Hans Kelsen was one of the most important legal thinkers of the 20th century, and he is known for mounting an elaborate defense of liberal party democracy at a time when the latter was hardly the most popular form of regime. This article examines how Kelsen responded to two major political movements he experienced in his intellectual prime: political Catholicism, which he was confronted with in interwar Austria, and Christian Democracy, which became a hegemonic political force (...) in Western Europe after World War II, when Kelsen was already in exile. The article reconstructs Kelsen's complex critique of these two religious movements and ends by reflecting on what we can learn from his arguments about current attempts to revive Christian political thought. (shrink)

While religious politics have been a widely discussed topic in the social sciences in recent decades, few studies develop general explanations based on systematic and detailed comparative analysis. This article seeks to explain when and how successful religious parties rise. To that end, I comparatively analyze the politicization of German Catholicism in the second half of the nineteenth century and Turkish Islam in the post-1970 period and briefly examine the negative case of nineteenth-century German Protestantism. According to the theory (...) of revival-reaction-politicization I propose, successful religious parties rise when major religious revivals confront social counter-mobilization and state repression, provided that existing political parties do not effectively represent religious defense. The study's findings challenge the pervasive tendency to treat Christian and Islamic politics as incommensurable. (shrink)

A translation of Carl Schmitt's classic explanation of the nature and historical/sociological significance of political Catholicism.

Political philosophy and revelation are often considered antagonistic to each other. They are distinct in their approach to their subject matter. However, they are not unrelated within their own scope. What is treated here is how this non-contradictory relation can be stated and maintained.

The politics of nativism directed at Catholic immigrants in 19th-century America offer a fruitful comparative perspective through which to analyze the discourse and the politics of Islam in contemporary Europe. Anti-Catholic nativism constituted a peculiar North American version of the larger and more generalized phenomenon of anti-immigrant populist xenophobic politics which one finds in many countries and in different historical contexts. What is usually designated as Islamo-phobia in contemporary Europe, however, manifests striking resemblances with the original phenomenon of American nativism (...) that emerged in the middle of the 19th century in the United States. In both cases one finds the fusion of anti-immigrant xenophobic attitudes, perennial inter-religious prejudices, and an ideological construct setting a particular religious-civilizational complex in essential opposition to Western modernity. Although an anti-Muslim discourse emerged also in the United States after 11 September, it had primarily a geo-political dimension connected with the ‘war on terror’ and with American global imperial policies. But it lacked the domestic anti-immigrant populist as well as the modern secularist anti-Muslim dimensions. This explains why xenophobic anti-Muslim nativism has been much weaker in the United States than in Europe. (shrink)

This essay compares the reflections of Tocqueville and the Second Vatican Council on the perils of modern civilization as they relate to the question of limited government. While their analyses diverge in some respects, both Tocqueville and the Council are concerned about the proclivity of the modern state to absorb all of human life and see this political danger as the expression of a deeper crisis prompted by the secularization of Western culture. Convinced that this threat cannot be addressed (...) at the political level alone, both conclude that the principle of limited government cannot be successfully institutionalized absent a far-reaching religious renewal. In Tocqueville’s famous formulation, “despotism can do without faith, but not liberty.”. (shrink)

Infin de siècleArgentina a secularist ideology of science was part of the positivist world view espoused by liberals and socialists. Between the years 1910 and 1935, a period in which the Catholic Church experienced a significant cultural expansion, the activities of the Catholic naturalist Ángel Gallardo and the astronomer and priest Fortunato Devoto challenged the so far prevailing idea of science as opposed to religion. This paper explores the connections between the scientific, religious and political aspects of those figures (...) in order to get some insights into the complexity of the relationships between science and secularization in societies with a Catholic majority. (shrink)

