COMMUNION FOR THE REMARRIEDThe pope has given the go-ahead for discussion. He doesn't say whether he is on the side of those in favor or those against, but he appears to be much closer to the former than to the latter.
HUMANAE VITAE, A HALF-CENTURY ONThe 'enthusiasm gap' is reflective of more than just the present moment; it suggests continuation of the skirmishes within the Church that have persisted through Francis’s papacy.
A WAKE-UP CALL TO LIBERAL THEOLOGIANSThe estrangement between academic theology and the institutional Church is one reason many younger Catholics are now turning to neo-traditionalist circles for instruction
DARING TO HOPE THAT ALL WILL BE SAVEDThe history of the church has not been kind to the notion of universal salvation. Though there have been a good number of theologians who defend the hope that all may be saved, the church’s teaching for centuries has been that hell will not be empty.
FOR US AND FOR OUR SALVATION?Rethinking Jesus’ death radically changes our image of God the Father from punishing and wrathful to one with whom most parents can identify.
IT'S NOTHING PERSONALPapal infallibility is utterly misunderstood. Nowhere is it decreed that the pope is infallible; the Catholic Church has never taught that any pope is infallible.
PARALLEL MAGISTERIUM?If theologians are condemned for not being in conformity with the Catechism, can they do theology at all?
TIME TO REHABILITATE TEILHARD DE CHARDIN?Naming Jesuit Fr. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin a doctor of the church — or at least removing the 'warning' from his writings — would give the Jesuit scientist and philosopher more legitimacy in the church. And two separate petitions to the Vatican aim to do just that.
THAT '70S CHURCHThe Roman Catholic tradition does not need to be afraid of history; its central claim is that God became a man who fully experienced the contingencies of life in a certain time and place.
A QUESTION OF CONSCIENCEMany U.S. Catholics find themselves stranded between those two worlds, especially when individual conscience comes into conflict with clear, if disputed, church teaching.
JESUS' TEACHINGS ON MARRIAGE AND DIVORCEDevelopment in teaching, development in interpretation, or change in teaching, change in interpretation – depending upon what word is preferred – has happened throughout Christian history, from the beginning of the Church.
A THEOLOGY OF ENCOUNTERHow many of us know what it is to be known not as who we are, but only by the labels that society gives us? Sometimes they are fairly innocuous. Sometimes they aren’t.
DOES CHURCH TEACHING CHANGE?Church Doctrine at Trent, Vatican I, and Vatican II. What institutions wittingly or unwittingly chose to remember and chose to forget from their past makes them what they are.
AGAINST BOURGEOIS RELIGIONRemembering Johann Baptist Metz: His chief contribution to theology is not so much a system, or even a set of positions, but a body of lapidary phrases that haunt and disturb theological discourse...
RICHARD ROHR REORDERS THE UNIVERSEChrist — essentially, God’s love for the world — has existed since the beginning of time, suffuses everything in creation, and has been present in all cultures and civilizations.
HONOR YOUR FATHER AND YOUR MOTHER Stale images of God aren't working for today's seekers, says Elizabeth Johnson. New ones are emerging from the experiences of all God's people, male and female.
LONERGAN ON A WORLD ON FIRETo understand: this our great, complex calling, requiring all that we are. We do not understand unless we have labored; we do not know until we have asked every question; we are not responsible except with a living mind.
BAD TRADITIONALISMThe social order of things — its hierarchies, its divisions — may seem inevitable; it is not. Christ’s love breaks it open.
REVISITING THE QUESTION OF "MINISTRY"Some criteria for a pragmatic theology of liturgical ministry: there is only one [merely logical] certainty: the future will not be like the past. And when the present seeks to recede into its past, it is untrue to its own moment.
A SYLLABUS OF INTERNET THEOLOGY ERRORSThe Digital Age is a period of both gain and loss. In just a few short years, the world has become both as small as one’s hometown and many times more hostile and strange.
INTERPRETING REALITYThis previously unpublished text is a set of notes intended for further study. It can be dated between the end of 1987 and the middle of 1988, when Fr. Bergoglio (now Pope Francis) was working on his thesis on Romano Guardini ...
THE BEGINNING OF THE END OF THE WORLDResurrection does not restore our natural life, but gives us a whole new life, a life on the other side of death, where death can no longer touch us.
CHARLES CURRAN REMEMBERS HANS KÜNGHans Küng has been the strongest voice for reform in the Catholic Church during the last 60 years, calling for a broad-based reform of the Catholic Church and pointed toward the goal of the reunion of all Christians.
