Catholic Theology After Rahner

Principles of Catholic Theology, Book 3: On God, Trinity, Creation, and Christ, by Thomas Joseph White, O.P., was released on October 4. The book, which draws from Thomistic tradition, is the third volume in a series that is both an homage and a challenge to Karl Rahner’s Theological Investigations. First Things editor R. R. Reno recently interviewed Fr. White about the book. The following has been edited for clarity and length.

R. R. Reno: Who was Karl Rahner? And what was his theological project?

Thomas Joseph White: Karl Rahner (1904–1984) was undoubtedly one of the most influential Catholic theologians of the twentieth century and worked alongside figures such as Joseph Ratzinger, Hans Urs von Balthasar, and Henri de Lubac. He mostly composed essays rather than books, and unlike the aforementioned figures, he made thematic use of scholastic theology, including the work of Thomas Aquinas. However, he also sought to reform scholasticism in light of modern philosophy (especially Kant and Hegel). He also engaged with a host of typically modern questions and in so doing changed the conversations in theology in major ways. For example: What do we really need to believe about the historical Jesus in light of modern studies of Scripture? How can we understand Genesis in light of modern scientific cosmology and evolutionary theory?

Rahner often puts the agnostic-existentialist question first: Can one really believe today in God? Or in Christian revelation? Can a modern person really believe in the historical Jesus as the savior of humanity? How can Catholicism be the true religion if there are other major world religious traditions? This way of proceeding is not meant to condemn the human mind to skepticism but to facilitate intellectually licit and living modern belief in divine revelation, re-presented now within a contemporary context. The approach, however, is fundamentally anthropocentric and tends to give methodological precedence to whatever concerns arise from secular culture, rather than expositing the inner teaching of Christianity taken on its own terms. For Rahner, the human being in his or her quest for meaning is the context in which religious belief appears to be relevant or not. By contrast, Aquinas seeks to first understand God and all things in light of God.

You've recently begun publishing books styled loosely on Rahner's Theological Investigations, which collected his essays into volumes, often with thematic unity. What are you trying to accomplish with this approach? Are you trying to establish a counter-movement to the Rahnerian establishment in Catholic theology?

Rahner’s influence has subsided greatly but not entirely. Today, those who continue his project reformulate Catholic thought in light of new contemporary anthropological concerns, often of a political origin, having to do with economic distribution, egalitarianism, the social problems of racism and sexism, or ecological concerns. Theology is deemed relevant insofar as it can address these issues, and is exposited accordingly. Of course, some find this approach problematic. Rahner’s influence has been relativized by the rise of theologies from the Communio movement, associated with the figures already mentioned—de Lubac, von Balthasar, Ratzinger—who broke with Rahner in various ways after the Second Vatican Council. One can characterize these thinkers as more Christocentric and ecclesial: The tradition of the Church and her teaching on Christ and the sacraments presents us with a theological starting point that casts ultimate light on the meaning of creation and the vexing problem of human existence. Meanwhile, some have sought to harvest insights from both of these “traditions,” bringing the more Christocentric and the more anthropological modes of theology into deeper conversation with one another. The theology of Cardinal Walter Kasper is a good example of this.

One can also observe a third phenomenon: a recent widespread interest in the study of St. Thomas Aquinas and an ongoing revival of the Thomistic tradition. My series Principles of Catholic Theology has its place within this context, which is not Rahnerian, but Thomistic. However, in overt homage to Rahner, I’m seeking to confront contemporary, challenging questions, including those that emerge from within our secular milieu. I’m venturing answers not with his methodology but from a Thomistic point of view. You might put it this way: After the Second Vatican Council a new period of theology emerged. Theologians were seeking to find new ways to write theology for a modern educated audience, so as to address the post–World War II, post-secularized world in a new way. Rahner did this with his anthropological theology. But what if we were to try to do so from a Thomistic point of view instead? What would that look like? Thus, my proposal is traditional in one sense (given that it is scholastic and takes direct inspiration from Aquinas) and innovative in another, as it seeks to rethink the potential shape of modern theology.

