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Faith and Theology in the University
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 July 2024
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In a recent lecture, Fr Edward Yarnold discussed the place of the theologian in the university. He mentioned the salutary effect of contact with other disciplines on the university theologian, the value of the ecumenical setting which a university provides for theology, and, in particular, the view, proposed by the 1952 Faith and Order Conference at Lund, that theologians should make for the centre of the Christian faith where they are united, and, working from that centre, justify their divisions. On this last point, however, Fr Yarnold registered misgivings, for, he asserted, ‘Theology is not a study which can be pursued with detachment: it requires faith’. He argued the issue with care on the principle that a living theology can only arise from a living tradition, and he went on to discuss the consequences of this viewpoint and draw out its advantages.
At the same time, Fr Yarnold was aware that some theologians, while sympathetic to what he had to say about a living tradition in theology, would want to question the role he ascribed to faith: ‘Some theologians—I speak of my own country, but the cap may fit other heads—have thought that this need for commitment is incompatible with scholarly objectivity and freedom of conscience’. For them, in other words, commitment, or faith, threatens the integrity which academic theology requires. They feel that faith would prejudice the detached course which this theology has to take if it is to be true to itself as academic. They would make a distinction between academic and commitment theology.
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- Copyright © 1972 Provincial Council of the English Province of the Order of Preachers
References
page 307 note 1 See E. J. Yarnold, s.J., ‘The Theologian in the University’, in The Month, March, 1972, pp. 79–82. The lecture was the first annual New Foundation Lecture given at the Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley, California, on 13th May, 1971.
page 308 note 1 Ibid., p. 80.
page 308 note 2 Ibid., p. 80.
page 308 note 3 In this paragraph, no names are given. This is deliberate. A trend may be real and need to be discussed, but to identify it with an individual is at once to caricature the views of the individual. Nothing is quite as simple as that. The reality of the trend, in Oxford at any rate, was demonstrated by a graduate seminar of philosophers and theologians which met weekly during Hilary term, 1972. It was chaired jointly by Professors Basil Mitchell, John Macquarrie and Maurice Wiles.
page 309 note 1 See Wiles, Maurice, ‘The Difficulties of Being a Theologian’, in Theology, 64 (1961), pp. 181–184.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
page 309 note 2 See Berger, Peter L., A Rumour of Angels (Penguins, 1971), p. 105Google Scholar.
page 310 note 1 See Ramsey, Ian T., Religious Language (London, 1957), ch. 1Google Scholar.
page 310 note 2 Ibid., ch. 2.
page 310 note 3 To give two examples: Athanasius, Or. contra Arianos ii. 21; Newman, J. H., Select Treatises of St Athanasius, vol. ii (London, 1890), p. 445Google Scholar.
page 310 note 4 Ramsey, Ian T., Models and Mystery (Oxford, 1964), p. 61Google Scholar.
page 310 note 5 e.g. Ramsey, Ian T., Christian Discourse (Oxford, 1965), p. 11.Google Scholar
page 310 note 6 Ramsey, Religious Language, p. 79.
page 311 note 1 Ibid., p. 21.
page 311 note 2 Ibid., p. 21.
page 311 note 3 Murdoch, Iris, The Nice and the Good (Penguins, 1969), p. 83Google Scholar.
page 312 note 1 Ramsey, Christian Discourse, p. 33.
page 313 note 1 Ramsey, Models and Mystery, p. 65.