Showing posts with label redemption. Show all posts
Showing posts with label redemption. Show all posts

Friday, June 23, 2017

A Forgotten Devotion in the West?

The Most Sacred Heart of Jesus (EWTN)

Fr. Tim Finigan: The healthy notion of reparation

That we can seek to make up for our sins is only possible because of our participation in Christ and the satisfaction of God's righteousness that He is able to make -- and the latter part is meant not in a Latin/legalistic way but an Eastern one.

Thursday, July 14, 2016

Bishop Barron Doesn't Go as Far as David Bentley Hart

The Cross of Jesus: God's Awful Work of Love by Bishop Robert Barron
How can we make sense of Saint Anselm's so-called "satisfaction" theory? By recognizing the true nature of sin.

But what he writes can be verbally harmonized with Patristic theories of atonement/redemption/deification. But is that what the bishop intended?



Monday, November 02, 2015

Made for Goodness

You were made for goodness and life, not sin and death. God made us in His image; with work, we can uncover that image and start living like the saints He made us to be!#BeTheBee #LiveOrthodoxy #OrthoPost

Posted by Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America on Thursday, October 29, 2015

Monday, July 13, 2015

A New Understanding of Anselm

Silverio Rebelo, Le Sacrifice du Christ chez Saint Anselm de Cantorbery, Le noveau visage du Cur Deus Homo, Irenikon, LXXXVII, 2014, 5-46

Summary of Silverio Rebelo:
"The Sacrifice of Christ according to Saint Anselm of Canterbury - A New Look at the Cur Deus Homo." According to the current interpretation of the Cur Deus Homo, Anselm explained the redemptive function of the sacrifice of the Cross in accordance with the basic perspective of the theory of vicarious satisfaction, the classic design of a legal-term replacement of the work of Christ. However, a closer examination reveals a theology of redemption of a very different type, deeply rooted in the patristic tradition, whose basic idea is that the sacrifice of Christ is a life-giving event. According to this interpretation of the mediation of Christ, faith allows believers to share in the perfection of his obedience unto death, which becomes the basis of their life of obedience to God. This leads to a veritable revolution in the understanding of the relationship between God and humanity: the sacrifice of Christ is not a condition of the grace of God for humankind, but a work that renews their way of living, and is an expression [of] God's unconditional will to save."

The article contains a discussion of merit in CDH 2.19 - is this the source of Aquinas's teaching on merit re: Christ's redemptive work in ST III? Or is it mediated by other sources? From a completely unrelated work? Wholly "original"?

The dominant understanding of Anselm's teaching among Latins, transmitted in academic settings, is probably familiar to those who have studied Latin theories of atonement. It is a representation put forth even by Joseph Ratzinger and Louis Bouyer. I assume that both read Anselm's CDH, either in Latin or in translation, so that their representation is confirmed by their reading of the primary source and not based solely on secondary sources. So why did the theological giants of yesteryear fail to get Anselm right (assuming this revised understanding of Cur Deus Homo is the correct one)? Did they lack access to the requisite scholarship for properly understanding how the terms satisfaction and honor were being used by Anselm, definitions that could not be uncovered until they were situated within the historical and theological culture in which they were used? Was it a problem of translation (and the interpretation that precedes translation)?

Monday, November 17, 2014

Syrian Orthodox Teaching on the Holy Cross

Doing some research on what the Oriental Orthodox churches teach on atonement. (Will check out the Assyrian teaching as well.)