Questions I address in this book include: Can we know anything of God by means of philosophical reason, and if so, what role should this reflection play within Catholic theology? Is our knowledge of the Trinity meaningful, and who is God? How can we believe in the Trinity in a modern context? What should we think about the beauty of creation, and how should this thinking shape our ecological responsibility to creation? Did Jesus of Nazareth really understand himself humanly to be God, or to be the Lord of Israel, and how is this question relevant to our understanding of theology in the era of modern historical criticism? Can we reasonably believe today that Christ is the universal savior of the human race, and if so, what are the consequences for our understanding of non-Christian religions, as well as of secular, non-religious cultures?

Yes, Aquinas and Thomism seem to be coming back. Why is that happening? What is its promise?

Some would say that the return to Thomism stems from nostalgia, a narrow desire for bygone certitude, or from a fear of critical thinking and theological innovation. I don’t think any of that is true. In fact, the opposite is the case, at least in one sense: Thomism addresses the profoundly important contemporary desire for metaphysical truth.

Modern Christian culture and some modern Catholic theologies have overtly accepted the primacy of the therapeutic and the subjective choices of individualism. What is true in religion is whatever feels good for me “spiritually” or accommodates my culture and my lifestyle intuitions. So Catholicism has to be perpetually reinterpreted to each culture and each individual. Behind this kind of stance is a not-so-hidden skepticism that despairs of any genuinely universal, objective knowledge of God, of Christ, and of the human condition. It’s every historical culture for itself or each man for himself, and the truth is a matter of taste, much like aesthetic choices in music or art. Such views are not entirely novel. Already in fourteenth-century medieval nominalism, one can observe a theological tendency toward a skepticism that claims that human beings cannot actually know philosophically if God exists. Consequently, we must live by a kind of blind faith, one in which the Christian revelation of God itself is not subject to great intelligibility. In this case the primary motive for religious belief tends to become ethical: Religion is about shaping our moral lives, which are meant to transform society. This vision is present later again in Kant, in modern liberal Protestantism, and in various versions of Catholic liberation theology. Religion is about doing things and changing the world, more than it is about knowing the truth.

Of course, it is true that theology is a practical as well as speculative science, and theology should summon us to new ethical responsibilities. But ultimately Christianity is grounded in fundamental truth claims about the nature of reality: the knowledge of who God is, as Logos and Agape, the revelation of God given to us in the Incarnation, Passion, and Resurrection of Jesus, the Church and her sacraments, and the mystery of supernatural grace. Without knowledge of these mysteries of the faith, the rest of Christianity makes little sense and is not compelling. Aquinas studies the inner mysteries of the Catholic faith in depth and with compelling intellectual vigor and luminousness. He also shows how this study is itself deeply compatible with (if not identical to) a profound philosophical understanding of the human being and of the created order, one that integrates scientific study of the causes of nature and of material realities. Furthermore, he provides us with an ethics of happiness, of virtue, and of social responsibility for the common good. These are interesting and freeing ideas, whereas Kant’s moralistic deontology is both somewhat boring and exhausting. In short, Aquinas is a great mentor for initiating one into the study of both the supernatural and the natural, and he conveys a vivid sense of the compatibility and intellectual vitality of both Christian faith and natural reason.

That points to my next question. You argue that Catholic theology needs metaphysics. Why is that the case? And why have so many modern theologians thought otherwise? Am I right that Rahner was prominent among those who presumed that Catholic theology must rest on anthropological foundations, not metaphysical ones?