In this paper I focus on one of the fundamental democratic freedoms – freedom of conscience – and see to what extent Catholicism is compatible or consistent with it and, by extension, with democracy in civil or political institutions. I draw primarily on recent ecclesial statements on the issue, but also on the philosophical views of Jacques Maritain. First, I outline briefly the view of democracy and freedom of conscience that putatively undergirds modern democratic societies, as well as (...) the understanding of this freedom in Catholic thought. Next, I present the claim that there are some important differences in the way in which this freedom is described in Catholicism as distinct from dominant, secular democratic views. Third, I suggest that these differences, while real, do not sustain the claim of a radical difference in principle between freedom of conscience in recent Catholic thought and that found in documents such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. I conclude that not only is the Catholic approach to freedom of conscience compatible with democracy in civil institutions, but democratic government may be an important way to develop values recognized by Catholicism as fundamental. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThis paper aims to rebuild the relationship between the Seinsfrage and Catholicism in Heidegger’s meditation and to shed light on his critique to Christianity as a philosophical necessity rooted in his broader critique of modernity in the context of the Black Notebooks. In order to reach these purposes, this contribution will be articulated in two parts: in the first one, I will rebuild Heidegger’s relationship to Catholicism and in the second one, I will focus on Black Notebooks as (...) important tools in understanding Heidegger’s critique to Catholicism, a critique that is built on three levels: historical, speculative and political. The essay will show how the Schwarze Hefte illuminate Heidegger’s attempts to answer the question of Being in an incessant tension with the coeval seven major treatises on the Seinsgeschichte, in which Christianity, metaphysics and nihilism are inextricably tied together. (shrink)

Latin America is not one, but many. It exists in six different regions with differing forms of Catholicism. This Catholicism had acted from a position of power. The challenge of modernity and independence movements made people anti-Church if not anti-Christian. New missionary priests from North America and Europe changed the face of Latin American Catholicism after the second world war. Yet Catholicism is not deeply rooted in Latin America and thus has had to resort to (...) class='Hi'>political means for survival. In the pluralistic world of the future, Catholicism in Latin America will have to live with change. (shrink)

Despite the restraining force of totalitarianism, Poland's religiosity evolved swiftly in the forty years after the World War II, producing a pope and empowering an enduring and peaceful political movement.

Some cases of countries and cultures in which traditional Catholicism has played a major role in defining public culture are undergoing accelerated secularization processes; the result should be relevant for the diagnoses underlying contemporary post-secular proposals. It is argued, first, that in these countries (Spain has been taken as a main example), where the Catholic Church lost its institutional power, it is also losing its ethical hegemony. While public and political debates still retain the sense of symbolically laden, (...) communal ethical accord, they are no longer understood with religious overtones. It is suggested, second, that laïcité — a non-aggressive stance concerning religion — could adequately describe this predicament, though it retains a trait of self-defence vis-à-vis the Church that is normally attached to the term ‘laicism’. It is proposed, third, that secularization takes place at the ethical level, in which no sense of loss can be attached to the secular citizen. It is at this level, where the conflicts around meanings and values, which can be framed in religious or secularized terms, set the agenda for legal and political discussions, and where the equal standing of religious and secular interpretations should be assessed. (shrink)

CELAM'S APARECIDA DOCUMENTS NOTED THAT THE CHURCH IN LATIN America has neglected the countless builders of the influential and baptized society. Does this apparent change in pastoral strategy mean a shift from a "preferential option for the poor" to a preferential option for the elites? Is this a reflection of the struggle between bishops who hold onto a "Christendom" and managerialist vision and those who presuppose a "class struggle" in their sociopolitical commitments? Or is it a movement toward a more (...) inclusive and balanced praxis, reaffirming the laity's specific political vocation to order the world's temporal goods according to the common good? (shrink)

