Theology Today - Vol 42, No. 2 - July 1985 - BOOK REVIEW - The Naturalists and the Supernatural: Studies in Horizon and an American Philosophy of Religion

256 - The Naturalists and the Supernatural: Studies in Horizon and an American Philosophy of Religion

The Naturalists and the Supernatural: Studies in Horizon and an American Philosophy of Religion
By William M. Shea
Macon, Mercer, 1984. 244 pp. $21.50.

The author is a Catholic philosopher, trained in the tradition of Bernard Lonergan, who did his doctoral studies at Columbia University under the naturalist John H. Randall. This book is the result of his efforts to integrate these two divergent, if not downright opposed, philosophical approaches. Although hardly written for the beginner in matters theological and philosophical, Shea's book is neither esoteric nor prolix. It is a clear, honest, and thoughtful wrestling with one of the most pressing ideational issues of our day, the possibility of transcendence in a secular culture.

Shea's overall thesis is that naturalism, when properly chastened and modified, actually has much in common with the sacramentalist Christian perspective. The chief locus of this commonality is the notion of mediation. In both perspectives, the holistic unity and meaningfulness of human existence is a mediated reality that systematically eludes, yet continuously haunts our cognitive endeavors. It is the mystery that shyly inhabits the edges of experience, eternally evading our focus, but refusing to go away. Moreover, this mystery is what gives significance to our search for intelligibility (pp. 85-90).

Another way to see Shea's central argument is in terms of Kant's pivotal dichotomy between the phenomenal world, which can be known by the mind, and the nournenal world (things-in-themselves), which by definition remains beyond the reaches of our understanding. Naturalism limits itself and others to the former, especially in terms of the "scientific method," while viewing the concept of the supernatural as an inherently meaningless effort to think and speak about the latter. Shea seeks to redefine transcendence by locating it within (not "in") the phenomenal world of experience instead of strictly over and above it.

257 - The Naturalists and the Supernatural: Studies in Horizon and an American Philosophy of Religion

The transcendent, however, is not in the world as just another datum; rather, it pervades the world and provides the very structure of the knower-known relationship within which we search for knowledge and meaningfulness (pp. 204-210).

After introducing his main themes, "Naturalism in American Culture" (chapter 1), "The Naturalist Horizon" (chapter 2), and "The Naturalist Horizon and God" (chapter 3), Shea devotes a chapter each to George Santayana, John Dewey, Frederick Woodbridge, and John H. Randall. In each case, he seeks to focus the point at which these thinkers actually leave room for the notion of transcendence and the point at which they are unfaithful to the open texture of the naturalist posture. The book concludes (chapter 8) with Shea's summary of the crucial issues involved in the debate between naturalist and supernaturalist perspectives together with his own proposal for an integration of the two. In his own words (p. 216):

I wish to affirm with them that unification of the subject is an essential outcome of religious experience. I want to suggest that human intentionality revealed in feeling, acting, and thinking is the explanatory link between the unification of the subject and of the subject's world. I want in particular to discuss one side of this complex-the unification of the subject's inner life-in order to indicate how other facets of unification are grounded in human intentionality. I shall proceed by putting three questions. First, what is the ground in the human subject of religious faith and practice? My answer is "feeling," in a peculiar meaning of the term. Second, how can action, essentially plural in our experience, be unified in religious experience? My answer is by intending the transcendent. Third, is there any reconciliation between religious experience and critical thinking? My answer is affirmative: Theology is knowing, belief is cognitively intentional, and both rest on the immediacy of feeling, again in a peculiar meaning of the term.

I shall leave it to the reader to grapple with Shea's "peculiar meaning of the term 'feeling' " presented on pp. 216-223. Clearly, it provides the fulcrum for his realignment of naturalism and supernaturalism. In addition to providing the quality and framework of our emotio-aesthetic life, this primordial "feeling" also provides the ground of our cognitive life (p. 221).

Although I must confess a certain uneasiness with the Lonerganian cum phenomenology jargon into which Shea tends to lapse, I must also admit that I am in general agreement with the overall direction of his project. Specifically, I am impressed with his insight into the naturalist perspective and his use of the notion of mediation as the axis around which to relocate the crucial, but presently stalemated, discussion about the viability of the concept of transcendence. Also, Shea's writing is free of gender specific terminology, a definite plus.

Jerry H. Gill
College of Saint Rose
Albany, New York