 2016
Ethics and Health Policy, 2012
International Journal of Public Theology, 2015
Th e modern life course is described as a 'choice biography.' Rationality and control, ... more Th e modern life course is described as a 'choice biography.' Rationality and control, and life planning and self-management are central notions. Instead of rejecting the notion categorically, this article opts for a more balanced approach. Th e Protestant tradition shares central characteristics with choice biography, as Calvin, Edwards, and Bunyan show. However, there are dissimilarities as well. Fundamental in 'choice biography' is its lack of transcendence. Modern individualism threatens to collapse into one-dimensional secularism and egoism. In retrieving Kierkegaard's legacy, the notion 'choice biography' might undergo a critical re-appraisal. In his philosophy, we find both the absolute value of the individual's choices, and a plea for transcendence.
Tsotsi The South African winner of an Academy Award, ‘Tsotsi’, deals with the hard life of a gang... more Tsotsi The South African winner of an Academy Award, ‘Tsotsi’, deals with the hard life of a gang member in a township – ‘a place without hope, where life has no meaning and survival is the only thing that matters’, as the movie-trailer tells us. His life changes however, as soon as after hijacking a car he discovers a baby on the backseat and takes it home with him. Until then he is leading a life of despair, violence and rivalry, in which he tries to forget the traumas of his past and has no hope for the future. Orphaned at early age, (his mother died on AIDS) he survives by robbing and killing. In one scène, after an outbreak of heavy violence after he was asked about his past, one of Tsotsi’s gang members explains to a rival thug that ‘Tsotsi never went to school. He doesn’t understand decency.’ Then he asks the rival: ‘Do you know about that, Fela? Decency? Can you even spell it?’ It is a key scène in the movie. Decency stands for dignity, the sense of human worth as self-respe...
The Bible is a defenseless book. Time and again it has allowed itself to be misused in order to g... more The Bible is a defenseless book. Time and again it has allowed itself to be misused in order to gloss over human evil and provide it with a religious sanction. Slavery, colonialism, apartheid, exploiting nature, the oppression of women, the death penalty, war – they have all been sanctioned as ‘willed by God’ using the Bible. What makes the Bible so susceptible to abuse and how can we resist this? Is it really a question of abuse, or does the Bible itself give rise to doubtful practices? Do we really need the Bible, when choices have to be made in contemporary matters? Why would we want to ‘appeal’ to Scripture? Can it be a guide in matters of good and evil?
In our high modern society the human life course increasingly seems to become a matter of individ... more In our high modern society the human life course increasingly seems to become a matter of individual construction. Traditional institutional frameworks of education, marriage and family, work and retirement, selfevident until far into the 20th century, more and more are loosing their regulating normative function. In the organization of the life course a process of de-institutionalization is occurring. How people organize their life over time is no longer embedded in a compelling network of social expectations, but seems to be object of personal choice. Sexual identity, marriage, getting and raising children, work and career, care, education – they seem to have become life style options. Shall I become hetero or homosexual, shall I live together in a LAT relationship or marry, or shall I stay single? Do I opt for an ambitious career for which I’m prepared to set everything aside, or do I want to live more broadly, with lots of free time, filled with voluntary work or social responsi...
Being raised in a Reformed family in the roaring sixties of the last century, the fifth of the Te... more Being raised in a Reformed family in the roaring sixties of the last century, the fifth of the Ten Commandments has left me with mixed feelings. 'Honour thy father and thy mother' (Exodus 20: 12) was used in church and at home, in and out of season, to prevent rebellious youngsters to emerge from their parents' authority. Children should not strive for independence and autonomy, but obey their parents, was the message. The fifth commandment was considered as a legitimization of the contested authority of educators in the nuclear family. Recent exegesis of the Ten Commandments, however, clearly takes distance from this interpretation. Actually, the focus of the fifth cornmandment is not on parental authority but on filial du ties for elderly parents. 'The command .. . is not about the obligation of (young) children to submit to parental authority, but is directed to adult persons, those who in the patriarchal society are family heads. They, the (oldeSl) sons, when the...
Invited by the family Jonker to say a few words in memory of Willie Jonker on behalf of the Theol... more Invited by the family Jonker to say a few words in memory of Willie Jonker on behalf of the Theological University Kampen, I was kindly asked to do it in Dutch, the language Willie Jonker learned fluently the moment he arrived in 1968 in Kampen as professor in practical theology, because as he said with a bit of irony 'die studente daar kan maklik 'n mens se intelligensie aan jou Nederlandse taalvermoe meet'.
International Perspectives on Aging
Old age can be considered a radicalization of the human condition. In this phase of life, its fun... more Old age can be considered a radicalization of the human condition. In this phase of life, its fundamental relationality is experienced in its extremes; in its dependency and loneliness as well as in the intensification of personal relationships of love and friendship. In dominant discourses of modernity, relationality competes with – or is at the most additional to – autonomy, understood as individual independence. By contrast, this chapter develops a responsive understanding of human life which comprises both individual agency and dependency in their dynamic interplay.
Journal of Population Ageing
‘Ageing is a disease, disease is suffering, and suffering should be minimized.’ Old age as an equ... more ‘Ageing is a disease, disease is suffering, and suffering should be minimized.’ Old age as an equivalent of suffering to be eliminated, is a well-known scheme of thought in contemporary culture. This ‘suffering from old age’ argument, however, as is argued in the first section of this article, obscures and denies the reality and complexity of the human condition and the place of suffering in it. Old age is to be understood as the radicalization and intensification of the human condition. Suffering in old age, as argued in the second part, can therefore best be conceived in terms of existential threats to the integrity of the self. It entails the embodied experience of the broken dialogue between the self and the world, often perceived as a lack of control and as loss. Suffering, perceived in this way, seems to be permanent to the human condition. It induces the search for meaning. In the context of unavoidable suffering, a ‘presence approach’, instead of an interventionist attitude, is required.