The question posed in this article is whether Catholics can fully, unreservedly, and conscientiously carry out their duties as citizens and as holders of their various public offices (legislative, judicial and executive) of the State, in accordance with the laws and constitution of the democratic and pluralist States in which they live. My concern—as a practicing Catholic and a practicing lawyer—is that the increasingly fierce Church criticism, which arose during the papacy of John Paul II and now of Benedict XVI, (...) of the perceived trend towards secularization in the social and political mores of Western (particularly European) democracies, and the greater readiness by Church officials to take it upon themselves explicitly to instruct the laity in political matters, puts this whole issue again into question. Should the bishops of the Catholic Church be seeking to use their ecclesiastical authority (over the faithful) to oppose or promote changes in the laws which apply to all within our society and/or to influence the way we might vote or carry out civic duties? This is a big and complex area involving the interplay of politics and theology; of private and public morality. It touches on the role of teaching office of the Catholic Church and the assent (and possibility of dissent) on the part of the faithful. It takes in questions of conscientious objection and unjust laws. It concerns individual conscience and the hope of salvation. It is about voting as sinning. It is about judging, and being judged. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Democracy, Culture, Catholicism: Voices from Four Continents eds. by Michael J. Schuck and John Crowley-BuckSteven P. MilliesDemocracy, Culture, Catholicism: Voices from Four Continents Edited by Michael J. Schuck and John Crowley-Buck NEW YORK: FORDHAM UNIVERSITY PRESS, 2016. 350 pp. $105.00 / $35.00Democracy, Culture, Catholicism is the product of a three-year, international project that started from a less specific inspiration. Originally begun at Loyola University Chicago's (...) Joan and Bill Hank Center for the Catholic Intellectual Heritage in 2010 as a broad inquiry into the relationship between the Roman Catholic Church and politics, the project leaders eventually took a different bearing from events as diverse as the Arab Spring, the Occupy Movement, and Pope Benedict XVI's encyclical Caritas in Veritate to focus their project more squarely on democracy. Examining democracy from within the diverse experiences found in Lithuania, Peru, Indonesia, and the United States, the editors [End Page 208] present us with a valuable snapshot of where the Catholic engagement with democracy as a cultural expression finds itself today in a global perspective.Given the amount of material at play, the volume is a monumental achievement, if only for the clarity with which it presents its findings. Some essays are stronger than others. Still, the volume benefits tremendously from an apparent and unusual amount of editorial attention that sequences the essays and interrelates them with useful references to one another in such a way that Democracy, Culture, Catholicism escapes entirely the fate of so many volumes of collected essays. Here, the reader has the sensation of reading one coherent narrative, not twenty-three disparately connected, individual essays. This alone is impressive.The volume possesses other strengths. Reflections emerge throughout that engage the deeper questions of democracy. Who are these people making decisions together? How can we understand the composition of a political community? Too much democratic theory overlooks the complex interweaving of history, memory, and identity that operates like a substrate of our consciousness beneath our reason while we are presuming ourselves to be rational decision makers using democratic procedures. The book's engagement not just with democracy and Catholicism but also with culture is important. These essays treat culture not only in different local expressions but also (and in a way that is deep, serious, and sustained) as a phenomenon of consciousness.The American perspective always lurks in the narrative, threatening to dominate. This is inevitable not only because the project was managed in the United States but also because the polarizing obsessions of the church in the United States about how to acknowledge the norms of modern political arrangements have tended to dominate conversation in the church worldwide. The editors have shrewdly chosen to save the United States for the last part of this volume, allowing other voices to come forward first to claim their own space. This editorial decision, like so many others, improves the volume and keeps the narrative in good balance. Still, some questions linger in this reviewer's mind as the volume concludes.What do we mean by democracy? Throughout, the authors treat this as a question that is largely settled. Democracy is identified with democratic values that the church accepts, and in Schuck's words, what is under way is "a critical conversation with the culture of democracy" (330). Yet procedural democracy cannot be severed from these values. Are democratic norms and values vindicated when majorities choose undemocratic values? A more careful drawing of distinctions between democracy, liberalism, and republicanism would expose the inner conflicts in which Catholicism meets modern political norms.Perhaps most urgently for the subject matter of this book, are the claims of Catholic social teaching and Christian ethics a foundation for the democratic, participatory values of this secular age, as writers like Charles Taylor and David [End Page 209] Walsh have suggested? This also would raise questions about how culturally conditioned we should understand democracy to be, surely an important consideration for this very fine study.Steven P. MilliesCatholic Theological UnionCopyright © 2018 Society of Christian Ethics... (shrink)