AN INTERVIEW WITH HANS KÜNG From Commonweal archives: A 1971 interview with Swiss Catholic theologian Hans Küng, who talks about papal infallibility, resisting authority, and his struggle for a less rationalist and more existential Christianity.
TRADITION IS AN ELUSIVE TERMTradition is a reality much deeper than a collection of ancient customs or a conservative force in human history safeguarding against change. It is a living reality active in the Church’s faith, witness, and practice
THE EUCHARIST IS JUSTICETo live the Eucharist is to pursue justice. The Eucharist, though, does not only inspire the pursuit of justice but also shapes the very meaning of justice.
THE KEY TO UNDERSTANDING GODNot only is the Eucharist central as the regula fidei, it is what gives coherence to all else, it is the key to our understanding of God as infinite self-gift...
UNDERSTANDING THE EUCHARISTOur inability to appreciate and understand the symbolic element of the sacraments has led to many unnecessary theological and doctrinal conflicts.
HENRI DE LUBAC’S SACRAMENTAL VISIONIf a sacramental vision is absent, the zone of the “sacred” becomes a mere abstraction and the zone of the “secular” becomes a hellscape devoid of hope, faith, and charity.
A THEOLOGY OF HEAVEN FOR OUR TIMEOur culture’s images of heaven are so saccharine, so sentimental, so boring. What would it be like to hold out the possibility of actual peace, reconciliation, and abundance for all?
NATURAL LAW IS NOT IMMUTABLENatural law is not beyond evolution and may even be a product of it, and how it is understood may be different in different contexts.
WHAT IS LIBERATION THEOLOGY?Broadly speaking, liberation theology is a social and political movement within the church that attempts to interpret the gospel of Jesus Christ through the lived experiences of oppressed people.
THE GOD OF LOVEIt is God’s will that it lies ultimately within the control of human beings whether God’s desire for union with each human being is fulfilled.
DOES DOCTRINE DEVELOP?: AN ANSWER IN SIX STEPSThe question “Does doctrine develop?” has caused the felling of many trees over the past two centuries. The question has become a vital one for modern Catholic thinkers for a variety of reasons.
HOW TO TEACH INTRODUCTORY THEOLOGY(?)It is no secret that, over the past few decades, the student population of Catholic colleges and universities has changed in terms of their religious beliefs and practices.
CHRIST, NOT KNOWLEDGE, SAVESOne of the dangerous tendencies or temptations those who study theology have to overcome is the suggestion that exhaustive theological knowledge is necessary for salvation.
WHAT IS ‘EUCHARISTIC ECCLESIOLOGY’? How can we, the eucharistic assembly, see ourselves as foundational to the Church if we view it as multinational corporation run by bishops? An apostolic model for
becoming a synodal Church.
THEOLOGY MUST INTERPRET THE GOSPEL FOR TODAY’S WORLDIn a new Motu Proprio, "Ad theologiam promovendam", Pope Francis updates the Statutes of the Pontifical Academy of Theology, calling it to "courageous cultural revolution" and commitment to dialogue in the light of Revelation.
EDUCATION – THEOLOGY IN CRISISA Church without theology – “faith seeking understanding” in the classic definition – is unimaginable. So is theology without a foot in the world of robust academic scrutiny, debate and research. And there can be no Catholic theology without some kind of vital connection with the Church.
REAL + TRUE - A VIDEO GUIDEThe Catechism is not a textbook, a collection of ideas, or a set of rules. We believe the Catechism is the faithful echo of a God who wishes to reveal himself to us and desires us to respond. These videos are meant to be a real-life application of the passage from the catechism.
THE PROSPERITY GOSPEL: DANGEROUS AND DIFFERENTThe risk, which puts humans and their well-being at the center, is that it transforms God into a power at our service, the Church into a supermarket of faith, and religion into a utilitarian phenomenon that is eminently sensationalist and pragmatic.
ORDO AMORIS: WISELY EXTENDING LOVEIt is rare for Thomas Aquinas to appear in the fever swamps of political X (née Twitter), particularly on the topic of immigration. Love of neighbor as contemplated in the ordo amoris does not require us to treat everyone the way we treat our own children, but it does require us to respond to cases of manifest need.
BRIDGING THE CHASM BETWEEN GOD AND HUMANSaint Athanasius famously claimed that the “Son of God became man so that we might become God”. This statement invokes the question of the relationship between God and human beings. It is a question that Trinitarian anthropology seeks to answer.