94 - A World of Grace: An Introduction to the Themes and Foundations of Karl Rahner's Theology & Apologetics and the Eclipse of Mystery: Mystagogy According to Karl Rahner & Karl Rahner: An Introduction to His Theology

A World of Grace:
An Introduction to the Themes
and Foundations of Karl Rahner's Theology
Edited by Leo J. O'Donovan
New York, Seabury, 1980. 198 pp. $14.50.

Apologetics and the Eclipse of Mystery:
Mystagogy According to Karl Rahner
By James J. Bacik
Notre Dame, University of Notre Dame, l980. 166 pp. $15.00.

Karl Rahner:
An Introduction to His Theology
By Karl-Heinz Weger
New York, Seabury, 1980. 200 pp. $10.95.

It has often been suggested that Karl Barth is a modern father of the church. According the same honor to a contemporary Roman Catholic theologian, I would cite the German Jesuit, Karl Rahner. Both men are prolific, at times abstruse; yet for both, pastoral concerns and the concrete life of the church are never far removed from even their most speculative efforts. Both eloquently, affirm that Christian dogmatics must be a church dogmatics.

It may well appear willful, if not perverse, to correlate these two giants of twentieth-century theology. What does Rahner's philosophical prolegomenon have in common with Barth's doctrine of the Word of God? What does the great advocate of the anthropocentric have to do with the intrepid defender of the theocentric? What can Athens safe to Jerusalem Would not Barth see in Rahner a Schleiermacher redivivus and react with predictable polemic?

The rhetorical starkness, if not simplicity, of such questions invites a

95 - A World of Grace: An Introduction to the Themes and Foundations of Karl Rahner's Theology & Apologetics and the Eclipse of Mystery: Mystagogy According to Karl Rahner & Karl Rahner: An Introduction to His Theology

deeper probing. And the merit of these three books is that they help the English reader to encounter Rahner's fundamental views.

What all three make clear is that Rahner's theological enterprise is centered upon his faith in Jesus Christ-a "Christological concentration," which permits his theological vision to hold in dynamic tension both anthropocentricity and theocentricity. For in Jesus Christ he sees both the human who is for God, and the God who is for the human.

Where Rahner's and Barth's Christological concentration may diverge is in the implications drawn from this recognition. For Rahner the revelation accorded us in this humanity, the humanity of God, discloses something of foundational importance about all humanity, about humanity as such. Thus his fundamental teaching about the "supernatural existential" derives from his faith-filled conviction that God's offer of grace is constitutive of human being and that this gifts our world with the specific and shining quality of a "world of grace." In many ways his systematic labors are but commentary upon the Jesuit poet Hopkins' contention that "the world is charged with the grandeur of God."

I recommend the first volume as an indispensable introduction to Rahner's theology. Written by long-time students of his thought, the work is of uniformly high quality, and the individual essays are remarkably integrated.

The essays succinctly explore all the major themes of his theology and provide valuable direction in reading his classic, Foundations of Christian Faith, as well as helpful reference to further reading. And not the least of the book's attractions is its helpful glossary.

Were I to single out my personal favorites, they would be William Dych's "Theology in a New Key" and John Carmody's "The Realism of Christian Life." The former is the single best short introduction to Rahner's enterprise I know. The latter makes clear that the living heart of Rahner's theology is the experience of life in the Spirit, mediated to him by his Ignatian tradition, whose most characteristic expression is not, for all its undeniable importance, systematic theology, but prayer. (Here too we can spot an affinity to Barth.)

Karl Rahner seems singularly blessed in his students, and has bestowed blessings upon them in offering not rigid positions, but lines of advance. If I were to re-address to his own work the famous question posed by Rahner himself concerning the Council of Chalcedon, "Does it mark an 'end or beginning?' " most of his students would quickly reply, "Beginning!"

A recent example of one of his students who employs central insights of his thought in a personal and creative manner is the second volume. It focuses on one crucial theme: the task of leading humanity to a fuller realization of its saving immersion in the mystery of who God is. This task is ever ancient to the church's pastoral charge (as the "mystagogic catechesis" of the early Christian community reminds us), yet also ever

96 - A World of Grace: An Introduction to the Themes and Foundations of Karl Rahner's Theology & Apologetics and the Eclipse of Mystery: Mystagogy According to Karl Rahner & Karl Rahner: An Introduction to His Theology

new, as a technological and consumerist society threatens the eclipse of that mystery.

It is a mark of Rahner's ecciesial and pastoral concern that the issue of mystagogy looms so central in his thought. And it is this concern which spurs his return to experience to find there intimations of that mystery to which the church's liturgical and theological language bears explicit witness. Bacik nicely distinguishes the different moments and tasks of this enterprise and offers perceptive explorations of the human activities of questioning and of free self-determination as points of departure.

The book, originally a doctoral dissertation under John Marquarrie at Oxford, retains few of the unhappy traces of that genre. Indeed it stands not only as a fine contribution to Rahnerian studies (which an "Introduction" by Rahner himself acknowledges), but as an exploration in contemporary apologetics which deserves a hearing in its own right. Its argumentation, though brief, is organized and clear. And its footnotes are never a distraction. Where Rahner is strong, Bacik gratefully draws upon him, where weak, he honestly confronts the issue.

The last of the three volumes promises well because of the author's competence and the intelligent structure of the work itself. However, once again a Seabury-published translation proves untrustworthy. Those already knowledgeable in Rahner might extract sonic precious nuggets, but for others the translated work is a sobering reminder that all does not glitter even in a world of grace.

Rahner has suggested that a "Copernican Revolution" is transpiring in Catholic theology today, a shift from an ecclesiastical to a humancentered theological universe. And without doubt, he is one of the prime movers. Yet in seeking a new paradigm for theology, he has also tried to remain faithful to the insights and concerns of his theological forebears, insisting that anthropocentricity and theocentricity are not opposed but complementary. In this he espouses a sensitivity characteristic of Catholicism: the attempt to affirm the "both/and" of divine and human contemplation and action, mysticism and politics. It is precisely Rahner's Christological concentration which encourages him in this endeavor and its further elaboration in a Catholic sacramental vision.

And here the theologies of Rahner and Barth can fruitfully challenge each other-just as Barth himself never forsook his life-long dialogue with Schleiermacher. Rahner's emphasis upon the humanity of God and its implications for all humanity may carry further themes sounded by Barth late in his life, while Barth's insistence that our theology speak truly of Holy Spirit can caution a chastened theology of experience against premature canonizations.

Robert P. Imbelli
MaryknolI School of Theology
Maryknoll, New York