The article considers the aesthetic meaning of Catholic and Orthodox cultural phenomena. According to the author, Catholicism is closely related to the notion of the tragic, which is manifested in the contrast between the Heavenly and the Earthly. Therefore Catholicism, generating an important aesthetic notion, gave rise to Romanticism. The author regards Orthodoxy as the foundation of the Russian Symbolism. Its essence is the proclamation of the Beauty of the man, which is revealed in the synergy of the (...) Spiritual and the Earthly. In the aesthetic aspect Catholicism and Orthodoxy rather complement than oppose each other. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:156 BOOK REVIEWS of theological method in Aquinas (p. 193; see also pp. 57 and 173). But this is not sufficient. Farthing should have acknowledged that Biel's recurrent critique of the supposed ' positive ' use of reason in Aquinas is beside the point and that, by thinking that Thomas is trying to ' demonstrate ' the faith, Biel has carelessly dismissed much that is interesting and valuable in (...) Aquinas. By bringing Biel's error to the fore, Farthing would have made clear to the reader that in this crucial respect, the dialogue between these two thinkers has completely broken down. University of Notre Dame Notre Dame, Indiana JOSEPH WAWRYKOW The Reshaping of Catholicism: Current Challenges in the Theology of Church. By AVERY DULLES. San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1988. Pp. 276. $19.95 (doth). Each of Dulles's twelve articles commends itself no less as a chapter in this collection than when it first appeared separately between 1984 and the end of 1987. In ensemble, " they give," Dulles remarks in his Preface, " a fair sampling of the issues the Catholic Church has had to face in the two decades since the Council." Whatever the leading Catholic ecclesiologist in America has to say about specific problems in Church renewal deserves careful attention. A positive general evaluation of the book is all hut a foregone conclusion. Still, a review can perform that opening survey of contents that will lend precision to a reader's anticipation of what the author has singled out as the current challenges. Four chapters take up the task of interpreting the texts of Vatican II, not as a species of source-criticism but in light of post-conciliar difficulties. Chapters 2 ("The Basic Teaching of Vatican II "), 5 ("Vatican II and the Recovery of Tradition"), and 8 ("Vatican II and the Purpose of the Church") emerge from a situation of divided opinion. They also apply the Council's teaching as a solution. Chapter 7 ("The Church and Communications") likewise engages conciliar texts, along a more speculative line. Chapter 1 ("American Impressions of the Council") joins with 2 in opening the book at a somewhat more popular level. The other chapters employ conciliar teaching to formulate theological answers to some important questions. These are questions which trouble not only the hierarchy and the theologians but also ordinary BOOK REVIEWS 157 members of the Church, as they come to terms with the Church's renewed self-understanding. Chapter 3 (" The Emerging World Church and the Pluralism of Cultures") picks up where Karl Rahner's wellknown address at the Weston School of Theology in 1979 left off. Dulles accepts Rahner's argument that Vatican II achieved the first official self-actualization of Catholicism as a world church. Taking the resulting problem of inculturation as the current phase in the relation between Christianity and culture, Dulles specifies the relation between two cultures as "cultural reciprocity." He leaves behind the simple, familiar contrast between classicism and a non-normative concept of culture. His ecumenical research enters into Chapter 4 ("The Meaning of Catholicism: Adventures of an Idea "), which places Vatican II in the context of two centuries of Protestant-Catholic discussion on the essence or basic idea of Catholicism. Intra-Catholic pluralism turning into opposition underlies most of the hook, hut Chapters 5 and 6 ("Authority and Conscience: Two Needed Voices") treat two such polarizations thematically. In 5 Dulles finds Dei Verbum open to an understanding of tradition as the handing on from generation to generation of the " tacit knowledge " whose content is the lived awareness of the God of Jesus Christ. Chapter 6 does not admit a second, alternative magisterium, hut it does situate hier· archical teaching amid the several sources of authority accepted by Catholicism-Scripture, tradition, the whole People of God, and theologians along with the hierarchy. And, in the formation of personal judgments and decisions, conscience has its own authority. A theology of communication follows from each of five models of the Church. Chapter 7 shows how this, in turn, implies a distinct approach to evangelization, use of mass media, and episcopal and papal teaching. Chapters 8 and 9 {"The Church, Society, and Politics") discuss the tensions inherent in the Church's mission... (shrink)

