Balthasar on Existentialism

"Catholic writers have often tried to imitate the anguished 'existentialist' tone of their Protestant counterparts, but that garment does not fit them any better than his father's top hat fit Little Johnny Upstart" (Balthasar, Grain of Wheat, 120).

Balthasar's Models of the Church, so to speak

Here's the latest comment on a post that demonstrated heavy use of weasel words to suggest a conclusion unwarranted by evidence to advance the author's ideology in the name of critiquing Balthasar's ideology. ...

What’s this, Halden, a “Petrine symphony” is what Balthasar’s book is all about? No, it is rather a Christological symphony, and Fred is right, it is Christ who is the conductor, not Peter. Peter is ONLY one of the several dimensions of the Church, and they are all necessary for the Church. In fact, the Petrine element is NOT even the most basic among them, it is the MARIAN dimension that is the most fundamental among these various elements. From a Catholic perspective, Balthasar’s is a corrective of every one-sided emphasis on the Petrine office among Catholics. It is ironic therefore that you should basically misrepresent his thoughts on the matter.

The comment above, from Tony, admirably formulates something which I felt but could not express well: that is, Balthasar's treatment of the Petrine, Pauline, Johanine, and Marian charisms is his version of what Avery Dulles intended for his now classic text, Models of the Church. Both are works of ecumenically aware and self-critical meditations on the form of the Church (note: that both insist on overlapping models coexisting — how Catholic!); they both also recognize the value in the Christian experience of Protestants while not shrinking from critical observations.

What Do We Mean when We Refer to Charisms of Orders or Movements in the Church?

[cross post from Deep Furrows, originally posted 11/11/2007. It relates both the the Pauline dimension of the Catholic Church lately discussed here as well as to the question of charisms in lay movements...]

Charisms are given for the whole Church

68 - If charisms are exclusively personal, they can hardly claim the Holy Spirit of the Church for themselves: it is from the wholeness of the Church that he distributes his gifts. Isolated, such a charism gradually becomes ideologized; either it is adopted for the whole, whereas it only constitutes a part, or the part is made an absolute and taken for the epitome of the Gospel.

The radiance of Christian mission in the Church

82-83 - the Church is no abstract entity; only real, corporeal persons participate in her. They are ecclesial to the degree in which their personal mission - Origen speaks of an anima ecclesiastica [ecclesiastical soul] - their charism, extends into the reality of the universal Church, as happens, in the case of prayer, for instance, or of suffering.
[...]
the ecclesial radiance of a person extends as far as his (accomplished) mission. Seen from that angle, Mary's mission radiates throughout the whole Church (the image of the "protective mantle" expresses this symbolically), and analogous to this, other charisms radiate across vast spaces of the Church. Remember Saint Francis, who not only radiates throughout the orders which live through its mission, but beyond that, all "franciscan" souls. Saint Francis is not an idea, but a reality.

The Holy Spirit uses persons
to renew access to the core of revelation

88-89 - The Holy Spirit may suddenly illuminate parts of revelation that have always been there, but have not been sufficiently reflected upon. The history of the Church confirms this. Before Saint Francis, no one had thought so deeply about the poverty of Christ. This poverty is not a secondary consideration but a new access to the center. Before Augustine, many had spoken of the love of God, but none did it in as penetrating a manner as he. Before Ignatius, no one had grasped Christ's obedience to the Father in quite so central a way.

Test Everything: Hold Fast to What is Good.
Page numbers head each quotation
from a remarkable conversation between
Hans Urs von Balthasar and Angelo Scola.

A History of Surprising New Charisms in the Church

At Inhabitatio Dei, Halden takes up a reading of Balthsar which sees the Petrine mission in the Church as having priority over the Pauline, Johannine, and Marian traditions. This reading construes the Petrine as normative and the others as exceptions. 

The Petrine certainly has its place, but Christ is the conductor of the symphony, not Peter. Did you catch the critical aside Balthasar makes regarding the Petrine: that is, "a certain absence of New Testament prophecy" (GL 1, p354)?

