Session 1
March 7, 2023
6.30pm - 8.00pm
Session 2
March 14, 2023
6.30pm - 8.00pm
Session 3
February 21, 2023
6.30pm - 8.00pm
Session 4
6.30pm - 8.00pm
Session 5
6.30pm - 8.00pm
Session 6
6.30pm - 8.00pm
Session 7
6.30pm - 8.00pm
Session 8
6.30pm - 8.00pm
Session 9
6.30pm - 8.00pm
Session 10
6.30pm - 8.00pm
Session 11
6.30pm - 8.00pm
Session 12
6.30pm - 8.00pm
Session 13
6.30pm - 8.00pm
Session 14
6.30pm - 8.00pm
Session 15
6.30pm - 8.00pm
Session 16
6.30pm - 8.00pm
Session 17
6.30pm - 8.00pm
Session 18
6.30pm - 8.00pm
Session 19
6.30pm - 8.00pm
Session 20
6.30pm - 8.00pm

Online Course Details    

Thinking with Theologians does pretty much what it says on the tin. In each course, we will take three weeks to grapple with some significant texts by notable Christian theologians, past and present, in the hope of expanding, deepening and challenging our understanding of what it might mean to talk about God. Each session will include a short presentation by the tutor, followed by a period of focused group discussion of a particular text or texts.

 

Sometimes the focus of the course will be on a particular figure or school of thought; sometimes it will be a particular theme or doctrine. Either way, the method will be the same: read carefully; reflect deeply; talk honestly – then see what happens.

God in Trinity

While we have witnessed a revival of interest in the doctrine of Trinity in the twentieth century, a lingering skepticism persists with regard to how moving the doctrine back to the centre of theological concern may revive faith in God.

 

This course aims to look at a tendency to reconnect Christian doctrines with our experience of God and Christian conduct. We seem to have moved beyond the polemic, apologetic or devotional approach and even the historical exploration seems of little value. What remains of real value is theological study of who said what on God in Trinity and why. If we attempt to understand this doctrine beyond shedding light on psychological or social constructs and aim for serious reflection on the trinitarian mystery of God, we shall strive to fill the void that the neglect of this doctrine has left behind.

 

Week 1

Sergei Bulgakov

The Divine I, Trinity as Divine triunity

In this session we explore parts of Bulgakov’s ideas in his second dogmatic trilogy: The Lamb of God (1933),The Comforter(1936) and Bride of the Lamb (posthumously in 1945). We shall discuss the kenotic key to the understanding of God in Trinity in Bulgakov’s work. The life of God is Spirit in eternal kenosis that finds its creative pinnacle in God’s Incarnation. Some understanding of 19century Russian orthodoxyand the German idealism of Hegel is presumed and/or recommended.

Bulgakov, Sergius, The Lamb of God. Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2002, p. 531.
Bulgakov, Sergius, The Comforter. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publish. Co., 2004,p. 398. 
Bulgakov, Sergius, Bride of the Lamb. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publish. Co., 2002, p. 531. 

 

 

Week 2

Karl Barth

One substance, three persons (Una sustantia, tres personae)

In this session we explore Barth’s God in Trinity as set written out in his work Church Dogmatics I/1. He emphasises the eternal unity and at the same time the distinction of God’s modes of being: “Only the substantial equality of Christ and the Spirit with the Father is compatible with monotheism” (CD I/1, p.353). Despite Barth’s recovery of the doctrine of the Trinity, our interest will be to explore accusations of tritheism and modalism in his trinitarian theology, a potential threat to God’s unity of being. How does Father the Creator, Son the Reconciler and Holy Spirit the Redeemer act as one?

 

Barth, Karl, Church Dogmatics I/1. T&T Clark Edinburgh, 1999,p.503

 

 

Week 3

Karl Rahner SJ

Economic Trinity equates Immanent Trinity and vice versa

In this session we explore Rahner’s attempt to present the doctrine of the Trinity in a more comprehensive way in his ground-breaking work: The Trinity (1970). We shall discuss his famous Trinitarian axiom “The economic Trinity is the immanent Trinity and the immanent Trinity is the economic Trinity” (The Trinity , p.22) and how this relates to Barth’s work on the Trinity. We shall touch on the implications for theological anthropology because if God has revealed Himself through self-communication by becoming man, this has consequences both for God and man.