This article recounts how Neo-Scholastic international lawyers navigated the complex political landscape of the 1920s and 30s, combining universalism, nationalism and religious belief. Participating in the contemporary re-engagement of Catholics with modern politics, they re-imagined the international legal order in Catholic terms. They argued that a universal morality, overruling the extremes of state sovereignty, was the only solid basis for just and stable global legal relations. While the contribution of Catholics to the establishment of the post-war world order and (...) the rise of human rights is widely acknowledged, the interwar genealogy of these developments is not. Reading these thinkers’ universalist legal tenets in conjunction with their political trajectories provides a relevant frame to understand the moral charge characterizing international law in the early years of the Cold War. (shrink)

Charles Taylor is quite rightly ranked as one of the leading philosophers writing in the world today. As such, his recent endorsement of Catholicism as his preferred vision for the good life warrants careful attention. To this end, I examine the core aspects of his Catholicism that centre on four main themes: Catholicism as difference, the need for transcendence, the necessity for acts of 'unconditional love', and his support for Matteo Ricci's Jesuit mission of the 16th century (...) as a model to be followed for Catholics today. I argue that Taylor has severe weaknesses in all these themes, which cast great doubts on the viability of his Catholic vision for offering an orientation towards the good. (shrink)

The social doctrine of Catholicism was formed during the twentieth century - first as an addition to moral theology, and then acquired a certain autonomy, enriched with continuous, organic and systematic reflection on new and complex social problems. The most important point in the development of social doctrine is that it, being a doctrinal corps, with a stable theological basis, is not confined to a closed theological system, but proves its adaptability to the evolution of society, depending on the (...) situation in the world and the human ability to respond to new problems and time calls It stems from the impartial consideration of the social documents of all the Pontiffs - from Leo XII to John Paul II - and becomes even more evident from the Second Vatican Council. So, in order to understand the historical development of social doctrine, it is necessary to understand the socio-cultural context of each document, to consider the economic, social, political and cultural conditions in which they were formed and applied. (shrink)

본 논문은 조선후기의 천주교 유입과정을 주제로 관용의 원리를 규명한다. 종교와 정치의 극단적 대립과 그 해소 과정을 보여준 조선후기의 천주교 박해 및 정착과정을 정치철학적으로 조명한다는 점에서 본 논문은 역사 ․ 종교 ․ 철학을 접목시키는 관점에 서있다. 구체적으로 스피노자의 정치철학을 매개로 종교와 사상에 대한 관용은 지배체제의 유지에 유용하다는 점을 이론화함으로써 사회균형 방안을 논구한다. 정치권력은 사상 및 신앙의 외적 표현에는 개입할 수 있어도 그 내적 원리 자체를 통제할 수는 없다는 스피노자의 관점을 토대로 조선 후기의 천주교 수용과정과 관련 역사를 논의하고 그로부터 종교와 정치의 명확한 (...) 관계 규정과 관용의 원리를 통한 사회 운영 방안을 모색한다. 논의는 세 부분으로 나누어 진행된다. 첫째, 조선후기 천주교 박해에 대한 해석의 틀을 제시한다. 둘째, 종교박해의 의미를 주권론과 호교론의 관계를 통해 규명한다. 셋째, 관용의 원리를 통해 주권론과 호교론의 절충을 꾀함으로써 조선후기 천주교 수용과정이 사회 균형과 관련하여 내포한 의미를 고찰한다. (shrink)

I argue that the same factors that motivated Catholicism to champion liberal democracy are the same that motivate 21st Century Islam to do the same. I defend this claim by linking political liberalism to democratic secularism. Distinguishing institutional, political, and epistemic dimensions of democratic secularism, I show that moderate forms of political and epistemic secularism are most conducive to fostering the kind of public reasoning essential to democratic legitimacy. This demonstration draws upon the ambivalent impact of (...) Indonesia’s Islamic parties in advancing universal social justice aims as against more sectarian policies. (shrink)