On the other hand, "the threefold archetypal experience of Christ [Peter, Paul, John], which is conferred by the Apostles on the Church for its use, remains permanently sustained and undergirded by the Marian experience of Christ, which in its depth and simplicity is quite beyond the power of words. But the Marian experience existed prior to the apostolic experience, and it thus wholly conditions it, for Mary, as Mother of the Head, is also Mother of the Body" (GL 1, p362). 

John is also a strong point of unity, as his testimony "constitutes something like a synthesis of the Petrine and Pauline elements" (GL 1, p 357).

What jumps out at me is the form of the Pauline mission in the Church through history: that is, the Holy Spirit's repeated irruption in history of new charisms: Benedict, Francis, Ignatius, etc. The Catholic Church is increasingly reflecting upon her history as profoundly Pauline, and this can be understood by reading the official documents on the laity, religious life, consecrated life, etc.

Cross-posted from the comments at Inhabitatio Dei.

The Pauline Tradition and the Surprise of New Charisms

Balthasar is an inherently pluralistic or symphonic theologian. Thus, the Pauline tradition is complemented by the Petrine, the Johannine and the Marian traditions (352-365). Balthasar's reading in these sections is profoundly both scriptural and ecclesial.

What's fascinating about the Pauline tradition is that it includes the surprise of new charisms, something that makes the Church ever more pluralistic as she abides in history. In this section, Balthasar explicitly includes Augustine and Newman as examples of new charisms. Elsewhere he discusses Antony of Egypt, Benedict, Francis, and Ignatius - all founders of ecclesial communities with monastic/ missionary tasks.

A "charism" as Balthasar discusses it here (also in the documents of the Catholic Church) could be described as a personal prophetic charism that opens up new avenues to the heart of revelation: Jesus Christ. It has also been observed that the Holy Spirit bestows these charisms according to particular circumstances and times in history.

And what was Paul's gift? "Jesus is the Torah in person; I have the whole of it when I have Jesus. This substitution of the name Jesus for the word Torah is Paul's 'Gospel'; it is the content of his doctrine of justification" (Ratzinger, Gospel, Catechesis, Catechism, 54).

Cross-posted from the comments at La Perruque

What Balthasar Said about St. Paul

The Irruption of Paul of Tarsus, According to von Balthasar
Thomas Bridges at La Perruque has posted two generous helpings from The Glory of the Lord: Volume One. I confess I had these passages in my head when I wrote my previous post, not wanting to dig out the Balthasar... and yes, this passage goes right along with the theme I've been hammering away at through Dawson, Ratzinger, and Balthasar.

I cannot resist repeating one snippet: 

The Pauline tradition, on the other hand, will mean the continued fostering of Paul’s view of revelation; but, on the other hand, it will also mean the ever-new and unforeseen vertical irruption of new charisms in the history of the Church. In this (discontinuous) tradition are to be found the great charisms of mission which suddenly visit and fructify the Church, the great conversions (from Augustine to Newman), the great visions which are ‘ineffable’ in themselves (2 Cor. 12.4) and yet are poured out over the Church in words inspired by the Spirit. [Glory of the Lord 1]

Brilliant Bits of Thomas Aquinas via Balthasar

For Mark at Joe vs. the Volcano:

"the absolution of confession contains an element of the reestablishment of reconciliation with the Church, which can be thought of as represented in a genuine (even though nonhierarchical) manner by a layman. This is why a great many theologians, including St. Thomas Aquinas, have attributed a quasisacramental effect to confession to a layman, which was in vogue in the West roughly from 1000 to 1500 A.D. (4 Sent. 17, q 3, a 3, qla 2, ad 1).

Explorations in Theology II: Spouse of the Word, 323>

"according to St. Thomas, the Fiat of the mother of God was spoken loco totius generis humani and not, for instance, loco totius Ecclesiae. (It could equally be said that, in her, the Church speaks her Fiat to God for the whole human race.)

