Tuesday, October 7, 2003

St. Blog's - Notable Posts

Sorry for the lack of blogging -- bogged down with work, very busy; will get around to posting something substantial at a later date. In the meantime, here are a few things which caught my eye:
  • Oswald Sobrino on the "kneeling theology" of Hans Urs von Balthasar -- contrasted with academic theologians who seek to revise, rather then explore, revelation. He relates his experience of reading Fr. Richard McBrien with which I would wholly agree:
    When you peruse the encyclopedic work of dissident theologian Richard McBrien of Notre Dame inappropriately entitled Catholicism, you get the sense that the writer is a sociologist of religion, and not an authentic theologian. Instead of "kneeling theology," you get an officiousness and busyness that falsifies revelation. The result is not a reflection of revelation, but of man's misinterpretation of and mangling of revelation.

  • William Luse writes about "Schiavo, Reeve, and the 'right' to die", including some criticisms of the NCCB's "pastoral reflections" on the subject.

  • I confess that I haven't read a single book in the Left Behind series, although I do see them in abudance on the subway commute. For those (like myself) largely ignorant of this subject, Envoy Magazine's Carl Olson has recently published Will Catholics Be Left Behind, providing a Catholic perspective on the dispensationalism -- belief in "the rapture" and theories of the "end times" -- of fundamental Christians. Catholic World News recently interviewed Olson, who addressed the historical development of dispensationalism, the role of the state of Israel, and the anti-Catholic bias of author Tim LaHaye (among other things).

  • Bill Cork has been writing some good and thoughtful stuff about Martin Luther over the past few weeks -- beginning with his review of Luther: The Movie, and followed by excerpts from writings by the Roman Catholic/Lutheran Joint Commission and Pope John Paul II.

    Mr. Cork also offers a much-needed analysis of Luther's writings on the Jews, placed in historical and chronological context. Mr. Cork points out that Catholics should probably think twice before raising the issue of Luther's & anti-semitism, when after all we have the words of our own Catholic saint (and a proclaimed Doctor of the Church, no less), to contend with in the person of St. John Chrysostom. On this note I'd like to recommend Robert Louis Wilken's John Chrysostom and the Jews: Rhetoric and Reality in the Late Fourth Century (U. of California Press; October 1983), which I found to be an indespensible resource for anybody wanting to understand Chrysostom's (in)famous sermons.

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