Latin Trinitarian Theology

From all eternity, the Father forgets about himself in love and generates the Son, and from all eternity, the Son forgets about himself and looks to the Father, and the mutual love of Father and Son is the Holy Spirit.

— Bishop Robert Barron (@BishopBarron) December 17, 2023

St. Augustine on Virtue and Politics

What qualities are required in citizens for the flourishing of a polis? Join @jennfrey of @eudaimoniapod, Russell Hittinger, and Fr. Michael Sherwin, OP for a conversation on Augustine on virtue and politics

with @americamag

HAPPENING NOW: https://t.co/WhoxJq27Rh pic.twitter.com/Ysqmjklep9

— Lumen Christi (@LC_Institute) May 1, 2021

The Authority to Punish Heresy and Apostasy

Integralism as Christian Default by Kevin Vallier

It’s a sign of the times when ⁦@kvallier⁩ argues that “Christian political theologians now must either work within an integralist framework or explain why not.” (Not to say I agree with all of the analysis here, by any means). https://t.co/MIy4TRM9PU

— Adrian Vermeule (@Vermeullarmine) May 20, 2020

Vallier:

Religious coercion has some limits, but it can be used to punish heresy and apostasy, and to ensure that Catholicism is the religion of the state.

Nowhere in the Kerygma or Tradition is political authority vested with the authority to punish heresy and apostasy. So why should we accept the claim that the political authority

It is not up to critics of integralism to show this claim is wrong when it is not a principle but a conclusion that must be given a demonstration/proof/derivation by its defenders. Repeating Aquinas or Augustine on this point could be one response, but Latin integralists must acknowledge the possibility that their arguments are flawed.

Act-consequentialism and integralism are plainly quite different normative theories. They are elegant approaches to ethics and political theory respectively because they make the good the sole normative master conception in a straightforward way. So much so, that one might even think that they’re the default normative theories.

I think that work on act-consequentialism has shown why it is axiologically mistaken. But I don’t think we yet have an account of why integralist axiology is mistaken if we take the truth of Christianity, and Catholicism in particular, for granted.

Latin integralism can hardly be said to be the "default" even for Roman Catholics when it doesn't have a place on the hierarchy of truths. I don't know how Vallier is able to make this claim, as if it were somehow self-evident.

Fr. Blankenhorn on Spiritual Communion

The Exodus took Israel through a long period of profound physical penance and spiritual purification: the two seem to be inseparable in the spiritual life. The desert became the only way for Israel to reach the Promised Land, and by God’s saving will, the people could only traverse this barren place by turning to the Lord each day for manna and quail. Israel had to learn radical trust in God, to recognize her utter dependence on him for everything: the direction of travel, the way to order the community’s life, and, of course, the reception of sufficient food and water.

Related:


Updated (4/9):

An essay touching upon the same topic, but much shorter. Still, it refers to the same two sources, St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas.

St. Augustine's Journey to Easter by C. C. Pecknold

Yet it is precisely in this exile that we must find our way to Calvary this year. We may be weary pilgrims, spiritually gaunt for so much sacramental fasting, but we are still pilgrims who must press our lips to the Cross. We cannot enter into the Paschal Triduum through Skype or Zoom. So what are we to do, we poor banished children of pandemic?

St. Thomas Aquinas gives us a hint: “the reality of the sacrament can be had through the very desire of receiving the sacrament.” He makes a distinction here between the signum and the res—the sacrament and the reality that the sacrament communicates. It is a distinction that goes back to St. Augustine.

There is at least one objection to this in the combox, concluding that if it is true, it renders going to Church superfluous. (Actually, it would render receiving the Sacraments superfluous.) I would think that desire is not enough -- one needs to ask God for the gift of life and trust in His goodness and mercy.

Αἰτεῖτε καὶ δοθήσεται ὑμῖν. -- Matthew 7:7 (cf. Luke 11:9)

A Latin View?

First Things: Embracing the Kind of Redeemer God Appointed by George Weigel

Animals feel pain, John Paul noted, but only men and women suffer. So suffering, even great physical suffering, has an inner or spiritual character; suffering touches our souls, not just our nervous systems. That is why the Bible is “a great book about suffering” (in John Paul’s striking phrase). And while the Scriptures contain many accounts of profound suffering, the Bible also teaches that “love . . . is the fullest source of the answer to the question of the meaning of suffering.” That was the truth to which Isaiah prophetically pointed in the “Suffering Servant” songs. To grasp that truth fully, however, humanity needed more than images or arguments; a demonstration was required.

That demonstration, Salvifici Doloris teaches, was what God ordained “in the cross of Jesus Christ.”

There the Son, giving himself without reservation to the Father’s plan of redemption, took the world’s evil upon himself and immolated it in perfect self-sacrifice to the divine will. On the cross, theologian Hans Urs von Balthasar wrote, the Son freely bore “all that the Father finds loathsome,” and did so in order to “clear out all the refuse of the world’s sins by burning it in the fire of suffering love.” At Calvary, the divine wrath at the world’s wickedness coincides with the divine mercy, determined to heal all that evil has broken or disfigured. On Calvary, the purifying fire of divine love reaches into history and transforms everything in this world that seems to stand against love, including suffering and death. 

