Henri De Lubac’s “ressourcement” signified a return to the foundation, to the sources—a spiritual and intellectual return to a communion with Christianity at its most vital moments, which proposed to nourish, invigorate, and rejuvenate 20th-century Christianity. Whether that was modernism in disguise became a point of contention, and even fierce controversies.
But if we were to say: “There is nothing great, nothing really new in the Christian past—those early happenings were just an aberration and are quite undeserving of an historian’s sympathetic curiosity or of any effort to rediscover their essence,” we would be making a false historical judgment and this would be detrimental to the preservation and to the renewal of Christian culture. —Henri de Lubac, Scripture In The Tradition
I. What I Did Not Know Then But Do Modestly Know Now….
August 1965; the first day of class at my small Christian college along the Minnesota River Valley. One class of 30 was assembling in the chapel’s “undercroft” beneath the church proper.
Professor Esbjornson came out of his office and to his lectern. The class was Religion 101 required of all students.
There were muted objections from some who thought the course would be one more example of catechizing, that probing process of questioning and answering followed by embarrassing corrections.
He was a tall man with a diplomatic look about him now gone to be with God. He found his class list and read the names: P for present, A for absent.
He stuffed the list in a manila folder and never took roll again that semester.
There would be two books: The Bible and the Concordia, and supporting documents one of which to be collected at the end of class stacked on a table by the door. Selected readings from the church fathers way back in time and with names like Ambrose, Origen, Augustine, and others.
If there is a time-line, he noted, this class would survey the beginning to the end of the Middle Ages followed by what he called “Evolution and Alteration” which meant Religion 102 second semester. Given the time-line, much of what was to be studied would concern how Christian doctrine was formulated and by whom which meant how the church fathers defined potent issues and thus how they came to interpret scripture especially for “spiritual meaning.”
It might be helpful, he also noted, how Mary treasured all these things and pondered them in her heart which he then suggested is a bit like a Bible interpretation gateway, this treasuring and pondering, this spiritual meaning.
He said he liked Mary.
He handed out the “syllabus.” It had a lot of pages.
He wrote a word on the black board: theology, which he said would be important. He then posed an interesting question to those first semester students.
He asked if human beings possess a natural desire to see God and come to know His essence? He spent some time with “essence.” And he posed a question as to whether the exile of Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden was or was not a good thing? Which led to another phrase on the black board: felix culpa. He said it was understood as “fortunate fall,” a theological concept that acknowledges humanity’s original sin as a precursor to a greater good since it made redemption possible.
It sounds a bit like a paradox; he said it was introduced into the traditional theological scheme of things around the 4th century by “Honey-Tongued” St. Ambrose who baptized St. Augustine and about whom, he said, we would hear some things in due semester time. And it’s important to understand, he said, that the “doctrine” of what came to be called original sin was developed in the 2nd century by Irenaeus in his struggle with Gnosticism but was further shaped by Augustine and Ambrose.
To understand this, he said, we need to understand that it’s “doctrine,” which one can find in the Concordia but wise to read what Ambrose and Augustine actually wrote and why. Doctrine is a set of beliefs taught by the church and thus as stated principles in what he called the wisdom of Christianity.
By the way, he noted, Ambrose also has a wonderful homily ”On Grace” wherein we find him arguing against Pelagianism which also needs definition but not that first day.
Little of this was resonating in my mind at that time but as Professor Esbjornson went on his point was that there is a theological tradition that the “fall” needed to be understood as God bringing greater good out of evil, the “fall” leading to redemption through Christ, making the “fall” a necessary pre-condition for the Incarnation.
There are numerous theological criticisms, he noted, including those that argue that an un-fallen creation could very well have led to something greater without suffering an exile.
Maybe God’s great plan was not very great after all.
And then he added that what we know of “tradition” has over time suffered more than the suffering brought by the “fall.”
Wise to return to the original sources to discover what those sources say. The syllabus suggests that we start with Genesis.
He used the word “debunkers,” those who would “debunk” arguing that the creation story is a fairy tale or a psychological initiation story.
And it’s a paradox since felix culpa suggests joy which is not joy in the sin but revelation about God and leads to such biblical phrases as “where sin abounds grace abounds all the more.”
That might take some hefty exegesis.
And it would be wrong to gloss the Bible verses without pondering, which is a good word, pondering, and creating an orthodox defense lest the whole business be dismissed of all seriousness and be regarded as an illusion.