This article compares the growth trajectories of Catholicism and Protestantism in modern China and tackles a puzzle: Why did Catholicism, which maintained a substantial numerical advantage in Chinese converts over Protestantism before 1949, come to lag so far behind Protestantism today? The article identifies three crucial differences in the institutional features of Catholicism and Protestantism, but shows that an institutional argument alone is insufficient to explain their reversal of fortune. It argues that the growth trajectories of (...) class='Hi'>Catholicism and Protestantism changed less because their institutional features have experienced major changes, but more because their institutional features played out differently in the sociopolitical contexts of pre-1949 China, Maoist China, and post-Mao China. The article advances a new approach that combines the currently dominant institutional argument with a historical perspective that stresses the importance of political forces in order to understand the growth dynamics of religions. It concludes by making some preliminary observations on the generalized patterns of how institutional features of Catholicism and Protestantism play out under different kinds of political structures, shaping their waxing and waning in a global context. (shrink)

There is much within contemporary continental philosophy that might give the indication that it is really just disguised Christian theology. However, in line with Hent de Vries and in contrast to Dominique Janicaud, I contend that there are reasons for taking continental God-talk seriously on purely philosophical grounds. On this basis, I then go on to advocate a specific form of God-talk-that dealing with kenosis-as being deeply relevant to contemporary politics because of the way in which it provides an argument (...) for democracy as the political system best opened to the critical function of charity. (shrink)

In this volume leading ethicists and theologians address conscience, a term with loaded meaning and controversy in the Catholic Church in recent decades around issues like political participation, human sexuality, war and institutional violence, and theological dissent. Many essays in this challenging and far-ranging volume focus on the tension between the primacy of conscience (codified at Vatican II) and the processes and cultures of Catholic institutions, including schools, hospitals, and medical research facilities.

A tendência de uma sociologia do catolicismo contemporâneo no país nestes últimos anos foi de reduzi-lo a uma instituição política e social movida por interesses de poder no campo religioso e no espaço público, dispensando a mediação de sua cosmologia como pano de fundo de sua atuação. A partir do livro pioneiro de Roberto Romano (1976) que resgata o papel da cosmologia católica na sua intervenção pública, e seguindo os estudos de Sanchis (1994) e Steil (1996) que chamam a atenção (...) para o seu perfil de “estrutura de longa duração” que se (re)combina com os estilos das épocas que atravessa, a intenção deste texto é detectar numa hermenêutica de aspectos cruciais da Teologia católica e em dimensões estruturais de sua configuração, condutas e comportamentos pelo qual o catolicismo se faz presente na modernidade. Neste particular, a cosmologia não vai engendrar um comportamento holista-tradicional mas vai expressar-se traduzida para os códigos contemporâneos seja do individualismo, da subjetividade, da cultura psi, da auto-ajuda e da expresividade emocional e corporal. Palavras chave : Catolicismo. Cosmologia. Modernidade.: The trend in contemporary sociology of Catholicism in Brazil has been to reduce Catholicism to a political and social institution moved by the interests of power in religious as well as public spheres, ignoring the intervening role of its cosmology as a background for its actions and postures. The article takes as a starting point Roberto Romano’s (1976) pioneer work in the field, where the author reinstates the role of catholic cosmology in processes of institutional public intervention. It has equally drawn inspiration from Sanchis (1994) and Steil’s (1996) studies stressing on Catholicism’s institutional profile as a ‘structure of long duration’ that interacts with the various ways of living of different times and spaces. Accordingly, the main goal of the article is to identify in a hermeneutics of crucial aspects of Catholic theology and in structural dimensions of its configuration, the attitudes and behaviors that inform Catholicism’s presence in modernity. In this way, cosmology doesn’t underpins any traditional holistic behavior but finds expression in translations of contemporary codes like those of individualism, subjectivity, psy culture, self-help and emotional and bodily expressions. Key-words : Catholicism. Cosmology. Modernity. (shrink)

In Roman Catholic Political Philosophy author James V. Schall tries to demonstrate that Roman Catholicism and political philosophy—-revelation and reason—are not contradictory. It is his contention that political philosophy, the primary focus of the book, asks certain questions about human purpose and destiny that it cannot, by itself, answer. Revelation is the natural complement to these important questions about God, human being, and the world. Schall manages to avoid polemicism or triumphalism as he shows that revelation (...) and political thought contribute to a fuller understanding of each other. (shrink)

No examination of our topic can be complete without taking into account the appearance of a new face on the "religious-political stage"—Russian Catholicism.

