God Encountered: Contemporary Catholic Systematic Theology Volume 2 Part 4
Author: Frans Jozef van Beeck Retail Price: $16.95 Our Price: $14.99
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Heroic as its Martyrs were, the early Church was not naive. It realized that sin dwelt in the members of Christ's Body; the saints were far from perfect. Next, the Church of the Doctors and the Councils, and, in due time, the Church of the Empires East and West knew that the Gospel's reception as Christendom's rule of life had come at a price. Baptism having become a birthright, sin had, too. It became a manifest fact of Christian life and culture--accepted, if rarely condoned. Sermons on the commandments, the capital sins, and the last things became a fixture of Christian life, as did sacramental and habitual penance. On the threshold on the modern era, in the West, the Church's main theme became humanity's salvation; theology of sin and theology of salvation but all coincided; Catholic moral theology became preparation for the confessional Today the Church lives in an hugely non-Christian world. Once again, yet in a new way, Christian realism and responsibility raise the old issue: What is the actual shape of sin? How does it happen, personally and communally? Does sin have a history? Does it make history, and if so, how? This installment of God Encountered explores these themes. It argues that sin arises from our participating in a lavish yet morally blind cosmos, and in a human family made for discerning justice, yet prone to prejudice both naive and willful. And underneath it all, it argues that sin is unable to nullify God's promises given in our very nature.