He wrote pondering on the board along with exegesis.
He bid us open our Bibles to Genesis 1 and the beginning of creation when God created the heavens and the earth and also noted that Origen had some ideas about this in a book titled “First Principles” some of which was in that pile over by he door.
He noted sadly that most of what Origen wrote has been lost over history and so we have to make do with fragments.
He posed the question as to whether God accomplished all of creation by stirring some organic stuff in a petri dish? That’s called an “hypothesis” and argues that the Bible can be mapped out into scientific facts and that to some it’s wise to picture God in a lab coat with his name stenciled over his left pocket but partially hidden by his pocket protector filled with pens.
Did I say that he had a sense of humor?
He opened the Bible and read from Genesis which as the name implies is about beginnings. He said it’s about God and the process of creation. He read to us with a lovely modulating voice and I remember thinking that if I closed my eyes perhaps I could hear God speaking.
And that would not be a mean thought.
And then he slowed, “pondering” the words where the earth was without form and void and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the spirit of God hovered over the face of the waters and was about to bring into bring “light” over the world, ornamenting what was being created and what was becoming exceedingly good.
Which owns an interesting resonance.
Here’s how Professor Esbjornson enlightened us:
The earth was in darkness unorganized and without form, and what is without form must be organized since order is the first need of all and once the organizing is completed, well, the result is a “tranquility of order.” What’s awkward is for “us” to think of something as an absolute privation of form. If the things of matter are to be formed and brought to perfection they must be lighted but not until a foundation has been laid which suggests by analogy various parts of a building one part after another after another which suggests creation preceding ordering.
Thus said Ambrose.
Controversy in time emerges when an argument appears by a group of heretics, Manichaeans, who ask whether God was in darkness before he made light.
Augustine, my professor argued, demolished this by distinguishing the light which we and all the other creatures see with the eyes of our flesh but God we must understand dwells in a different light which we call “supernal” and different from physical light.
Having been defeated those Manichaeans slouched away.
But there was a snag there because I had trouble with that word “supernal.” I understood how things in darkness could not be seen but when God made physical light all creation was enhanced. Remove the light and all will be in darkness and incapable of displaying its comeliness.
Professor Esbjornson then said that the difference is that God dwells in the Word light but then he added that although “In the beginning” the supernal light would be hidden but would one day not be hidden but not until the work of fulfillment is accomplished and all darkness will be afraid of this supernal light.
I was wondering, though, whether this supernal light was or was not like “animism.” Best, though, to stay on point and not wander into whether animate and inanimate things are part of a universal spirit, rocks, trees and rivers, toads.
Did I mention there was a practicing Buddhist on my dormitory floor?
I raised my hand to ask a question by reading from the New Testament the Gospel passages where darkness covered the entire surface of the land while Jesus was on the cross. I asked whether the darkness was to be likened to the dark we read in Genesis but complicated by the profound spiritual weight of humanity’s sins placed on Jesus Who is one part of the Trinity but the one Who acts.
I also said it was not a natural phenomenon like an eclipse; Jesus’ death was not an astronomical event.
He wrote another word on the board, “typology,” which he said was a word used to illustrate a moment in which the New Testament can be read into the Old Testament and in turn the Old into the New which focuses our attention on God’s progressive revelation creating historical patterns foreshadowing redemption.
He urged upon me some pondering.
Have you ever thought about the word darkness but also the darkness that humanity suffers without the light?
Can it be defined? Supernal is the guiding light of divinity hidden deep within each of us which can be awakened to the love and wisdom of the soul. It requires attention since this sacred light gradually begins too emerge upon the shores of consciousness and usually during the darkness of the night and around 3 AM daily light saving time.
There’s that humor again.
Then he flipped the Bible to John 8:12 and the phrase “I am the light of the world” which signifies spiritual guidance, truth, and eternal life leading people out of the darkness of confusion and death.
And another phrase ex nihilo which he wrote on the board and said that it means “out of nothing.” But he added that one might best place the adjective “creatio” in front of ex nihilo meaning that matter had to be divinely created, matter, the stuff created from nothing by the spoken “word.” And there we were again, that “Word.”