To embrace the cross is to embrace the logic of salvation as God has established that logic, not as we might design things. God’s “demonstration” does not end on Good Friday, however. It continues through Holy Saturday until the full meaning of “redemption” is revealed on Easter. 
There, in the Risen Lord who manifests what Benedict XVI called an “evolutionary leap”—a new and supercharged mode of human life—we encounter the supreme demonstration of the divine logic of redemption. There, in the “Lamb . . . [who] had been slain” (Revelation 5:6) but who is now gloriously, radiantly alive, we meet God’s triumph over death itself and over all that is death-dealing in the world. There, we meet the redeemer God ordained.

Jesus . . . has become a high priest forever. . . . For all eternity he lives and intercedes for us . . . there is no limit to his power to save all who come to God through him (First Responsory,  Office of Readings for Wednesday of the Fifth Week of Lent, from Hebrews 6:19–20, 7:24–25). 

What is the Greek for "intercedes" here? ἐντυγχάνειν

Who intercedes? Only Jesus as man? Or the Son of God, in the loving conversation with the Father? The Word of God, who creates anew?

What does God find "loathsome" or "hateful"? Not sin. But the consequences of sin, the ways in which His creation has been damaged or marred because of sin? God does not want suffering.

"There the Son, giving himself without reservation to the Father’s plan of redemption, took the world’s evil upon himself and immolated it in perfect self-sacrifice to the divine will." Here is something akin to the obedience which St. Augustine and Joseph Ratzinger would emphasize as being integral to the sacrifice of Christ. Does such a view find parallels in the East, whether Greek or Syriac? There is definitely scriptural warrant for this, for example St. Paul, Hebrews 5:8-10, Romans 5:19. And this is probably the primary way in which the satisfaction of Christ should be understood, as it is His obedience or "righteousness" which enables us to be obedient or "righteous."

My question is whether this obedience is the main or even the first part of how we should understand the sacrifice of Christ.

Latin Notions of Sacrifice

Holy Mass: You Cannot Do Anything to Glorify God More by Peter Kwasniewski

Jesus Christ delivered us from the abyss of sin and death by the mysteries of His life and, above all, by His death on the Cross, when He offered Himself to the Father as an infinitely pleasing sacrifice of love.

Timothy Noone on the Semiotics of Augustine

TAC Lecture: Dr. Timothy B. Noone: “Augustine on Words, Signs, Thought, and Things in De Magistro”

More on Newman

Erich Przywara


Christopher M. Wojtulewicz


Cyril O'Regan

How Much of This is St. Augustine, How Much is Just Latin Theology?

Orthodoxy, worship, and Saint Augustine by Matthew Tsakanikas, STD
Doctrine exists for worship and not simply for itself. Doctrine apart from worship is barren.

Does this escape "functional Unitarianism"?

Fr. David Meconi, S.J. on EWTN Live

09/09/2015

"The Augustinian Roots of Thomistic Deification"

Christendom College: Author Fr. David Meconi to Deliver Annual St. Thomas Aquinas Lecture - itunes

I did not know he had taken over editing of HPR from Fr. Baker. Something he wrote for Christmas: Why God Becomes Human

Fr. Z: “The book on Augustine which Pope Benedict would have wanted to write”… revisited.

OUP interview with the author.

Vatican Radio: Pope Francis celebrates Saint Augustine

The Ignatius Press edition of Restless Heart should be available on DVD soon, in both "theatrical" and "extended" (or original uncut) versions.

Related:
Order of Preachers Vocations: In Praise of the Rule of St. Augustine

Another Week

Another Orthodox representation of Catholic teaching on original sin, this time at Orthodoxy and Heterodoxy: Original and Ancestral Sin: A Brief Comparison.

Jean Bethke Elshtain Videos

Related:

Fr. Z: REVIEW: The book on Augustine which Pope Benedict would have wanted to write.

Added this to my wish list as well.

St Augustine of Hippo, An Intellectual Biography, by Miles Hollingsworth

Another Book from Matt Levering

A Sure Guide to St. Augustine’s Thought and Theology by Jared Ortiz
A review of Matthew Levering’s new book, The Theology of Augustine: An Introductory Guide to His Most Important Works

(via Insight Scoop)

The Scale of Perfection by Walter Hilton

Currently on sale at Ignatius Press. (web edition)

I had not heard of him before...

THE SCALE OF PERFECTION: INTRODUCTION
Gloriana.nu
EWTN

CCEL

Feast of St. Augustine of Hippo, 28 August

The Scriptural Roots of St. Augustine's Spirituality | Stephen N. Filippo | IgnatiusInsight.com

Dominicana: St. Augustine: Ever Ancient and Yet Ever New!

The extended trailer for Restless Heart:


A review of the movie.

Rome Reports on the St. Augustine production

From 2 years ago, when the miniseries first came out in Italy/Europe?