Ibid., 163

Balthasar, Oakes, Pitstick

Mark at Reason in the Light of Faith remembers the Balthasar controversy from First Things: FIRST THINGS Moment of 2007. A couple of things were curious about this debate:

1. Did David Schindler weigh in on it? Or Fr. Garownski? Or Juan Sara?
   
2. Nobody mentions Origen's devotion to the kenosis of the Logos...

Other highlights:

• Pitstick's opening salvo claims that Balthasar's theology on the descent into hell "retains the form in its general expression but changes the content to the point of contradicting the original" (First Things December 2006).
  
• Oakes: "When I first read Alyssa Lyra Pitstick, I realized that her arguments depended on three hidden presuppositions: a crypto-Monophysite Christology, a crypto-Jansenist theology of grace, and a crypto-Lefebvrist view of the Church’s teaching office. So in my two responses to her views in First Things, I decided not so much to defend Balthasar as to force Pitstick to remove the “crypto-” prefixes-by having her openly avow this trifecta of revanchist Catholicism. I deny that my attacks were ad hominem, as the letters from Robert Colau and Benjamin Petty claim, for I focused exclusively on her reasoning." (First Things March 2007).
  

As far as I'm concerned, these two quotes encapsulate the debate. Pitstick cries heresy and Oakes cries heresy in response. Heresy, however, is a juridical ruling of the Church and not the result of opinion, theological or otherwise. So, I'll leave the inquisition into heresy to others...

Balthasar speaks of the descent into hell throughout his works, but here's a section from his book, Credo: Meditations on the Apostle's Creed:

"Descended into hell." Naturally, since "Death" is "followed by Hades" (Rev 6:8), regarding whose hopelessness the Psalms give us a realistic picture. It was as a humanly dead man that the Son descended to the dead, and not as a victoriously living one with an Easter banner, such as is depicted in Eastern icons through an anticipatory projection of the Resurrection onto Holy Saturday. The Church has forbidden the signing of hallelujahs on this day. And yet this new dead man is different from all the rest. He has died purely from love, from divine- human love; indeed, his death was the supreme act of that love, and love is the most living thing that there is. Thus his really being dead — and that means the loss of any and every sort of contact with God and his fellow human beings (one might reread the Psalms on this) — is also an act of his most living love. Here, in the utmost loneliness, it is preached to the dead, indeed, even more: communicated (1 Pet 3:19). The redemptive act of the Cross was by no means intended solely for the living, but also includes in itself all those who have died before or after it. Since this love-death of our Lord, death has taken on a quite different meaning; it can become for us an expression of our most purest and living love, assuming that we take it as a conferred opportunity to give ourselves unreservedly into the hands of God. It is then not merely an atonement for everything that we failed to do, but, beyond that, an earning of grace for others to abandon their egoism and choose love as their innermost disposition.

From Holy Saturday onward, death becomes purification. On that day, the dead Lord opened up a way out of eternal forlornness and into heaven: the fire that purifies the dead toward greater love. Under the Old Covenant, that did not exist; for everyone, there was only Sheol, the place of being dead. Descending into this, Christ has thrown open the entranceway to the Father.

53-54

Balthasar on Barth

After Existentialism, Light: When Dialectics is Disobedience

Its loud avowal, “I cannot,” is actually disobedience.

Is Pitstick's Argument with Balthasar in Limbo?

More broadly, Griffiths sheds light on the difficulty we all face as the generation after the generation after Vatican II. For a long time now, critique has reigned supreme, and “orthodoxy” has been an empty standard in academic theology. Alyssa Lyra Pitstick’s trenchant analysis of Hans Urs von Balthasar represents an effort to recover a functional standard of orthodoxy for Catholic theology. Griffith’s makes a very convincing case that she fails. She both overestimates the precision of the tradition on the destination and nature of Christ’s descent into hell, and underestimates the scope for speculation and debate on this theological topic.

An interesting article by R.R. Reno at First Things On the Square. It's curious that Reno should praise Griffiths for refuting Pitstick but honor Pitstick for making a charge of heresy. Isn't that like praising a District Attorney for prosecuting cases heedless of the evidence because somebody should do something about crime... (What next? Complaining that lay people, even women, should not criticize priests and cardinals?).