It’s scripture which means “sacred writings,” which develops in early Christian thought and lest we become debunkers like those Gnostics who were called heretics by the folks who were called apologists, among whom one named Theophilus of Antioch and Origen and then he quickly flipped backward to John 1:3 and then forward to Hebrews11:3 where we find words supporting emerging Christian thought which he added suggests that the New Testament should again be read into the Old Testament and which becomes evident when the Old Testament is read into the New Testament which he then said is a paraphrase from St. Augustine and how scripture is unified because the New is in the Old Concealed and the Old is in the New Revealed which is how the Old points forward to Christ through types and promises while the New then unveils their fulfillment.
Why mention this? Well those Gnostics were positing something called eternal matter which takes God out of the creation picture. What arises from Tertullian[1] and Origen is the core doctrine of ex nihilo which came to be known as the rule of faith.
He checked his watch since there was no clock in the undercroft room. He thanked us for coming which I thought was a decent thing to say. He pointed to that stack on that table by the door for us collect one of the handouts about a half inch thick: assigned reading as what was on the syllabus.
There was quiet as the scholars made their exit.
I opted to head to the chapel and browse the packet, the first part to be read for the next class session titled “Introduction to Genesis 1-3” with this statement: “The early chapters of Genesis had a greater influence on the development of Christian theology than did any other parts of the Old Testament because it was from these chapters that the Fathers set out the fundamental patterns of Christian theology.”
I thought that was saying a lot. I guess it had to be since here the doctrine of creation was affirmed as something exceedingly good which also meant that the six days were now called the Hexameron.
Who were these Fathers?
Well, the packet began, first, with some pages from St. Ambrose (374-397), his Genesis Commentary and a long analysis on the statement, “And God said: Let there be light!”
One might think that God turned on a switch and there was light. But, no….
Ambrose began by developing an idea that light came from the spirit of God to begin the work of the divine but the beginning of scripture was also like the light which was fitted to begin ornamenting the world and God Himself was in the light and there was also another living inside the light, He who is the true God from true God and enlightens anyone who comes into the world which argues that the phrase “in the beginning” is the “beginning of salvation history.” There is no distinction to be made between God’s word and light both in themselves the operation of creation.
But one thing I had never really thought about during those months of catechesis. The creation story we find with Ambrose is a Trinitarian creation which means the Father and the Son are co-equal but with the Father speaking and the Son acting and with the Spirit stirring the waters prefiguring Baptism.
St. Ambrose spares no editing on the notion of light at the beginning because light was fitted to the ornamenting of the world would exist again as a “tranquility of order.”
And it is again the light which comes along to show creation’s ornaments in their fullness.
And what is that other than advent, a prefiguring.
Sitting there in chapel that day reading and pondering I thought all of this pretty grand because I had never thought of that phrase “Let there be light” in that way. And when I walked out of the chapel to go for lunch I was also aware that my understanding was deficient in so many ways and much that I did know coming from another building was distracting from the enchanting and mystical cosmos about which I was learning.
The physics building….
I was also beginning to see how this beginning in Genesis, the Old was shining light on the New and the New was in turn shining light on the Old.
The light invaded the darkness for us to see but also to frighten the darkness, so says Ambrose, by the clearness of the light. And God has not spoken any of this as if to whisper a word by His larynx or by a motion of His tongue but composed as it were, by celestial speech.
Well, there was more to this in the packet apart from Ambrose including St. Augustine and his “fight card” with the Manichaeans which went through a number of rounds.
I did not know then but know now that in 1965 my reverend Professor Esbjornson was practicing what might best be called ressourcement theology. I should add that we became friends growing in admiration and strength over four years.
And so that first year in college, 1965 to 1966, Religion 101 followed by Religion 102 and what a gift were those two classes.
II. Years Later, 1979 To Be Exact….
The library of a small Presbyterian college in Arkansas had a basement and in a darkened corner were metal book shelves with the label, “withdrawn from circulation.” They had sign out sleeves but the cards hadn’t been signed out for two or three decades and so none were circulating.
One was titled “On First Principles” by Origen, edited by G. W. Butterworth and with an introduction by Henri De Lubac. It had been a decade and a half since I had read Origen but here he was, an old friend. Butterworth I did not know and De Lubac only by name. There was an oddity; the book had a 1973 publication date and out of circulation at an early date.
Perhaps a mistake?
I meandered up the stairs to the head librarian; she looked at the book and then said I could have it.
I had in my hands an old friend and an accidental sort of re-acquaintance with Origen and his first ever systematic expositions written between the years 220 and 230.
