Michael Purcell

Liturgy: Divine and Human Service'

Liturgy has been the forum for the enactment of a diverse range of theologies, at times stressing the human, at times the divine. Following Emmanuel Levinas, this article understands the meaning of liturgy as ‘a movement of the Same towards the Other which never returns to the Same.’ Whether directed towards God, or expressive of human longing, the structure of liturgy is essentially ‘for-the-Other.’ This movement out of self is seen when one considers liturgy as the ‘work of the people,’ where ‘work’ is understood as Œuvre rather than travail. To say that liturgy is œuvre is to situate its significance not in the activity of the subject who has a concern to achieve or realise something through his own effort, but in the Other who inspires the work. The activism of travail finds its counter in the essential passivity of œuvre. By recognising this the horizontal and vertical elements within divine liturgy can be brought together in a mutually indispensable way. As essentially ‘for-the-Other,’ responsible service, which is at one and the same time divine service and human service, is at the heart of the liturgy. In liturgy we are drawn out of ourselves in a ‘movement of the Same towards the Other which never returns to the Same’ and which is positively experienced as responsibility. It is not that we first worship and then are called unto service in a movement out of self towards the Otherness of God and thereafter towards the Otherness of the other person. The movement out of self – liturgy – is at one and the same time worship and ethics, an ethical worship, in which justice is rendered both to God and to the other person.

An Agape of Eating

SummaryThe Eucharist is food to be consumed, as Trent clearly states when it states that the sacrament was instituted ut sumatur. Emmanuel Levinas, however, reflecting on the phenomenology of eating, points to the essentially destructive charakter of eating which, responding to the emptiness of need, seeks satisfaction through violent and totalising act in which the alterity of what is other is assimilated through the violence of teeth and tongue and incorporated into the same. Contrasted with eating, Levinas proposes loving as the phenomenological model for expressing the inter-human relationship, for loving contests the ego-dominating tendency to totalise for the Other, as other, is always in excess of the subjective power of appropriation. The Other maintains himself beyond the intentionality of the subject who would assign signification to the Other in terms of the Same, which is to suggest, says Levinas, that there is a ‘signification where the for of the one-for-the-other, outside of any correlation...

Glimpsing Grace Phenomenologically: Prevenience and Posteriority

Grace is a fundamental theological category. In the history of theology it has been the focal point of theological argument. In postmodernity, with the proliferation of new articulations of notions of gift and donation (Marion) and the deconstruction of the sign (Derrida), as well as fresh understandings of the relation between freedom and responsibility (Levinas), the theology of grace may find a new language and grammar in which to be spoken. Largely, that voice will be both phenomenological and metaphysical. This article focuses on the notion of grace as prevenient (gratia praeveniens) and juxtaposes this with the notion of the `posteriority of the anterior (Levinas).

Responding to Dr Plant

This response to Dr Plant engages with important issues regarding the possibility of using the work of Emmanuel Levinas as a theological tool and resource. Levinas and theology is both an important conjunction and disjunction. The distinction between a theology that is fundamental and a theology that is dogmatic needs to be stressed. Levinas ethical metaphysics, and his recognition of the need for a theological recuperation of the ethics he espouses, opens up a possible and fundamental theological dialogue which recognizes the fundamental and salvific importance of the ordinary and the everyday in human existence.

Review Article : Frank M. Turner, John Henry Newman: The Challenge to Evangelical Religion (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2002. £25.00. pp. 740 + xii. ISBN 0-300-0925I-2)

Newman is often viewed through the lens of his later works, subsequent to his conversion to Catholicism, namely his Apologia pro vita sua, and The Idea o f a University. While the Apologia remains influential, and often the first port of call for those wanting to know about Newman, it has a certain interpretative bias. The older Newman is looking back on his life, and his early years, and filtering things from that vantage point. What Turner does is concen-

James Patrick Mackey, The Critique of Theological Reason (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000. pp. 333. ISBN 0-52I-77293-I)

his is a ’bold’ essay. I use the term ’bold’ t deliberatively not only to outline its ambition, JL but also to recognize the native wit and style of James Mackey’s writing and comment. In Ireland, a ’bold’ child is not simply one who is audacious and courageous, butone who, almost with devilment, pushes things to their limit, and at times goes too far. A bold child is to be scolded for wrongdoings, but with an admiring smile. So, this is a ’bold’ essay, and Mackey is a ’bold’ author.

