JP2's Theology of the Body

"Much has been written during these recent years about the problems concerning love, chastity, marriage, procreation and the family. We hope not to offend anyone by stating that it has rarely been done with so much care in analysis and rigor in thought; with an equal concern to integrate these problems and there very diverse aspects into an overall vision of human reality. Psychology, metaphysics and morality are successively employed. The biological and medical givens, treated in a separate chapter, are in no way neglected. The role and value of sexuality are fully recognized, especially since the latter is never separated from the subject that it affects and which is responsible for it. So the eminent dignity of man, such as the Church of Christ promotes and defends it, is admirably brought out.

The author, however, does not address himself soley to believers; at least he does not appeal first to their faith. He does not proceed according to the teachings of Scripture but through the paths of rational argumentation. He says nothing, for example, of Pauline mysticism. Without excessive accomodation to the place of current modes of language, he has nonetheless assimilated the best of modern reflection, particularly of phenomenology, and he knows how to utilize both the philosophy of Aristotle and, even more, that of Saint Thomas Aquinas to make the latent personalism spring forth"

(from Henri de Lubac's Preface to Love and Responsibility (Karol Wojtyla);

Theology in History 581-582).

To understand John Paul's theology of the body, perhaps we should follow him in engaging phenomenology, literature, art, and all of these ambits of human reflection... Instead of reducing what he says to our preconceptions, how about expanding our horizons through dialogue?