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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 09 September 2014
James Tunstead Burtchaell had been teaching Rosemary Haughton's 1967 book The Transformation of Man for a number of years when he published Philemon's Problem in 1973. Now, with both authors having reworked their books in the last two years, we are given an opportunity to compare and contrast the development of Burtchaell's and Haughton's thinking on how grace transforms human beings. The present essay sees an intellectual convergence between Haughton and Burtchaell; it sees much to be grateful for in both books by both authors; and it claims that Haughton's new book has developed her thinking on grace's communal character further than Burtchaell's new book has developed his thinking on the same topic.
1 Burtchaell, James Tunstead, Philemon's Problem: The Daily Dilemma of the Christian (Chicago, IL: ACTA Foundation for Adult Catechetical Teaching Aids, 1973).Google Scholar Hereafter Burtchaell, Daily Dilemma I wish to express gratitude to Ellen S. Ryan who read this essay and improved it by both her editorial suggestions and her own dedication to transformation.
2 Burtchaell, James, Philemon's Problem: A Theology of Grace. (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1998).Google Scholar Hereafter Burtchaell, Theology of Grace.
3 Burtchaell, , Theology of Grace, 333–34.Google Scholar
4 Burtchaell, , Theology of Grace, 3;Google Scholar and Burtchaell, , Daily Dilemma, 176.Google Scholar
5 Haughton, Rosemary, The Transformation of Man: A Study of Conversion and Community (Springfield, IL: Templegate, 1967).Google Scholar Later references are to this edition.
6 Haughton, Rosemary, in a new preface to a new printing of The Transformation of Man: A Study of Conversion and Community (Springfield, IL: Templegate, 1980), i.Google Scholar
7 Haughton, Rosemary, Images for Change: The Transformation of Society (Mahwah, NJ: Paulist, 1997).Google Scholar
8 Ibid., 83.
9 Haughton, , Transformation, 114–15 (text rearranged).Google Scholar
10 Ibid., 7.
11 Burtchaell, , Theology of Grace, 117, 137, 176, 224, 303Google Scholar, and throughout. Also see Burtchaell, , Daily Dilemma, 97.Google Scholar
12 Burtchaell, , Theology of Grace, 301.Google Scholar
13 Haughton, , Transformation, 38.Google Scholar
14 Ibid., 256.
15 Ibid., 39.
16 Burtchaell, , Theology of Grace1, 306.Google Scholar
17 Haughton, , Transformation, 104.Google Scholar
18 Haughton, , Images, 193–94.Google Scholar
19 Burtchaell, , Daily Dilemma, 79, 111;Google Scholar for the Hiroshima story, see also Burtchaell, , Theology of Grace, 203–04.Google Scholar
20 Burtchaell, , Theology of Grace, 242.Google Scholar
21 Ibid., 154.
22 Haughton, , Transformation, 114.Google Scholar
23 Ibid., 60.
24 Burtchaell, , Daily Dilemma, 176;Google Scholar and Burtchaell, , Theology of Grace, 3.Google Scholar
25 Haughton, , Transformation, 35.Google Scholar
26 Burtchaell, , Daily Dilemma, 96;Google Scholar see also Burtchaell, , Theology of Grace, 176.Google Scholar
27 Haughton, , Transformation, 150.Google Scholar
28 Ibid., 246.
29 Burtchaell, , Daily Dilemma, 37;Google Scholar see also Burtchaell, , Theology of Grace, 85f.Google Scholar
30 Haughton, , Transformation, 94.Google Scholar
31 Burtchaell, , Daily Dilemma, 169.Google Scholar
32 Haughton, , Images, 130.Google Scholar
33 Burtchaell, , Theology of Grace, 332.Google Scholar
34 Ibid., 287, 291.
35 Haughton, , Images, 46.Google Scholar
36 Ibid., 175, 187-89.
37 Burtchaell, , Theology of Grace, 13, 155, 302.Google Scholar
38 Ibid., 333.
39 Ibid., 308.
40 Burtchaell, James Tunstead, “Community Experience as Source of Christian Ethics” in his The Giving and Taking of Life—Essays Ethical (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1989), 41.Google Scholar
41 Meilander, Gilbert, “Discerning…. to a point. A review of Burtchaell's The Giving and Taking of Life.” First Things 2 (04 1990): 47.Google Scholar
42 This is not in the least meant to deny the need for authority in the believing community. Elsewhere, I suggest an understanding of moral doctrinal authority in the institutional Catholic Church: “Is it not an underemphasized role of the pastoral magisterium of the church to remind all of us that our experience will mislead and not teach unless we are surrendering to the transformational work of divinely infused virtue in us? Without this reminder, human experience is set up as the new tyrant of moral knowing, replacing second scholasticism's pretended objectivity of syllogistic inference….
Does not the pastoral magisterium function precisely in the ecclesial role of reminding all of us that only in the communio sanctorum, only as members of those being transformed by our communion in the holy things of God, do we have a ghost of a chance of finding a ‘substantial and not accidental’ interpretation of our experience” (“ ‘New terrain’ and a 'stumbling stone’ in Redemptorist Contributions to Gaudium et Spes: On Relating and Juxtaposing Truth's Formulation and Its Experience” Studia Moralia 35 [1997]: 42–43Google Scholar).
The phrase “substantial and not accidental” that appears in the citation above comes from a remarkable essay demonstrating just how difficult Aquinas thought it is for human beings to achieve anything like real knowledge. See Durbin, Paul, “The Simple Understanding of Quidditas” in Summa Theologiae, The Blackfriars Edition.Google Scholar Latin text with an English translation, 12 (New York: McGraw Hill, 1958): 171.
It is Burtchaell's Thomistic understanding of truth that Meilander misconstrues. As Burtchaell has put it: “The authentic and sound Christian tradition would insist that ethical truth must be discerned, not decided” (“Community Experience as Source of Christian Ethics,” 9).
43 Haughton, , Images, 144.Google Scholar
44 Haughton, , Transformation, 114.Google Scholar
45 “Sermones enim morales universales sunt minus utiles, eo quod actiones in particularibus sunt” (Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, II-II, Prologus).
46 Burtchaell, , Theology of Grace, 267.Google Scholar
47 Haughton, , Images, 162.Google Scholar
48 Ibid., 52.
49 Ibid., 26.
50 Ibid., 193-94.
51 Ibid., 130-31.
52 Ibid., 159-60.
53 Burtchaell, , Theology of Grace, 32.Google Scholar
54 See Haughton, , Images, 160.Google Scholar
55 Burtchaell, , Theology of Grace, 8.Google Scholar
56 Ibid., 173.
57 Ibid., 334.
58 Haughton, , Images, 140, 144.Google Scholar