Hat tip: Ignatius Insight Scoop

2008 Balthasar Blog Conference

The first annual 2008 Balthasar Blog Conference is almost upon us! The theme for this blog conference will be “Von Balthasar’s Theological Interpretation of Scripture” and will take place over nine days from March 17-25. We have a plenary post and response planned for each day. Below is the official schedule for the event.

If you are a blogger, please let others know about the upcoming event. This schedule will continue to be updated as I receive information from each of the participants.

Official 2008 Balthasar Blog Conference Schedule:

Monday, March 17 — Adrienne von Speyr’s influence on Balthasar

• Plenary: Lois M. Miles, “Von Balthasar, von Speyr and Holy Scripture: The Importance of the Contemplative Reading of Scripture for Hans Urs von Balthasar”
  
• Response: Halden Doerge

Tuesday, March 18 — Balthasar’s approach to biblical hermeneutics

• Plenary: Cynthia Nielsen, “Balthasar’s Biblical Hermeneutics”
• Response: Jonathan King

Wednesday, March 19 — Balthasar’s use of the Old Testament in his theological aesthetics

• Plenary: Halden Doerge, TBA
• Response: Andrew Guffey

Thursday, March 20 — Aesthetics and Revelation

• Plenary: Daniel Wade McClain, “Aesthetics and Revelation: Balthasar’s Creational Aesthetic”
  
• Response: Brian M. Niece

Friday, March 21 — Balthasar on the Gospels

• Plenary: Heather Reichgott, “Balthasar and ‘Contradictory’ Material in the Gospels”
• Response: Meg Shoeman

Saturday, March 22 — Balthasar on Scripture, Church, and Mariology

• Plenary: Francesca Murphy, TBA
• Response: Steve Garrett

Sunday, March 23 — Balthasar on the Apocalypse

• Plenary: Andrew Ryan Guffey, “The Apocalypse and the Theological Aesthetic of Theo-Drama”
• Response: David W. Congdon

Monday, March 24 — Balthasar on the problem of universalism in Scripture

• Plenary: David W. Congdon, “Toward a Hermeneutics of Hope: Hans Urs von Balthasar on the Biblical Warrant for Universalism”
• Response: Patrick McManus

Tuesday, March 25 — Balthasar on the resurrection

• Plenary: John L. Drury, TBA
• Response: W. Travis McMaken

Sobrino and Balthasar in The Tablet

via dotCommonweal:

"Father Sobrino”, we are told, “reflects the so-called theology of the homo assumptus, which is incompatible with Catholic faith.” Moreover, the Congregation disapproves of Fr Sobrino speaking of the “faith” of Jesus, because: “If Jesus were a believer like ourselves, albeit in an exemplary manner, he would not be able to be the true Revealer showing us the face of the Father”. The issues here are complex, but that assertion is, to say the very least, questionable and its formulation tendentious.

I chose those last two examples because readers of The Tablet might care to turn to pages 327-8 of Hans Urs von Balthasar, The Glory of the Lord, Volume I: Seeing the Form, where von Balthasar insists that “the man Christ” is “a human being who has been assumed into God” and that he possesses “archetypal faith”.

(Professor) Nicholas Lash

Balthasar and Rahner on the Laity

There's a new post up at Deep Furrows on Balthasar's critique of Karl Rahner's theology of the laity: "What is a Lay Person?"

Although Rahner articulated this position, it's a pretty common one in the Church today.

The post is based on Balthasar's article, "The Essence and Significance of Secular Institutes," printed in The Laity and the Life of the Counsels: The Church's Mission in the World: Ignatius Press, 2003.

The Rahner article cited by Balthasar is "On the Lay Apostolate" (Schriften zur Theologie 2:339-73).

St. John of the Cross

Monograph by Balthasar from Lay Styles.

Fun with Google Books

The Laity and the Life of the Counsels by Balthasar

The Eschatology of Hans Urs Von Balthasar: Eschatology as Communion By Nicholas J. Healy

a tantalizing sample