Leashing God with Levinas: Tracing a Trinity with Levinas

Levinas ethical metaphysics opens up a nexus of relationships, in the midst of which God becomes accessible as the counterpart of the justice I render to others. Although Levinas refuses a theorising theology which does violence to God, we attempt in this article nonetheless to glimpse the possibility of a divine threesome (leash) which can be articulated in the language of ethical metaphysics. We seek to trace a Trinity, not in Levinas, but with Levinas. We seek to ‘leash God with Levinas.’ n n n nThus, we argue the liturgical nature of God. God is utterly ‘for-the-other.’ The Father, as utterly self-diffusive, is ‘for-the-Son’, and the Son, as utterly responsive, is ‘for-the-Father.’ The divine nature (ousia) is the ethical reality of ‘for-the-other.’ Secondly, this one nature (ousia) has three distinct hypostases, which need to be understood ethically. The relationship between Father and Son is not the same as the relationship between the Son and the Father. The Father and the Son are the same in that they are essentially ‘for-the-other,’ bound by a bond or a Spirit of responsibility. Yet, the Sons relation to the Father is responsive, whereas the Fathers relation to the Son is initiative or originary. Thus, there is both an identity yet a non-identification of Father and Son. Again, since responsibility is the ethical hypostasis of ‘the-other-person-in me,’ we might say that the Father is in the Son and the Son is in the Father (cf. John 14:10,11), in a non-identical way, and that it is precisely this perichoresis of the one in the Other which constitutes the hypostasis of each.

On the Ethical Nature of Priesthood

This article argues that ministerial priesthood, rather than being ontologically comprehended, should be ethically articulated. The ‘character’ of priesthood is to be ‘for-the-other.’ Following a thought of Emmanuel Levinas on the ‘liturgical orientation of work,’ we argue that n n n n(i) — Priesthood is essentially liturgical, in the sense of a movement out of oneself towards the other which never returns to the self. This movement is at one and the same time on orientation towards God, as divine other, and the other person. This ‘liturgical’ orientation of the self is seen and celebrated in the sacred liturgy of the Church with which the life and ministry of the priest is intimately associated. In this sense, the liturgy of the Church is not only an expression of what the Church is, but also, as an expression of the ethical subjectivity of the self which is ‘the-Other-in-me,’ a celebration of who I am. n n n n(ii) — Priesthood is essentially eucharistic. In the commemoration of the passion, death and resurrection of Christ, the ethical and ecclesial structure of subjectivity, is recalled and realised in the words ‘for you (hyper hymon)’ and ‘for all (hyper pollon).’ n n n n(iii) — Priesthood is self-sacrificial. If living eucharistically is living ‘for you (hyper hymon)’ and ‘for all (hyper pollon),’ then this finds its extreme expression in the sacrifice of oneself for-the-other in suffering and death. This involves substitution which, as Levinas says, ‘is indispensable to the comprehension of subjectivity.’

The Question Is: A Consideration of the Question in Rahner, Blanchot and Lévinas:

Lobjectif de lA. est de rehabiliter la pensee theologique de Karl Rahner en la deplacant de son contexte ontologique vers un cadre ethique qui soutient mieux son veritable accomplissement theologique, en reconsiderant la question de la question qui fut le point de depart de toute sa reflexion theologique. Pour ce faire, lA. fait appel aux doctrines de Maurice Blanchot et dEmmanuel Levinas qui, en substituant a la metaphysique lethique, mettent en relief le caractere accompli de lethique rahnerienne et projette une lumiere differente sur la question ontologique dans sa doctrine

THE ABSENT AUTHOR: MAURICE BLANCHOT AND INSPIRATION

Maurice Blanchot apporte des elements nouveaux a la theorie de linspiration dans la creation litteraire. Leffacement visible de lauteur devant son travail sert de correctif a la vision optimiste anterieure qui voulait que lintention de lauteur nous soit accessible. Le texte tel quil se pose est separe de la propriete de lauteur. Linspiration a un aspect communautaire: la relation de la communaute a Dieu est cet espace interelationel a linterieur duquel emerge linspiration