Humanity in the conditions of globalization is getting closer and unified in the realm of economy, politics, culture. This is to some extent characterized by interfaith relations.The confessional network in Ukraine has already almost finished. If some new religious movements appear, they will not be very successful, but will remain at the level of individual communities. Believers in their confessional preferences are largely determined. Sometimes there is even a curtailment of the activities of some new, as for Ukraine, currents. There (...) are dozens of different religious trends in Ukraine, but the largest among them is Orthodoxy and Catholicism. (shrink)

Religious and moral ideas are the basis of those social, political and economic relations, with the apology of which stands for Catholicism.The ethic of social ideas, according to Catholic theorists, makes it possible to better perform the "presence" of the church in all social systems. John Paul II formulates this task in the following way: "Christians must spread the social doctrine that is based on the gospel, which the churches have proclaimed always, but even to a greater extent, (...) over the past hundred years. This doctrine relates above all to moral principles, because without them the so-called social question can never be resolved. ". (shrink)

1) What should be understood by "liberal Catholicism "? Lord Acton is not easy to define as a historical figure. This is not only due to the rich variety of ...

In his 1923 work, Roman Catholicism and Political Form, Carl Schmitt claims that representation is a complexio oppositorum and incarnates a hierarchical form of political authority, which is alternative to liberalism. This article shows that Carl Schmitt’s interpretation of the political theology of representation is based on a misreading. Schmitt selectively overlooks some meanings of the theology of repraesentatio to build his decisionistic political agenda. An investigation of the original conceptual meanings of representation in Tertullian, (...) the first Christian author who theorized representation and established many of its subsequent theological meanings, shows a different picture. At its inception, representation already included mechanisms of plurality and participation, which anticipated, and perhaps motivated, the absorption of the representation vocabulary within democratic discourse and practice. Political theology is a valuable field of inquiry to prove the claim that the... (shrink)

Charles Taylor's work has recently taken a religious turn, with Taylor becoming more explicit about his own religious faith and its influence on his thinking. Ian Fraser offers a systematic, critical exploration of the nature of Taylor's Catholicism as it appears in his writings. This reply to Fraser endorses his belief in the importance of looking carefully at Taylor's religious views. However, it raises doubts about some of Fraser's particular arguments and conclusions, and aims to foster a clearer understanding (...) of Taylor's religious beliefs. It poses questions for Fraser about what Taylor is setting out to do in A Catholic Modernity?; why he invokes the figure of Matteo Ricci; whether he believes that acts of practical benevolence are impossible without a religious foundation; and whether his religiously-inspired pluralism suffers an inherent contradiction. (shrink)

During the years leading up to the revolutions of 1848, liberal and conservative Germans engaged in a contest over the terms of the Enlightenment legacy and the meaning of Christianity--a contest that grew most intense in the Grand Duchy of Baden, where liberalism first became an influential political movement. Bringing insights drawn from Jewish and women's studies into German history, Dagmar Herzog demonstrates how centrally Christianity's problematic relationships to Judaism and to sexuality shaped liberal, conservative, and radical thought in (...) the pre-revolutionary years. In particular, she reveals how often conflicts over the "politics of the personal," especially over sex and marriage, determined "larger" political matters, among them the relationship between church and state and the terms on which Jews were granted civic rights. Herzog documents the rise of a politically sophisticated conservative Catholicism, and explores liberals' ensuing eagerness to advance a humanist version of Christianity. Yet she also examines the limitations at the heart of the liberal project, especially liberals' unwillingness to grant equality to those deemed "different" from the Christian male norm. Finally, the author analyzes the difficulties encountered by philosemitic and feminist radicals in reconceptualizing both classical liberalism and Christianity in order to make room for the claims of Jews and women. Originally published in 1996. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These paperback editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905. (shrink)