John Paul II and the Significance of the Trinity for Human Dignity (original) (raw)

Hans Urs von Balthasar, "A Commentary on John Paul II's Dominum et Vivificantem"

Communio: International Catholic Review, 2020

H a n s Urs von Ba lt H a s a r "Being fulfilled by God's Holy Spirit through renunciation, through making space, through becoming poor, is the only mode in which we can come to know God as he is in truth: the Love that can be thought only as a reciprocal 'self-giving' in which nothing is held back." 1. COM PLETION OF A TR IN ITA R I A N TH EOLOGY Dominum et vivificantem, the encyclical presented by Pope John Paul II on the Solemnity of Pentecost in this liturgical year 1986, is manifestly the completion of a project that bears a trinitarian structure. His first encyclical, Redemptor hominis (March 1979), concerned Jesus Christ the Son of God as the center point both of our faith and of our ecclesial task in and for the world. It is first of all through Jesus that we find access to "his and our Father" (Dives in misericordia), as we are granted to know the Father's mind through the Son's Incarnation, life, and death on the Cross. Out of this death the Holy Communio 47 (Winter 2020).

Paul, the Trinity, and Contemporary Trinitarian Debates

The Pacific Journal of Baptist Research, 2016

The twentieth century" so write Christophe Chalamet and Marc Vial, "can be seen as the century of a rediscovery of trinitarian thought". 1 As they point out, this had led to a number of controversies, including the definition of "personhood" and the relationship between the "economic" and the "immanent" Trinity. But perhaps most importantly, the latest debates concern the claim that this rediscovery presents nothing other than "thoroughgoing departures from the older tradition, rather than revivals of it". This, at least, is the judgment of Stephen Holmes. 2 It is a damning assessment of so-called "social" or "relational" models of the Trinity, which speak of divine ontology in terms of relationality, movement, dance etc., i.e., those that resist "static" notions of Being parsed in terms of a doctrine of divine simplicity. Hence, the recent Counterpoints book, Two Views on the Doctrine of the Trinity, which gave space for representatives in this debate to discuss matters head on, is an important service to the wider ecclesial and theological community. 3 In this volume, Paul Fiddes presents a defence of the "relational" model of the Trinity, precisely that which Holmes claims is an illegitimate development away from the tradition. 4 In the following I will reflect on a

TOWARDS A FUNDAMENTAL THEOLOGICAL RE‐INTERPRETATION OF VATICAN II

The Heythrop Journal, 2008

This paper argues for a fundamental theological re-interpretation of Vatican II ecclesiology that acknowledges not one but two principal ecclesiologies inspired by the Council documents. Ecclesiastical authorities and some theologians have acknowledged that communion ecclesiology is the principal ecclesiology of Vatican II. However, this conception does not sufficiently account for the full range of relations with the Other that is a distinctive development in the Church's self-understanding inaugurated by Vatican II; such an understanding is better represented by an ecclesiology of friendship. I thus argue there are two ecclesiologies reflected in the Council documents: communion ecclesiology and another to be developed based on mutual relations and friendship with the Other. The latter is distinctively Ignatian in spirit; further, these two ecclesiologies are not fundamentally opposed to each other but are united in the missions of the Son and the Spirit.

The Trinity and the Life of the Christian: A Liturgical Catechism, New Blackfriars 92 (2011).

In this article -the first Bishop Kevin Dunn Memorial Lecture -I argue that one of the most important resources available for Catholics seeking to understand or teach Trinitarian doctrine is the liturgy of the Mass. I suggest that the text of the liturgy (novus ordo) offers us three patterns of Trinitarian speech that we should emulate. The first ascribes equal glory to Father, Son and Spirit. The second pattern teaches us that the fundamental story of Christian faith is a Trinitarian one. The creation comes from the Father, through the Son and in the Spirit; salvation is a process of being incorporated into the Son by the Spirit so that we may be led to the Father. This narrative is seen particularly clearly in the new eucharistic prayers of the Roman rite. The third pattern is that of using such theological formulae "as one nature and three persons". These formulae are used sparingly and in contexts which emphasize that the realities of which they speak remain mysterious -and must be the subject of our worship if our understanding is to grow. In our thought, teaching and prayer we should be attentive to the relative priority that these liturgical patterns suggest.

The Trinity in Selected Creeds of the Church

World of Theology, 2020

This study assumes that the classical Christian teaching on the Trinity is consistent with the Bible, though this claim will not be documented at length. The reader who is uncertain that the Triune nature of God is taught in the Bible should carefully consider some of the many relevant biblical texts on this theme. Though the technical language of the classical Christian creeds is not used in the Bible, this careful way of speaking about God flows organically from the entire Bible. A few selected texts which the reader may want to consider: Though the teaching about the Trinity comes mostly in the New Testament, there are many places where the Old Testament points toward understanding God as a Trinity. This is sometimes connected with descriptions of complexity within the Godhead, sometimes with clear distinctions between the work of God as Creator and as Redeemer. Some of these texts are: Our understanding of the Trinity is closely associated with our understanding of Jesus, the Christ, who is fully God and fully man, yet one Person. This classical Christian teaching is also assumed in this study, though it will not be defended

