Philosophy for Theologians by Rev. Benedict M. Ashely, O.P.: 3. Why Theology Has Difficulty with Modern Philosophy

Recorded in 2000. Students of theology often wonder why they are required to take courses in philosophy that seem to be a history of a welter of obscure opinions that lead nowhere. Yet as John Paul II has pointed out in his encyclical Fides et Ratio (Faith and Reason) theology is "faith seeking understanding." God has spoken to us in the language of our own way of understanding derived from our own human experience. Consequently if we are to understand what God is telling us about the divine reality we must compare that revelation with what is told us through God's creation as we know it through our natural senses, imagination, and reason. Formerly the term "philosophy" was often understood to be a "metaphysics" or "science of being as being." Today the term is often taken in a very narrow sense to be the clarification of the languages of the various sciences. Originally, however, "philosophy" included all kinds of knowledge of which human beings are naturally capable and was thus contrasted only to theology in that the latter was the study of the revealed Word of God received not by reason but by the gift of faith. This course will deal with "philosophy" in this original broad sense as the whole scope of purely human knowledge as it is used by theologians in precise, critical ways to understand revealed truth. The aim of the course, therefore, is to help students of theology understand the ways the Scriptures, the documents of the Church, and the writings of theologians use purely human knowledge to express, explain, and communicate God's revealed Word to different cultures especially to our contemporary culture dominated by modern natural science and technology.

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