A link, an update, and some random thoughts

I have a bad habit of pushing invitations and deadlines to the end of the semester, then realizing I’ve committed to do a couple podcasts and write a couple articles while I’m finalizing grades. Were I wise, I would digest this insight and change my habits. Alas…

I joined Jeffrey Rickman on the Plainspoken podcast to talk about Methodism from a Catholic perspective. It was a fun conversation, as Jeffrey is a very focused and very kind host. You can check it out here: PlainSpoken: A Catholic View of Methodism

I also joined the guys at the Storm the Gates podcast to talk about the church of the middle ages and some other things. I honestly can’t recall what all those other things were, but we’ll all find out when the link drops.

One of the most interesting things that has happened since my reception into communion with Rome has been the opportunities that have dissolved and emerged as a result. I grieved the conclusion of many partnerships and ventures that I enjoyed and pursued while a Methodist. On the other side, I have found new invitations to speak, now as an outsider, about the tradition than birthed and raised me. And those are both fun and generative, so I am grateful.

This week, I’m working on a piece for The Living Church’s online journal, Covenant. It’s related to the First Council of Nicaea in light of its 1700th anniversary. Next week, I’ll be in Rome for the IOTA Nicaea Conference commemorating the event, so my mind is very much on what to make of 4th century Christianity for today. When I turn my attention to such questions, I find that I gravitate toward theologians whose judgment I’ve learned to trust. That has me plucking through the first volume of Matthias Joseph Scheeben’s Handbook of Catholic Dogmatics, in particular his treatment of faith and reason, theology, and doctrine.

For those unfamiliar with Scheeben, he was a nineteenth century German Catholic theologian who produced one of the finest theological systems of the modern period. What makes him interesting, and potentially fruitful for contemporary Protestant and Methodist theology, is the larger context of his writing. German Catholic theologians of the nineteenth century were embroiled in a debate about what to make of the intellectual currents flowing from the Enlightenment. Whereas the Enlightenment hit England in the late-seventeenth century (Wesley, after all, was deeply effected by the thought of John Locke), the German Enlightenment got underway a bit later (the three critiques of Immanuel Kant were published at the end of the eighteenth century).

This would eventually provoke the modernist controversy, and the famous diagnosis and response to modernism by Pope Pius X. But in Scheeben’s day, questions provoked by the Enlightenment and modernist thought in general were quite lively, and provoked his remarkably capable and pious mind to articulate a view of faith, reason, doctrine, and theology well worth rumination into the present.

If you feel so inclined, I commend the book by Aidan Nichols from Emmaus Academic, and for those of you who like to hear it from the horses mouth (and with a generous book budget), the multivolume set, now in translation from the same publisher.