Introduction: The Doctrine of the Trinity in Christian Faith and Global Theology

Journal of Reformed Theology, 2009

During the fi nal decades, there has hardly been a doctrinal topic that aroused so much theological refl ection and discussion as the doctrine of the Trinity. Numerous articles, books, and collections of essays have been published by theologians from all major Christian denominations in which the continuing meaning and relevance of this doctrine is explored and substantiated. Since in the 20th century Karl Barth and Karl Rahner put the theme on top of the theological agenda after ages of trinitarian oblivion, we seem to have collectively moved towards an era of what has come to be known as the 'trinitarian renaissance.' Th is renaissance-or revival, as it is also sometimes called-is not restricted to the doctrine of the Trinity as such, but tends to aff ect the overall scheme of how Christian theology is being done. When the doctrine of the Trinity is what binds most Christians together, then how should it infl uence Christian faith and theology as a whole? How should it infl uence, for example, the way in which we conceive of the church, or our anthropology, or even our understanding of the sacraments? Such questions are far from idiosyncratic by now. All in all, the rebirth of trinitarian theology is generally seen as "one of the most far-reaching theological developments of the [20th] century" (Stanley J. Grenz).

A Thomistic Analysis of the Trinitarian Anthropology in John Paul II's Mulieris Dignitatem

In this paper, I consider to what degree the Trinitarian theology of St. Thomas Aquinas uphold the magisterial teachings of St. John Paul II on the matter of whether the communio personarum in the Holy Trinity can be imaged in the human person by nature. In Thomistic scholarship, the teachings of John Paul II on the image of God being discussed from the aspect of sexual differentiation will give pause to many because though St. Thomas himself holds, in line with Augustine, that man is indeed an imago Trinitatis, he clearly denies that this can be the case according to many, insofar as the imago Dei can only be in the mind. As I argue, the Trinitarian analogy proposed by St. John Paul II would only present a contradiction if the argument for the Trinitarian image was considered with regard to origin and thus to personal differentiation. By making a brief analysis of Mulieris Dignitatem, it will be seen that the argument is not based upon sexual differentiation per se, but instead on the ‘gift of self.” I maintain that the Trinitarian likeness is derived from the love shared between persons in the unity of conjugal communion by which the persons are directed toward one another, such as in the Trinitarian circumincession. Looking at the evidence will serve to show that John Paul II’s Trinitarian anthropology validly illustrates the analogous nature between the interpersonal communion of love in the Holy Trinity and the communion of love between man and woman. John Paul II’s teaching does not conflict with that of St. Thomas, but rather, builds upon the very foundation that St. Thomas has provided, and even takes the matter further so as to formulate a greater magisterial development, showing how the “gift of self” in the Trinity serves as the exemplar cause for the communio personarum, as the principle of directedness in the very nature of man.

The Second Vatican Council’s Doctrine on Mary and St. Pope John Paul II’s Interpretation of It

Rocznik Teologii Katolickiej, 2019

This article traces the origin and content of the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church: Lumen Gentium's chapter on Mary, which served as the focal point of the Second Vatican Council's doctrine on the Mother of God in the mystery of Christ and the Church. The article proceeds to describe the Archbishop of Cracow Karol Wojtyla's participation in conciliar discussions on Mary and then focuses on how Pope John Paul II embraced conciliar Mariology and reflected it in his teachings. What St. Pope John Paul II wrote about Mary goes beyond Vatican II's Mariological teaching and includes Mary's mediation, consecration to Mary, and Her role as the "Spouse of the Holy Spirit. " Pope Saint John Paul II offers a valuable paradigm for interpreting the Second Vatican Council.

The Universal Mission of the Church according to Pope John Paul II

New Blackfriars, 2011

Recently, Pope Benedict XVI announced the establishment of a Pontifical Council for New Evangelisation. This Council has been given the specific task of promoting a renewed evangelization in countries where the first proclamation of the faith already resounded, and where Churches are present of ancient foundation, but which are going through a progressive secularization of society and a sort of "eclipse of the sense of God," which constitutes a challenge to find the appropriate means to propose again the perennial truth of the Gospel of Christ. 1 This 'charter', together with the fact that the new Council does not replace the Congregation for the Evangelisation of the Peoples, shows that its purpose is to spur new efforts at spreading the Gospel in European countries like the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy and Spain, where secularism has a strong anti-Christian bias-but not excluding countries like the United States of America, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, where Christianity has also been weakened by strong secularising trends. Besides this, the establishment of this Council once more raises questions about the nature of 'new evangelisation', its relation to evangelisation per se, to the mission ad gentes, and the place of 'new evangelisation' within the universal mission of the Church, as well as the question of whether or not Benedict XVI's understanding of these activities might differ from John Paul II's. As a contribution to answering these questions, especially that of the place of 'new evangelisation' within the universal mission of the Church, I propose in this essay to analyse John Paul II's understanding of the universality of the Church's mission. Why Mission? According to John Paul II, the basis of mission has a double aspect. First, the nature of Christ, and therefore the Christian, is to love,