This article contends that Christ’s eucharistic offer of friendship, and the habits of attentiveness such real presence demands, must shape the church’s mission in a digital milieu that tends to shallow attention and relationships. It makes this argument in dialogue principally with the theology of Bernard Lonergan and the pontificate of Pope Francis, while aided by the cultural commentary of Nicholas Carr, Sherry Turkle, and Marshall McLuhan. First, I consider how Lonergan’s focus on human knowing and choosing anticipates the recent turn in the Catholic magisterium under Pope Francis that considers the formative effects of digital communication technologies. Second, I show how Lonergan’s account of bias helps explain the shallowing effects of these technologies, for both cognition and community. Third, inspired by Lonergan and Pope Francis, I propose how practices of friendship—informed by Christ’s own friendship extended through Eucharistic presence—can foster habits of real presence able to counter the shallows of our digital age.

This essay purports to discuss some of Pope Francis's ambiguities. It is divided into seven sections. I present his background. I acknowledge the significance of his message of mercy and, based on Bernard Lonergan and Ladislas Örsy, I show how mercy ought to be wisely practised. I discuss Francis's Bergsonian epistemology, which I deem inadequate. I deplore his ambiguities about uncertainty. I then proceed to detail two impasses, which he has not overcome, at least until now: the possibility of ordaining women to the priesthood and the possibility of admitting Gays and Lesbians to eucharistic communion. I finally conclude with an appeal to a constructive and critical dialogue.

For twelve of the years during which he spent a semester lecturing as a visiting professor at the Gregorian University (Rome), Frederick Copleston enjoyed close contacts with Bernard Lonergan. He was one of the two ‘house’ censors of Insight. He also wrote a very positive review of the book for the Oxford-based Journal of Theological Studies, which was then co-edited by Henry Chadwick. The personal and professional contacts between Copleston and Lonergan have been widely neglected; they call for further study and evaluation.

This article introduces Bernard Lonergan to environmental ethics through a conversation with Willis Jenkins. Jenkins represents a ripe dialogue partner for Lonergan because of his attentiveness to methodological questions within environmental ethics, as in his incisive critique of Lynn White's influence. To pursue this conversation, this article examines Jenkins's critique of White and then turns to Lonergan's thought to supplement and refine this critique. From this engagement, the article identifies the need for a “practical cosmology”: an ongoing Christian practice that can affectively motivate care for creation. It proposes that the Christian liturgy, through its rich symbolism and distinct cosmology, offers one such practice and thus can weave that care seamlessly within Christian identity. To test this conclusion, the article briefly considers the import of this conversation for contemporary ecclesial responses to the ecological crisis, such as in Laudato si’.

This paper presents some comparative themes examining the anthropologies of Bernard Lonergan, René Girard and the four noble truths in Buddhism. It also engages some specific aspects from the Tibetan lineage of Buddhism represented by Pema Chödron (Canada), following her teacher Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche.

The approach of the paper invokes the structure of John Thatamanil's The Immanent Divine: diagnosis, etiology, prognosis, prescription (solution) as an organizational way of presenting material on such diverse thinkers. Following an overview of these thinkers, I will highlight some of the themes such as suffering, violence, healing, compassion, and the role of affectivity in its relation to desire. It should become clear that such a practical approach to Buddhist-Christian dialogue provides a fruitful starting point and underscores the value of learning other religious traditions.

Lindbeck's difficulties with Lonergan's account of religion stem from his radical methodological option in which he draws on Wittgenstein. I revisit ‘the dialectic of methods,’ by examining children's mistakes. I use Lonergan's distinction between ordinary and originary meaningfulness to argue that in Wittgenstein's account of rule‐following such mistakes highlight the publicity of norms in ordinary meaningfulness, but I show how alternatives can be cited in which originary meaningfulness is not obscured. I explain the core of Lonergan's foundational methodology and show how for Lonergan the desire to understand is an exigence which, as retorsion indicates, is difficult to deny. I conclude that in his account of religion Lonergan has an answer to a question posed by Wittgenstein on the purpose of thinking.

This paper explores St. Paul of the Cross's passion-centred spirituality as a context for avoiding the distortions of such spirituality and promoting proper praxis. These distortions are not the legacy of Paul of the Cross himself, but the fact that his contemplation of the passion was primarily performative and mystical, along with the lack of a systematic theology on the passion-death-and resurrection, there remains a context wherein distortions of passion-centred approaches can occur. The paper then presents some aspects of Bernard Lonergan's thought on lex crucis and also from his Trinitarian work in order to provide a theological framework (orthotheoria). This framework can help prevent the distortions of such a passion-centred spirituality and guide orthopraxis of passion-centred spiritualities. In the final section we explore some insights from Buddhism that are consonant with both Paul of the Cross's spirituality and Lonergan's law of the cross as fruits of the Spirit and seeds of the Word.

This article proposes a theological approach to the encounter between theology and the world of science and technology. A suitable locus for encounter is the different partners' shared commitment to the desire to understand. I draw on the work of both Bernard Lonergan and Paul Ricœur to describe understanding as the enactment of a pattern of cognitional operations. However, the theoretical mode of understanding proper to science is distinct from the practical mode of understanding proper to technology. Lonergan's elaboration of the “intellectual” pattern of operations is drawn on to enhance an encounter with science, while Ricœur's elaboration of the “action” pattern is drawn on to enhance an encounter with technology.

This paper addresses the foundations of the Church systematically as it originates in the Triune God's plan of salvation. The Church is an extension of the missions of the Son and Spirit in history. Analogies are invoked to help ground the nature and the mission of the of the Church. The paper further explores the implications of Ecclesia de Trinitate in light of Vatican II, the visible and invisible missions of the Son and the Spirit, the role of Mary and the multi‐religious context.

The Catholic Church's efforts at evangelization must include even its own members in an age of growing secularization wherein religious impulses can be subordinated to culture even unconsciously. Bernard Lonergan observed that religious values should transcend cultural and personal values. But prominent advertising confirms that in contemporary Western societies religious values are subsumed under others, even where spirituality may be held important. The goal before the Church, then, is a transposition of values possible in focus upon a common perception of theology and the culture reflected in advertising—the felt transcendence of the human person. The Second Vatican Council called for the Church to engage with the world; if the message served by the Church is to be heard above the din of the larger culture, it must be delivered in manners persuasive upon the sensibilities of contemporary people. The powerful cultural transmitter that is advertising may assist in this task, for study of the anthropologies of advertising and theology reveals certain surprising commonalities suggesting that methods, if not media, could be equally effective in both realms. Advertising's use of ethnography and narrative, in particular, may provide lessons for the Church in defining audiences and targeting the message to them.