Book Review: Horan, Ofm, Daniel P.: All God’s Creatures

Abstract

our encounter with God is personal based in personal relationships leads to the center of Christian faith: “the trinitarian confession of one God in three persons” (174). God must take the initiative to make the divine Self known through revelation. The fundamental paradox is expressed at John 1:18: “No one has ever seen God. It is the unique one of a kind Son (monogenes), always existing in the bosom of the Father, who has made him known” (trans. mine). And further (John 14:9), “Whoever has seen me has seen the Father.” As G. develops it so well, employing “phenomenality” and “performance”: “The mystery of the ineffable ‘singular event’ that is the triune God is revealed in the events instigated by Jesus of Nazareth, the accessible phenomenality of that event” (282). We experience God’s love in Christ when we incarnate that love in our own time-bound lives. “God’s absolute, infinite, unfailing love is never graspable as such, but only in particular, fallible performances” (309). It is the Holy Spirit that enables the community to have a continuing personal share in the reality of Jesus, and so Christology is always trinitarian in character. In the course of the book, G. offers a rich and insightful summary of a number of theological views. His treatment of Anselm is particularly helpful for his basic thesis. The book affords a good review for those knowledgeable in the field and a wonderful introduction for students exploring these matters. I have only one question. In his treatment of the conciliar developments, he ends with Constantinople I. Yet Cyril of Alexandria’s second letter to Nestorius (Council of Ephesus) seems crucial for a correct interpretation of Chalcedon. Nonetheless, the origin of trinitarian doctrine surely lies, as G. emphasizes, in the concrete and specific experiences of faith and worship. The constructive retrieval of person as free, intentional, and relational (Kasper) with the addition of “the crucial and inescapable element of performance-in time” (313) enables us to counter social acceleration (“now-ism”) and to explore time and meaning. Painting, architecture, and music are aesthetic ways to experience the presence and absence of God. I highly recommend this book as an intensely practical way to access the mystery of God’s salvific love.