No CrossRef data available.
We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 09 September 2014
This essay envisions the meaning of providence according to recent feminist and process theologies of power and attempts to distinguish the meaning of providence from the action of the Holy Spirit in our lives. It compares the classical meaning of providence with those elements in modern and contemporary thought that warrant changes in our understanding of these themes, while it maintains the continuity of Christian tradition. In doing so, it offers some reflection on the relationship between theology and spirituality, and suggests a new synthesis between the immanence and transcendence of God in the experience of Christians today. In light of the biblical idea of justice as right relations, the mystical and political are integrated.
1 I have worked out the details of this classical understanding in “Not a Sparrow Falls: On Providence and Responsibility in History” Proceedings of the Catholic Theological Society of America 44 (1989): 19–38. The relevant texts are cited there.
2 Rahner, Karl, Foundations of Christian Faith, trans. Dych, William V. (New York: Seabury, 1978), 35–39.Google Scholar
3 Metz, Johann Baptist, Faith in History and Society: Toward a Practical Fundamental Theology, trans. Smith, David (New York: Seabury, 1980)Google Scholar; see also Ogden, Schubert, On Theology (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1986), 134–50.Google Scholar
4 McFague, Sallie, Models of God: Theology for an Ecological, Nuclear Age (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1987), 78 ff.Google Scholar; see also her The Body of God (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1993).
5 Case-Winters, Anna, God's Power: Traditional Understandings and Contemporary Challenges (Louisville: Westminster/John Knox, 1990)Google Scholar; Cobb, John B. Jr., Process Theology as Political Theology (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1982).Google Scholar
6 Soelle, Dorothee, “God's Pain and Ours,” in Theology for Skeptics: Reflections on God, trans. Irwin, Joyce L. (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1995), 61–83.Google Scholar
7 Gilkey, Langdon, Reaping the Whirlwind: A Christian Interpretation of History (New York: Seabury, 1976), 180–83.Google Scholar
8 The Mystical and Political Dimension of the Christian Faith (Concilium 96), ed. Geffre, Claude and Guttierez, Gustavo (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1974)Google Scholar; Mysticism and the Institutional Crisis (Concilium 1994/4), ed. Duquoc, Christian and Gutierrez, Gustavo (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1994).Google Scholar For an overview, see Hennelly, Alfred T., Liberation Theologies: The Global Pursuit of Justice (Mystic, CT: Twenty Third Publications, 1995).Google Scholar
9 Scheeben, Matthias Joseph, The Mysteries of Christianity, trans. Vollert, Cyril (St. Louis: B. Herder, 1946), 404Google Scholar; 729–30; see Mersch, Emile, The Theology of the Mystical Body, trans. Vollert, Cyril (St. Louis: B. Herder, 1951), 137, 142.Google Scholar
10 Dorr, Donal, Spirituality and Justice (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1984), 250Google Scholar; see The Holocaust as Interruption (Concilium 175), ed. Fiorenza, Elisabeth Schüssler and Tracy, David (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1985).Google Scholar
11 Carr, Anne E., A Search for Wisdom and Spirit: Thomas Merton's Theology of the Self (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1988).Google Scholar
12 Schillebeeckx, Edward, Christ: The Experience of Jesus as Lord, trans. Bowden, John (New York: Seabury, 1980).Google Scholar
13 See the studies of Western Christian Mysticism by McGinn, Bernard, The Presence of God (New York: Crossroad, 1991–1998).Google Scholar Three volumes have been published, with two more to follow.
14 Farley, Edward, Theologia: The Fragmentation and Unity of Theological Education (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1983).Google Scholar Although the term was used by Farley in the context of theological education, it has been widely used to denote the unity of theology and spirituality.
15 Soelle, Dorothee, Beyond Mere Obedience, trans. Denef, Laurence W. (New York: Pilgrim Press, 1982).Google Scholar
16 Eisler, Riane, The Chalice and the Blade (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1987)Google Scholar; Condren, Mary, The Serpent and the Goddess: Women, Religion and Power in Celtic Ireland (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1989).Google Scholar
17 Noddings, Nel, Women and Evil (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989).Google Scholar
18 Ruddick, Sara, Maternal Thinking: Toward a Politics of Peace (Boston: Beacon Press, 1989)Google Scholar
19 Tanner, Kathryn, Theories of Culture: A New Agenda for Theology (Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress, 1997).Google Scholar
20 Casey, Juliana, Where is God Now? Nuclear Terror, Feminism and the Search for God (Kansas City: Sheed and Ward, 1987)Google Scholar; see also Pasewark, Kyle, A Theology of Power: Being Beyond Domination (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1993).Google Scholar
21 See the many publications of Schneiders, Sandra M. on the several effects of feminism on social and ecclesial structures. Especially important are her Madeleva Lecture With Oil in Their Lamps (New York: Paulist, 2000)Google Scholar and Finding the Treasure (New York: Paulist, 2000).
22 Ruether, Rosemary Radford, New Woman New Earth (New York: Seabury, 1975; republished with a new Preface, Boston: Beacon, 1995)Google Scholar; Tracy, David, Dialogue With the Other: The Inter-Religious Dialogue (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1990).Google Scholar
23 LaCugna, Catherine Mowry, God For Us: The Trinity and Christian Life (San Francisco: Harper Collins, 1991)Google Scholar and “God in Communion with Us” in Freeing Theology: The Essentials of Theology in Feminist Perspective (San Francisco: Harper Collins, 1993), 83–114; Johnson, Elizabeth A., She Who Is: The Mystery of God in Feminist Theological Discourse (New York: Crossroad, 1992).Google Scholar
24 Gustavo Gutierrez, cited in Ogden, Schubert, The Point of Christology (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1982), 91Google Scholar; see also Gutierrez, Gustavo, A Theology of Liberation (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1973; reprinted, 1988)Google Scholar; Gutierrez, , On Job: God-Talk and the Suffering of the Innocent, trans. O'Connell, Matthew (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1988), esp. 93–103Google Scholar on contemplation and prophecy.
25 Heagle, John, “A New Public Piety: Reflections on Spirituality,” Church 1 (1985): 53Google Scholar, cited in Schneiders, Sandra M., “Spirituality in the Academy,” Theological Studies 50 (1989): 679, n. 13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
26 Rahner, , Foundations, 79.Google Scholar
27 Johnson, Elizabeth A., “Does God Play Dice? Divine Providence and Chance,” Theological Studies 57/1 (March 1996): 3–18.CrossRefGoogle Scholar