The book was titled “On First Principles” and I confess the title excited me. The book and I owned a history. He was apparently some kind of theological genius and at one time head of a Christian school whose interpretive thought about “creation” was presumed to be highly significant.
In addition, there were some samplings of his homilies, especially on Genesis and Exodus which was an English translation from a surviving Latin translation by Rufus of Aquileia (340-410).
The book is an anthology with some homilies and a lengthier treatise on First Principles which is all well and fine but if we look back into the fledging years of Christianity, one must wonder if there’s not some kind conference to meander ourselves off to and learn a bit more about the early Christian church.
Exciting no?
Of which the Gospels are foundational and thus indispensable.
To quote Augustine: isn’t the question once again an argument as to whether we should read the New through the Old and he Old through the New?
Here’s the complication: Only fragments of Origen’s vast corpus have survived although some have been reconstructed.
As for “First Principles,” Origen begins by making the argument that the apostolic doctrine in the New Testament is not complete because the apostles intentionally left some matters untouched for the sake of their spiritual successors.
Those matters untouched Origen called “exegetical difficulties” which were placed there by God the ultimate author so that man could use his mind.
But with this caveat: not only during Origen’s own time but in our time which would mean ressourcement, a renewal in our century of the words and thoughts of the church fathers which argues the need to re-possess what the Holy Spirit had caused to be written, spiritual doctrine providing authoritative interpretation and thus a ground plan necessary.
Having said that, Origen enlarges on a spiritual hierarchy beginning with the Father who acts on all beings followed by the Logos (the Word) acting upon rational beings, and the Spirit who acts upon those rational beings who are to be sanctified. And not to be forgotten, angels.
And so a systematic “first principle.”
Bear with me now dear reader because after this “systematic” delineation Origen discusses the material world whereby Man (who according to Origen was created because the angels fell) is a pre-existent fallen spirit in a material body. However, after Adam’s transgression came redemption by the incarnate Logos which will eventually lead to the resurrection, the last judgment and the life of all men restored to spiritual bodies,
All of these are systematic principles which are further developed when Origin takes up the question of freedom which is characteristic of Man but the difficult issue occurs when a soul is in a body and freely struggles for victory aided by angels but hindered by demons.
A further aid to this struggle is of course the Scriptures which Origin argues have various levels of meaning: literal and spiritual followed by allegorical.
But once again why?
The levels of meaning are again “exegetical difficulties” placed there once again by God so that man could use his mind.
But wait, there’s more.
It turns out that this time period was witness to a turbulent period for the Christian Church largely because there was little doctrinal consensus among the various regional churches. Gnosticism was flourishing. Writing in the third century Origen was doing so in a manner refuting Gnosticism while offering a rigorous Christian system which was also philosophically rigorous and respectable and more than mythological speculations.
In short, if that’s possible, Origen mastered Greek philosophy which gave him the “tools” to compose his systematic treatise On First Principles and by systematic I mean his presentation of Christianity as a coherent theological system with an influence existing throughout Christian theological history albeit flagging a bit over modern times.
But how?
Well, let’s call to mind Plato’s emanations scheme, the pre-existence of the soul and the soul’s freedom which eventually leads Origen to the doctrine of the Holy Trinity.
Face it; the man had moxy.
His treatise On First Principles is regarded as one of the earliest on Christian systematic theology which is an attempt to arrange religious truths as a self-consistent whole, coherent themes in biblical teaching, structural undergirding for faith emphasizing unity and practical application categorized as key topics which when classified read like a college course catalog.
Consider for a moment the argument that the religious life means nothing more than a subjective organizing of human feelings; call such a variety of religious experiences.
Compare that with a week-by-week study taught by a serious biblicist with organizational clarity and informed by tradition and steeped in scripture.
Such a study surely bears the finger prints of Origen.
When I looked into matters a bit more, however, I discovered that some of his theological views were deemed heresies three centuries after his death. There were controversies suggesting that he had been corrupted by his Greek education and was to be regarded as a Neo-Platonist, or even a Stoic, and there were issues also about his use of allegory which at that time was regarded as deviant rather than dogmatic.
But I knew that modern readers typically read the Genesis creation story as a scientific account which rejects the veracity of scripture and misses the mark according to Origen. For him, the question is not how but why. And the point being that the narrative is theological and especially soteriological which I learned meant concerning salvation.
