The Charmed Circle
Lowery, Mark
IN BRIEF The Charmed Circle. Theology for the Head, Heart, Hands and Feet. By Robert Masson. Sheed and Ward, $10.95, 250 pp. This is a fine introduction to theology that aims at avoiding the...
...What is more, the book will serve as an accessible entry into Karl Rahner's thought, and one that avoids the common error that Rahner doesn't start with faith but with the human being...
...MARK LOWERY 687...
...One is hesitant to note an omission in so well-conceived and delivered a book as this...
...Christianity is presented as a "charmed circle" — charmed meaning either something inherently bewitched and superstitious, or delightful and promising...
...An exceptionally broad range of material is used to accomplish such a project, ranging from apocalyptic literature to liberation theology and including an aesthetic blend of the religious experience of slaves with an exegesis of the creation stories...
...It is accessible to a general audience, and has a pedagogically impeccable style making it well-suited for the classroom...
...The likes of Hans Urs von Balthasar and Henri de Lubac, not found in the index, offer a sacramentally rooted methodology that gives the Eucharist (and the full doctrinal heritage rooted therein) more centrality...
...Masson shows that despite the proclivity of many (individuals and churches, past and present) toward the former, the latter is in fact the case, making the Christian vision a viable option for modern people...
...it can be argued that such a position must be included to truly overcome the dichotomies that Masson's bowk wrestles with so well...
...There is a stream of reflection existing alongside (and often compatible with) Rahner's own reassessment of Neo-Scholasticism that yields a richer ecclesiology than Masson provides...
...This is a fine introduction to theology that aims at avoiding the false dichotomies that often beset us between faith and understanding, action and spirituality, God's transcendence and immanence...
Vol. 114 • November 1987 • No. 20