Catholic theologians are typically less likely to state things so boldly as Karl Barth did when he simply affirmed that traditional philosophical metaphysics has no place in a constructive modern dogmatic theology. However, in Rahner, one notes a decided reticence to employ classical metaphysical modes of thought. The motive is no doubt somewhat pragmatic. In a modern and postmodern context, the intellectual landscape has shifted drastically. Thinking is determined in large part by the influences of Hume’s and Kant’s anti-metaphysical skepticism (which leads to agnosticism) and by the new metaphysics of history elaborated by Hegel (which promotes a global secular liberalism). In this context, it seems necessary to reformulate Christianity so as to present it primarily as a truth about man, about the human being who has been redeemed by God through God’s own historicity, his historical life of solidarity with us conducted in Christ, and which alone can redeem “from within,” as it were, the legitimate aspirations of modern societies motivated by the exploration of liberal freedom. It is no accident that the soteriological event of the Resurrection takes precedence in Rahner over any constructive, contemplative ascent to a consideration of the Trinity. According to Rahner, we know God through his historical life with us, but we know little if anything of God in himself, as he is in eternity. The Resurrection expands the horizon of modern freedom, but it does not necessarily take us “back” to a medieval consideration of the contemplation of the eternal. When Rahner wrote that the “economic trinity is the immanent Trinity” and vice versa, I take it that he was pointing us toward the primacy of God’s manifestation among us in Christ. The horizon of Christian theology is activist and historical rather than contemplative and theoretical.

Whether my interpretation is accurate or not, I think that the relevance of Rahner’s approach has subsided in large part because its apologetic relevancy and urgency has evaporated. Today, Kant’s metaphysical skepticism commands a much weaker consensus. In fact, within analytic philosophy there is an increasing recognition that some form of metaphysical reflection is required. This is true even for the modern sciences, if we are to take seriously the notions of real causality, essences, and properties. It’s also true for genealogical explanations of nature, and common human nature, which are a foundation for any universal ethics of virtue and of rights. Furthermore, in the face of more aggressive forms of theoretical atheism and materialistic naturalism, it is necessary to ask simply and earnestly whether there is any good philosophical reason to believe in God.

Thus, in the present context, the theologies of the twentieth century seem by and large inadequate and outmoded. Ironically, theologians who today double down on the Rahnerian premises and methodology are making the Church increasingly irrelevant to our contemporary society, even while claiming to do the opposite. By contrast, the metaphysical reflection of Aquinas in matters of causality, natures, properties, and transcendentals (being, unity, truth, goodness, beauty) invites us to think openly and clearly about the transcendent existence of God, which is hidden but real, just as it also invites us to consider anew the real range of human knowing and of theoretical understanding. This approach releases modern human beings from the artificial imprisonment of a life of reason to the mere sphere of “Immanentism,” which is concerned principally with material objects and human politics, and which remains oblivious of the transcendent God and mystery of the supernatural. The human search of intelligibility cannot be artificially and ascetically reduced to the mere level of sensate objects, any more than human beings can live out their moral lives without engaging in real questions of transcendent justice, both human and divine. Metaphysics is indeed a necessary science. It constitutes the most pre-eminent, noble form of natural human knowledge, superior even to that of the material natural sciences. Without explicit reference to the metaphysical dimension of human knowledge, Catholic theology readily becomes intellectually incoherent and religiously superficial.

Our culture emphasizes diversity and inclusion. This tempts us to find ways to affirm all religions and minimize differences. You argue that we must resist this temptation. Why?

We need to begin with the affirmation that truth matters. Actually, this claim is a way of honoring various non-Christian religious traditions, which are typically concerned with ultimate truth claims and with overarching, global explanations of reality. Major religious traditions differ from one another (and often in more nuanced ways, within themselves) about ultimate explanations, so to study any of them seriously, one has to take them at their word and understand the distinctiveness of each one, as well as some of the internal doctrinal debates to which they give rise. The claim that there is no great difference between Catholic Christianity and Mahayana Buddhism is simply absurd. In fact, it is only when one accepts dutifully to understand the irreducible metaphysical and anthropological differences of the two that one can begin to appreciate the similitudes that emerge and the common practices that can be observed. It is entirely legitimate for Catholic theology to inquire whether Buddhist beliefs and practices (or Muslim ones for that matter) are either conducive to or obstructive of the pathway toward salvation by grace, in light of the revelation of the unique, saving grace of Christ. But my point is this: We will not be able to admit our limits of comparative understanding, or advance our understanding, if we cannot first ascertain honestly in what ways other major world religious traditions are both irreducibly different from and also partially similar to the teachings and practices of Catholic Christianity. In this regard, study of other religions is simply part of the integral search for the truth, which is a dimension of the Catholic intellectual life.