I foundered bit when learning that much of his commentary on Genesis did not survive over time. But I still had the homily and learned that Genesis 1-2 owns two separate creations: immaterial/incorporeal and material/corporeal; these two accounts are theologically related.
Here, then, is what excited me. First is the argument that incorporeal can be understood as the rational mind. This statement should be understood as Origen’s “decoding.” This rational mind “cools” as it were away from the mind’s early love of God. What follows is a bit sticky because that cooling off results in the fall. From the blissful pre-existent state of union with God which becomes a divine defection which creates a cosmic crisis.
There was something resonating in my mind.
What was coming back to memory was that I was remembering reading Origen years ago in those class packets for Religion 101 with passages from his “Homily on Genesis and Exodus” which he posed as a salient answer to the question why Genesis is not primarily scientific but soteriological which I learned again meant concerning salvation and how we are rescued from sin and reconciled with God but somehow also balances human responsibility with divine sovereignty and about which there are different views. So, Origen avers that Genesis is a “coded “ text that offers clues into the deep meaning of the cosmos but only if we learn how to decode the story through spiritual interpretation.
The same phrase appears in Henri de Lubac’s Scripture and Tradition.
And did you know I found the whole business from years ago enchanting and recalled that I wrote a paper for Professor Esbjornson titled “Orient on Prayer and Grace” and was not penalized for writing “Orient” rather than “Origen.”
Little did I know then but know now that I was in 1965 and again 1979 in a very amateur way practicing a smallish bit of ressourcement theology.
I was returning to my old Professor’s religion classes and it was as if I could feel him over my shoulder and with a tickle in my nose inhale the aroma of his pipe tobacco.
III. Years Later….
Even though I am approaching age 80, on occasion something is presented to my “consciousness” that resonates from 61 years ago. Perhaps the best word is “touchstone,” a reliable reference from Matthew Arnold which has to do with assaying gold but in literature serves as a metaphor although still an “assay.
Here’s the “touchstone” example I have in mind from Peter Casarella’s introduction to Henri De Lubac’s Scripture in the Tradition:
“The French Jesuit believed that modern exegesis had begun to lose sight of fundamental questions about existence itself. The pursuit of specialized disciplines, while legitimate as one aspect of scriptural interpretation, had come to an inquiry into understanding reality as a whole. ‘De Lubac’s research into the doctrine of the senses of Scripture,’ writes Hans Urs von Balthasar, is not simply curiosity of the history of theology’ but ‘an instrument permitting the discovery of the profound interconnections within the history of salvation.’”
In short, if that’s possible, De Lubac was interested in a careful critical scrutiny of ancient exegetical practices which consisted of the very best of the Christian past in all its immortal beauty. What was once an exciting newness and spiritual reality lived profoundly in an historical reality and both found in the prodigious new fact of Christ.
Thus his aim became a new synthesis of history and theology within the framework of traditional spiritual exegesis not to supplant historical research but to counter the growing tendency to treat the Christian past as a mere ancient relic.
Additionally, De Lubac also wanted to show that scripture and tradition were not two, wholly separate sources of revelation but anticipating and illuminating and elucidating.
And with this caveat: the newness of Christ does not render the ancient philosophy of the Old Covenant meaningless. He repeats Augustine’s argument that the New is hidden in the Old and the Old is made manifest in the New.
And what would it have been like to live in a time and journey along with Paul on one of his missionary trips to Corinth, for example, to defend the gospel against false teachers and to advance this theological principle: the resurrection of Jesus is essential for our faith and without this belief faith is worthless.
De Lubac might add that nothing there is antiquated or naive or childish when in fact, it’s a fact.
Let us turn, then, to this modern ressourcement theologian Henri De Lubac.
IV. Drawing Anew From The Living Spring Of Christian Learning, Wisdom, And Experience
Photographs of Henri De Lubac show a warm and smiling face. Accompanying blurbs consider him one of the most influential theologians of the 20th century whose doctrinal research influenced Vatican II. But there seems to be some misunderstanding as to whether he is a ressourcement theologian.
The word intrigues since it leads to the difficult field of biblical interpretation. Consider for a moment two books which have just landed on my doorstep: both the impressive size of phone books:
The first is Volume One titled Medieval Exegesis: The Four Senses Of Scripture by Henri De Lubac and Renewal in Twentieth-Century Catholic Theology, edited by Gabriel Flynn and Paul D. Murray.
What’s the point of all this dense reading?
