How Balthasar! How intolerant! How controversial!

The monthly theological reading group I attend is reading Engagement with God (Ignatius Press, 2008), by Hans Urs von Balthasar. Here are a couple of quotes for you or Brit Hume to use on television (or in the workplace, social events, parish council meetings, etc.):

For only the Christian is in a position to judge clearly how basically unsatisfying it is for man, both as an individual and as a social being, to have as his ultimate goal the civilizing and humanizing of the world, because he himself has found his own fulfillment in the person of Jesus Christ. ...

If it is true however, that man is endowed by his very nature with the capacity to begin the work of making the earth his subject and of humanizing the world, and similarly true that his nature grants him power to step out beyond the limits of the natural order toward a goal that in his own strength he cannot attain, then only the Christian, and he alone, since he knows God's involvement for the world in Christ, will be able to direct right man's strivings in the world and his efforts to attain transcendence. (pp. 69, 70)

For those unfamiliar with von Balthasar who might be tempted to label him as "triumphalistic," be assured that von Balthasar demands nothing less than complete self-giving on the part of the Christian, in imitation of the crucified Christ. Engagement with God is an excellent and accessible introduction to von Balthasar's work; read the foreword to the book, "Discerning What Is Christian", by Dr. Margaret M. Turek.

• Ignatius Insight Author Page for Hans Urs von Balthasar

Comments

[Magister Christianus]

von Balthasar is exactly correct. In a recent post on this matter (http://bedlamorparnassus.blogspot.com/2010/01/christianity-et-al.html), I cite Neuhaus' statement about Jesus, "If he is the way, the truth, and the life, he is that for everyone and everything." The "if" may be argued, but it is not triumphalism to acknowledge the logical consequences of the claims of Jesus.