There are many technical debates about the human consciousness of Jesus. What's the essential issue at stake? If Christ is a genuine human being like us, within a shared history with us, can he truly possess the beatific vision? Isn't this related to the question of whether Christ truly suffered on the cross? 

Understood within its historical context, the various writings of the New Testament teach collectively and in complementary ways that Jesus of Nazareth is both true God and true man. But did Jesus understand himself in this way? Did he believe that he was the Lord God of Israel, and that he was mysteriously one with God whom he called “his Father”? What evidence can we perceive of this in his teaching and action, in his ministry and his miracles? In fact, the four Gospels do depict Jesus as one who knows of his own identity as the Son of God. He is not seeking to learn gradually of his own identity or of that of the Father or the Holy Spirit, as if he were at first religiously agnostic and confused. Rather, he is conveying to his disciples a gradual, deeper understanding of his true identity and mission, which he has known all along. Consequently, the Catholic Church has affirmed, based on Scripture, that Christ not only possesses divine wisdom as God, but also does so in his human intellect as man. Christ understood himself to be one in being with the Father, as the Son of God, and Christ said and did things to indicate this knowledge in his speech and actions. Furthermore, he knew, as man, in his human mind, why he was going to suffer crucifixion in atonement for human sinfulness, and that he was going to found the Church as the visible body of sacramental reconciliation with God. These are not speculative claims. They are based on the biblical depiction of Christ, which itself stands up to rigorous historical scrutiny.

Based on these notions, medieval theologians such as Aquinas taught that Christ did not merely have supernatural faith (which Christians possess by grace) but that he instead had in his human mind a higher intuitive understanding of the inner mystery of his Father, of himself as Lord, and of the Holy Spirit. The 1992 Catechism of the Catholic Church speaks of this grace as “the intimate and immediate knowledge that the Son of God made man has of his Father” (473), which is another way of speaking of the beatific vision of Christ. In the Summa Theologiae, Aquinas vividly defends the compatibility of this grace in the human mind of Christ with his genuine and profound suffering in the crucifixion. In fact, he claims that the agony of the soul of Christ was compounded by his knowledge of human sinfulness, which gave rise to a loving contrition for all human sins. Sometimes knowledge provides a remedy to suffering, and sometimes it is a cause of even greater suffering. Aquinas argues that in the Passion of Christ, both effects are present, as he experiences profound consolation found in the perfect knowledge of his Father, and profound agony stemming from his knowledge of our human miseries. Both are encompassed by his perfect charity, in which he simultaneously loves God on our behalf, and has compassion upon the human race.

You teach in Rome and have lots of exposure to seminarians, young priests, and theological trends. Do you see movements back toward Rahnerianism? What about the study of St. Thomas? Do you have a sense of where Catholic theology is heading?

There seems to be a generalized recognition among the younger clergy today that we are entering into a new period of missionary life, where the key challenge in Europe or the U.S. is to convey a genuine understanding of the Catholic faith in a world that is religiously illiterate and increasingly naive or totally uninstructed in regard to Christianity. While there is no one trend that affects all, it seems to me that many young clergy desire three things. First, they seek a recovery of the traditional theological resources of the Church in a way that is open and non-defensive. Second, they aim for a form of communication of theological knowledge that is effective so that it can be understood by people today both practically as well as theoretically. In short, theology needs to have an evangelical or missionary dimension to it. Third, there is a concern to keep theology connected to the spiritual life and to the liturgical and ethical practices of the Church. After the scandals of recent decades, younger people in Catholic theology are sensitive to the importance of integrity of life as a dimension of a more holistic Catholic witness to the faith. Of course in any and all of this, there can be a mixture of nostalgia and superficiality, but generally speaking I would say that all of these trends are very positive, realistically forward-thinking, and bode well for the future of Catholic theology.

R. R. Reno is editor of First Things.

Thomas Joseph White, O.P., is the Rector of the Angelicum in Rome. 

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Image by Gabriel Sozzi, licensed via Creative Commons. Image cropped, filter added.