Well, to simplify as best I can, consider again the Genesis creation narrative. The story of the creation and the fall have been subjected to reductionism, literalists arguing that the Bible is a sort of pseudo-scientific textbook with the subtitle creation science, whereas rationalists divorce God from tradition leaving multiple arguments abounding including Stephen Hawking that a belief in a personal, creator God is just one more fairy tale.
The issue is an old one which has led to the opposition of faith and reason whereas when Newman addressed the issue by arguing that faith and reason are not inherently opposed but complementary operations of the mind aimed at truth. Reason requires empirical evidence while faith operates on probabilities like trust, moral dispositions acting as the reasoning of a divinely enlightened mind.
Give this a name and one arrives at “illative sense” which Newman argued is the bridge between reason and faith and by this he also meant that religious matters especially often cannot be captured by formal, deductive logic. So the challenge is to argue that to weigh evidence only by empiricism is too narrow and inapplicable to our daily living.
Such might be a way for a person of faith to give real assent to the probability of a one time lived experience called the Creation Story bringing such to a high degree of certainty even if we do not have the bones of Adam and Eve in front of us.
What then is a balanced Catholic (and for that matter albeit a bit later Protestant) renewal from the way in which scripture was interpreted by the church fathers in the Latin Middle Ages and before?
Who were those commentators and what were their approaches to Biblical interpretation and did that approach become naive during theEnlightenment and the following decades and into what became known as “Modernism” with its accompanying adjective “Secular.”
One should expect that ressourcement engendered controversy much of which was directed at the terminology and it’s here that Flynn and Murray suggest the term was coined by the poet Charles Péguy though in their view his understanding was weak.
Still, the argument is for a Renaissance in Twentieth Century theology but obviously with very good scholarly care although with some concern over terminology. Flynn and Murray again introduce this issue in their introduction titled “Ressourcement or Nouvelle Theologie” giving the reader the argument that this renewal influenced French theology between 1930 and 1960, and beyond. There’s also the argument for its importance in history at least until the Enlightenment which stalled various renewals.
Who then should one turn as a leader for both biblical renewal and liturgical movement?
Consider Joseph Ratzinger’s tributes to De Lubac about whom he writes that in (Vatican II’s) comments about the church, most were moving precisely in the direction of Lubac’s thought which was to go to the sources of Christian doctrine and find in those sources the truth and wisdom of our Christian living.
The claim is that De Lubac was a leading practitioner of resssourcement with books “that seem like a rich intricately woven tapestry of texts from the tradition,” from the sources.
On the other hand, there’s some concern that this renewal be called ressourcement or nouvelle theologie both of which seem to represent a very strong historical theology.
According to some, what distinguishes those ressourcement theologians from the nouveau is that the former were at one time nouveau while the ressosurcement folks were not always committed to ressourcement.
A score card of some sort might be helpful.
Before moving on, it might be wise to give some thought to the following since it’s already been mentioned: The Genesis creation story and the doctrine of imago dei arguments which suggest we read Genesis with Origen which presents immediate problems since again often what we have in hand are fragments.
The first issue is that his main doctrine for Christianity was to defend against pagan accusations. And the second is that prevailing consensus tends to reject the veracity of scripture on a literal or historical level.
With Origen, then, a biblical exegetical issue is less a concern with science and more what the narrative reveals about the creation of the world and the status of the soul and how such knowledge facilitates our spiritual development. The problem for Origen was the same as it is ours which is not to find a guiding scientific principle but theological and specifically concerning salvation. We must learn to read the text to gather what De Lubac calls “spiritual reading”which requires some decoding facilitating our spiritual development through spiritual interpretation.
For Origen, therefore, the guiding interpretive principle is to find a meaning worthy of God, worthy of divine majesty, and deeper truths beneath the literary or historical levels of scripture which suggests in turn that if we as readers remain on the surface level of the text we miss the transformative truths that the text conceals.
Origen in this decoding then argues that the interpretations we should be aiming to reach are soteriological and not scientific. If we concern ourselves then with a return to Origin in our own day and our questions change from the scientific to such questions as:
Why did God create the world?
Why does it seem unjust?
What is the purpose of life in this world?
And again, if we fix our attention only on the biological mechanism by which the cosmos came into being we remain blind to the underlying point which involves loss of our spiritual health and the soul’s ailment which impairs our spiritual well-being and if we dig more deeply in this spiritual treasure we find the gems God has hidden which in time are revealed as the most precious jewels in creation, the most esteemed, the Incarnation, and a way of life, a way of salvation, culminating in the vision of God.