Rahner, Karl, The Trinity, New York : Crossroads, 1997.

Course
Resources

Week 1: The Divine Humanity

In this first session we look at Bulgakov’s great trilogy with particular focus on The Lamb of God, 1933 where he elaborates his doctrine of the Divine-Humanity through the role of the Divine Sophia.

 

“What can I say about Christ’s Divine-Humanity and about our divine-humanity? The salvation effected by Christ is accomplished in the individual soul… salvation is not only personal and individual but also universal and omni-ecclesial. … This is the truth about the reign of Christ in the world. The revolt of the kings and people of the earth against their Lord and Christ began long ago. … This revolt tried to abolish the Divine-Humanity. Its aim was to enable the prince of this world to keep the world in his hands. Docetism and gnosticism, Manicheism and transcendentism, Hindusim and Jesuitism, and so on, a great multitude of conscious and half-conscious opponents of the Divine-Humanity – in the name of gnosis, piety, asceticism, moralism, spiritualism – have sought and still seek to abolish the power of the Divine-Hummanity, to disincarnate the Logos.”

Sergius Bulgakov

Paris, St. Sergius Theological Institute, 30 September 1933

 

Readings

Main reading


Bulgakov, Sergius, The Lamb of God. Grand Rapids, ch. 1.

or

Bulgakov, Sergius, The Lamb of God. Grand Rapids, ch. 3.

 

Additional readings: available in the Heythrop Library.

Bulgakov, Sergius, The Lamb of God. Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2002, p. 531.
Bulgakov, Sergius, The Comforter. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publish. Co., 2004,p. 398. 
Bulgakov, Sergius, Bride of the Lamb. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publish. Co., 2002, p. 531. 

 

Please read as much as you wish in preparation for the session, but focus on the main reading if you only have time to read one chapter.

 

Please come to the session prepared articulate your thoughts in response to the following questions:

 

1. What is Bulgakov saying that sounds, or seems, original to you?

2. What, if anything, is really important in what seems to be saying? Try to pick out a few points that seem most important or interesting.

3. What kind of a contribution does Bulgakov bring to Christian theology?

Week 2: One substance, three persons (sustantia, tres personae)

In this session we explore Barth’s God in Trinity as set out in his work Church Dogmatics I/1. We shall explore how Barth deals with accusations of tritheism and modalism in his trinitarian theology, a potential threat to God’s unity of being.

 

“If there are those who think they miss the citation of an authority which they think important, they should consider that dogmatics follow a different principle of selection from that which obtains in historical presentation in the narrower sense. Hence, I have not followed up systematically the counter-theses implicitly or explicitly contested by me, not even those of my special and direct adversaries and critics of the day, but have pursued my own course, taking up theses which have made some kind of impression on me, and doing so at the point where it seems that they materially serve to advance or at any rate to clarify the problems. … I believe that it is expected of the Church and its theology – a world within the world no less than chemistry or the theatre – that it should keep precisely to the rhythm of its own relevant concerns, and thus consider well what are the real needs of the day by which its own programme should be directed. I have found by experience that in the last resort the man in the street who is so highly respected by many ecclesiastics and theologians will really take notice of us when we do not worry about what he expects of us but do what we are charged to do.”

Karl Barth

Bergli, Oberrieden (Canton Zürich) August, 1932

 

Readings

Main reading

Barth, Karl, Church DogmaticsI/1. T&T Clark Edinburgh, 1999, p.503

 

The Root of the Doctrine of the Trinity, p. 304-333.

or

The Triunity of God, p. 368-383.

 

 

Additional readings: available in the Heythrop Library.

Barth, Karl, Dogmatics in Outline. SCM Press, London, 2001.

Barth, Karl, Evangelical Theology. T&T Clark Limited, Edinburgh, 1979.

 

Folsom, Marty, Karl Barth’s Church Dogmatics for Everyone. Zondervan Academic, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 2022.

McCormack, Bruce, L., Karl Barth’s Critically Realistic Dialectical Theology. Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1997.

 

Please read as much as you wish in preparation for the session, but focus on the main reading if you only have time to read one chapter.