Journal of Pastoral Theology, 2015
NTT Journal for Theology and the Study of Religion
In 2013 the World Council of Churches adopted the pilgrimage theme for its policy in the coming y... more In 2013 the World Council of Churches adopted the pilgrimage theme for its policy in the coming years. In this article the implications of the WCC’s use of the pilgrim metaphor is explored and analyzed. It is argued that, in order to present themselves credibly as involved in a Pilgrimage of Justice and Peace, Christian faith communities should embody ‐ at least ‐ the demanding virtues of hope, humility, and the relativization of self-identity.
STJ | Stellenbosch Theological Journal
Die dood en die sin van die lewe deur Van Niekerk, Anton A2017, TafelbergISBN 9780624075332
STJ | Stellenbosch Theological Journal
In this article, the changing geography of care for the elderly in today’s society is mapped out ... more In this article, the changing geography of care for the elderly in today’s society is mapped out in (1) its consequences for the meaning of “home” for frail elderly and (2) for the distribution of care responsibilities. Two current ideas that are criticized are that (1) home is always the best place to be (and therefore also the preferred place to receive care), and (2) that one has stronger ethical obligations to people who live in one’s neighbourhood, because of their proximity. Together with the so-called ethics of care, care is considered a fundamental societal practice, and the distribution of caring responsibilities a primary ethical question. Care responsibility, it is argued, is never a natural given, but must be negotiated in every situation and different context anew. In following moral philosopher Robert Goodin, the article concludes that responsibility in long-term relationships between frail parents and adult children not proximity is decisive for assigning responsibili...
Journal of Reformed Theology
Pro Ecclesia: A Journal of Catholic and Evangelical Theology
Health and Social Care Chaplaincy, 2016
Ethics and Health Policy, 2012
The Event of Compassion. In: Considering Compassion: Global Ethics, Human Dignity, and the Compassionate God, Frits de Lange & L. Juliana Claassens (eds.), Pickwick Publications (Wipf & Stock), Eugene OR 2018, 17 - 30.
This essay is about ethics and compassion. But I do not do not want to look here at compassion f... more This essay is about ethics and compassion. But I do not do not want to look here at compassion from the perspective of ethics, but conversely, I want to question ethics from the perspective of compassion.
Instead of situating compassion somewhere within ethical theory, I rather seek to question the ethical enterprise as a whole from the perspective of compassion. More precisely, my argument is that the event of compassion deconstructs the “ethical subject” as the center of moral agency, i.e., the presupposition of most of the modern ethical theory. I suggest that in ethics, we, as moral subjects, do not know who we are. And that is exactly who we are. Instead of defining more precisely our moral identity, ethics benefits of its unsettlement.
In the first part of this essay, I will approach compassion not as an ethical concept, or a moral emotion, virtue or principle, but as a phenomenon that, if taken seriously, precludes the possibility of speaking about moral agents as closed subjects, centers of interior reflection on their outward behavior.
In the second part of this essay, I illustrate this perspective with a reading of the biblical parable of the Good Samaritan that is one of the most powerful stories ever told on the subject of compassion.
How will we be able to provide dignified care for elderly who are dependent on support of others,... more How will we be able to provide dignified care for elderly who are dependent on support of others, and how you will be able to respect and value yourself once you got old yourself?
This is the question that I want to think through with you from the perspective of Christian ethics. The leading vision in Christian ethics is the double love command: Love God with all that is in you, and love your neighbor as yourself. It my impression that when the commandment: Love your neighbor as you love yourself, is understood as: Love your ageing neighbor, as you love your ageing self, Christian ethics can deliver an important contribution to the societal debate on ageing.
Public theology’s mission is to constantly remind the health care sector – easily colonized by th... more Public theology’s mission is to constantly remind the health care sector – easily colonized by the powers of money and market – of the divine compassionate care, as the original ‘why’ and ‘what for’ of our care for human bodies and minds. This chapter presents two contributions of public theology to health care, one concerned with the goals of health care (what is health?), the other with its values and virtues (what is good care?) Through Christianity, health care became a public affair, a matter of institutionalized compassion. Health care should contribute to a person’s capability to ‘live upright’. Curing is one important, but no decisive element in a comprehensive understanding of health care. Central to Christian anthropology is the recognition that human beings are interdependent, vulnerable, and relational. The ‘ethics of care’ presents itself as a powerful ally of public theology.
In light of the numerous challenges posed by globalization, living together as humanity on one pl... more In light of the numerous challenges posed by globalization, living together as humanity on one planet needs to be reinvented in the twenty-first century. To create a new, peaceful, just, and sustainable world order is vital to the survival of us all. In this regard, humankind will have to expand the limited scope of its moral imagination beyond the borders of family, tribe, class, religion, nation, and culture. Will the cultivation of compassion, as scholars like Martha Nussbaum and Karen Armstrong, and religious leaders like the Dalai Lama maintain, contribute to a more just world? A global movement to cultivate and extend compassion beyond the immediate circle of concern may indeed find inspiration from many different religious traditions.
The question at the heart of this book is whether the Christian legacy provides us with sources of moral imagination needed to guide us into the global era. Can the Christian practice of faith contribute to a more compassionate world? If so, how? And is it true that compassion is what we need, or do we need something else (justice, for example)? In Considering Compassion, colleagues from different theological disciplines at Stellenbosch, South Africa, and Groningen, Netherlands, take up these challenging questions from a variety of interdisciplinary angles.