Origen describes this world, then, as a sort of hospital or schoolroom where by we gradually ascend to God though moral, intellectual, and spiritual development.
And although sinful, we are something other than a “species.”
Surely we are these days starved for a substance reflecting things enchanted and other than our sterile and mechanic age.
The issue became more complicated in this twentieth century renaissance in catholic theology since it coincided with the terrible conflicts of totalitarianism and especially the Nazi atrocities. What to do in the face of such evil?
Some liturgical changes inaugurated by Pious X led to renewed inspiration. And lest he be sidelined, Yves Congar used the changes as a standard for church reform which would answer an urgent call to move from a less profound to a more profound tradition which also called for a re-discovery of those most profound resources.[2]
About which one might wish to wonder why all the turmoil?
In their introduction, Flynn and Murray make the point that De Lubac had a dynamic view of tradition while expressing his regrets that some highly regarded theologians, experienced guardians, owned a lack of openness to the problems and currents of contemporary thought. Their lack of a truly traditional mind would impact that Christian renewal. Still, De Lubac’s prodigious theological program, so goes the argument, would impact directly on the documents of Vatican II and which motivated others to “go to the sources of Christian doctrine and find in those sources the truth of our life.”
The achievement of those ressourcement theologians, however, lay not so much in their rejection of a long since arid neo-scholasticism as in their concern to engage with the contemporary world and to ensure the essential unity of theology.
The shibboleth then is to read “contemporary” as a synonym for modernism and secularism.
About this unity, Flynn and Murray make this further argument that prior to Vatican II ressourcement theologians were hostile to Protestantism because of dogmatic and eschatological differences.
However, Flynn and Murray include an article by John Webster of St. Andrews titled, “Ressourcement Theology and Protestantism” which suggests a mood of receptive ecumenicism.
As for De Lubac, then, regarded as one of the most influential theologians of the last century and upon whom (at least at one time) came the argument that the was doing ‘new theology.” His response was vehement in as much as he explained that he had never used the expression and more so detested the thing. Rather, he explained his position that any of the varied forms of immanentism flatten the distinction between nature and grace as well as time and eternity.
Scholars over the past few decades have wrestled with De Lubac to the point in which “myths” have been pinned on his life and work and other scholars then writing to debunk those myths.
I’m thinking here of Dr. Sara Hulse Kirby’s 2023 cogent essay in Church Life Journal, “7 Persistent Myths About Henri De Lubac’s Theology” wherein she argues “aspects of the French cardinal’s life and thought remain misunderstood by his critics as well as by many seeking to claim him as an ally. The following seven myths are as widespread as they are egregious.”
In fact, as Dr. Kirby makes clear, impressions continue but De Lubac was not inventing new theory but rediscovering the tradition which was not mere antiquarianism but ressourcement, a return to the sources of the tradition which had been abandoned in the modern era with numerous attempts to reinterpret and thus modernize traditional Christian doctrines to make them more relevant to modern culture and individual experience. One might further note an emphasis on personal Christian consciousness as a standard of faith which is, as a result, a decontextualization (yes there is such a word) which ventures to rethink theology in light of, say, evolution which again means critical of traditionalism.
So, then, ressourcement, which signifies a return to the foundation, to the sources, or, if I might add, spiritual and intellectual return to a communion with Christianity at its most vital moments, would in turn nourish, invigorate, and rejuvenate 20th-century Christianity. That would include again a return to the sources, which for De Lubac meant scripture and the writings of the Church Fathers.
Whether that was modernism in disguise becomes a point of contention, which is a modest word in place of fierce controversies.
Here is Dr. Hulsey on whether De Lubac was attempting to do New Theology which she quotes him as arguing that it’s a “polemical” term which most of the time signifies nothing, serving only to throw suspicion on the author in the minds of those who do not take a closer look at it.
He was, in fact, no modernist heretic but was opposed to secularism which was making grace irrelevant. What’s equally interesting, however, is his belief that over time Thomism had become rigid and thus the dynamic spirit of Thomism needed to be recovered in all its cosmic beauty.