 

Please come to the session prepared to articulate your thoughts in response to the following questions:

 

1. What is Barth saying that sounds, or seems, original to you?

2. What, if anything, is really important in what seems to be saying? Try to pick out a few points that seem most important or interesting.

3. What kind of a contribution does Barth bring to Christian theology?

 

a. How does Barth’s use of the term ‘the Root of the Doctrine of the Trinity’ compare to your own understanding about the place of this central belief of Christianity? In what sense do you think that God is mysterious?

b. Barthlinks the doctrine of the Trinity with Revelation. What do you think he means by this?

c. Overall,how convincing do you find his theological model of the Trinity?

 

Week 3: Equityof the economic and immanent Trinity and vice versa

In this session we shall discuss Rahner’s attempt to present the doctrine of the Trinity. His axiom “The economic Trinity is the immanent Trinity and the immanent Trinity is the economic Trinity” (The Trinity, p.22) has implications for theological anthropology because if God has revealed Himself through self-communication by becoming man, this has consequences both for God and man.

 

“Let us emphasize once more that we could not help presenting in a veryunsystematic way the ‘systematic’ doctrine of the Trinity. We had to bypasssome themes and underline others. … In the first place, there are a number ofquestions which, even though scholastic theology had displayed great conceptualsubtleness regarding them, remain kerygmatically rather sterile. Secondly, asis evident from our basic axiom, Christology and the doctrine of grace are,strictly speaking, doctrine of the Trinity. They are its two chapters abouteither divine procession or mission (‘immanent’ and ‘economic’). Hence what wehave already presented here is and intends to be nothing more than a certainformal anticipation of Christology and pneumatology (doctrine of grace) whichare to follow.”

Karl Rahner, TheTrinity, p. 120

 

Readings


Main reading

Rahner, Karl, The Trinity, New York, Crossroads, 1997, p. 120

 

The Problem of the Relation Between the Treatises On the One God and On the Triune God, p. 15-21.

 

and

The Axiomatic Unity of the “Economic” and “Immanent” Trinity, p. 21-24.

 

and

A New Relationship Between the Treatises On the One God and On the Triune God, p. 45-66.

 

or

A Systematic Summary of Official Trinitarian Doctrine, p. 58-76.

 

or

Transition from “Economic” to “Immanent” Trinity, p. 99-101.

 

and

How the “Economic” Is Grounded in the “Immanent” Trinity, p. 101-103.

 

and
The Problem of the Concept of “Person”, p. 103-115.

 

 

Additional readings: available in the Heythrop Library.

Rahner, Karl, Foundations of Christian Faith. Crossroad, New York, 2007.

Rahner, Karl, Theological Investigations, Volume XIII. Darton, Longman & Todd, London, 1975.

Rahner, Karl, Theological Investigations, Volume XVIII. Darton, Longman & Todd, London, 1984.

Taylor, Mark Lloyd, God is Love, A Study in the Theology of Karl Rahner. Scholars Press, Atlanta, Georgia, 1986.

 

Please read as much as you wish in preparation for the session, but focus on the main reading if you only have time to read one chapter.

 

Please come to the session prepared to articulate your thoughts in response to the following questions:

 

1.      What is Rahner saying that sounds, or seems, original to you?

2.      What, if anything, is really important in what seems to be saying? Try to pick out a few points that seem most important or interesting.

3.      What kind of a contribution does Rahner bring to the doctrine of the Trinity?

 

 

a. How does Rahner’s use of his definition that ‘the Immanent Trinity equates the Economic Trinity and vice versa’ compare to your own understanding about the place of this central belief of Christianity? In what sense do you think that God is mysterious?

b. Rahner links the doctrine of the Trinity with the doctrine of Christology and the doctrine of grace and in extension bears an influence on anthropology. What do you think he means by this?

c. Overall, how convincing do you find his theological model of the Trinity?

 

Resources


















Week 1

Week 2

Week 3

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Tutors

Fr Ladislav Šulik SJ

Fr. Ladislav Šulik SJ STL MA studied philosophy and theology in Slovakia and at the Gregorian University, Rome. He was ordained in 2010 and is Chaplain at the London Jesuit Centre. His particular academic interest is in the central Christian belief of the Trinity. His pastoral ministry has led him to work in spirituality, retreat giving, spiritual accompaniment at various Jesuit retreat houses and Spirituality centres.

MY LJC