We should also note that two primary sources for De Lubac were his Christian resistance to Nazism and Antisemitism and the executions of good friends by the Gesteapo which led to a profound sorrow. Rather than capitulating, he challenged the assumptions to Nazi ideology and the theory of racial superiority and the brutal submission of the church to an ideology based upon race. Ressourcement developed then, a call to collective responsibilities which included a deep seeded interest in a rejuvenated European culture after World War II based upon a Christian humanism in response to the challenges still presented by the Enlightenment, European totalitarianism, and secular modernity.
What we know as theology is therefore constantly changing, progressing. And such practitioners, if that’s the right word, who refer to themselves as Cultural Christians or Non-Denominational Christians, are critical of traditional religion while arguing for belief in a Creator, but do not see God as a moral judge but to see Christ’s teachings as a mere Trinity of love, kindness, and forgiveness.
I was not aware of De Lubac in 1965 and likely neither was Professor Robert Esbjornson in August of that year. Scripture and Tradition was not published in this country until 1967.
If there’s a paradigm, well, one needs only to open the New Testament to Luke’s Gospel.
So, Luke tells us in the second chapter that the time came for Mary to give birth to her first born son whom she wrapped in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger because there was no place for the small family in the inn. Balthazar would call this a “theo-aesthetic ” moment since we can visualize the scene in our minds-eye. And it’s “theo-dramatic” since it describes life as a divine drama written and directed by God in which Mary plays a specific role in God’s grand cosmic play which also means exploring and revealing revelation in time, in history with Christ’s birth and life and death a covenant with humanity unfolding with his self-emptying love leading to redemption.
Or so she must have pondered.
Such is an ultimate standard revealing God’s nature not in a book per se but as words about the Word.
And as we know our response to our understanding the transcendent glory of God meeting humanity in history in the person of Jesus, well, all of that takes some “pondering.” More than just understanding is the need for spiritual understanding.
What follows is equally dramatic what with the appearance of angels to the shepherds who when they go away to heaven the shepherds are left to converse and decide to go over to Bethlehem to see what has happened. They do so with haste and then make known what had been told them regarding the child.
Mary has been treasuring all these things, pondering them in her heart.
The word “pondering” in the Bible means to weigh heavily, to reflect deeply. It’s not just casual thinking so much as giving God’s Word significant focus and attention leading to spiritual understanding. The word appears in Proverbs when considering life’s paths and also in Psalms encouraging meditation on God’s law and doing so by day and by night.
I mention spiritual understanding again because such takes up most of the argument in in de Lubacs’ Scripture In The tradition especially part I,” Spiritual Understanding.”
Mary is “meditating on truths” as does the woman in Proverbs 31, that woman of valor whom we know to be wise and capable, representing an ideal of biblical womanhood, wisdom in action, stability and blessing which with pondering and prayer brings thoughts or circumstance together to understand them better.
One should also argue that with Mary’s “pondering” she is performing an act of exegesis.
Well, once again, de Lubac aimed at a careful scrutiny of the ancient exegetical practices, such as those by Ambrose and Origen and a host of others which became the individual methods practiced by the church Fathers which he believed would aid in renewing theology and the Church. But how? Casarilla quotes an essay by Maurice Blondel dedicated to DeLubac stating that tradition anticipates and illuminates the future and is disposed to do so by the effort which it makes to remain faithful to the past.
In other words, there is a spiritual force in history which calls us to look to history and a method of immanence in order to discern the activity of God’s spirit from the beginning.
He goes on to argue that rather than historicism which defines the alienation of the past from the fundamental questions of human existence, history as spiritual understanding offers an outlook on the past that can shape the future and which means in exegesis the unity of history and spirit and with more and more spiritual understanding of God’s self-revelations in the Word made flesh.
Here the point takes on a particular but vital purpose since I believe my old professor and De Lubac were “on the same page.” The problem is that each new generation has received a Christianity “ready-made” which suggests in turn that each generation need not be troubled with the tree but have only to gather the fruit. The act has a certain disinterestedness about it more so since the object of faith seems not to need increased understanding.
But doctrine may not have achieved final form.
__________
From The Man Who Wore A Tea Cup On His Head, a memoir in progress.
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Notes:
[1] Some argue he coined the term “trinity” but did find himself in trouble by arguing that Mary had troubles and thus doctrinally unstable.
[2] See Flynn and Murray citing Congar’s Tradition and Traditions.
The featured image is “In the classroom” (1886), by Jean-Paul Louis Martin des Amoignes, and is in the public domain, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
