Remi Brague

My college friend Tim Regan recently directed me to French thinker Remi Brague. I immediately pre-ordered and excitedly await the release today, November 30, first Sunday of Advent, of his latest book: Eccentric Culture: A Theory of European Civilization. His thesis is that European, which is to say Christian, civilization is rooted in the mediation by Rome of two prior, foundational sources, Jerusalem and Athens. Rome, of course, contributed its own elements to our history, as did other cultures; but there was about Rome humility or deference to the Hellenic as a superior culture. And so, Roman Christianity deferred to both Greece and Israel as foundational sources. This makes Europe an “eccentric” civilization in that it centers not on itself, but on two points that are prior and external. This places our Christian identity in a refreshing and new light: we (cultural) Europeans (or Christians) are basically barbarians (non-Greeks) and gentiles (non-Jews.) Therefore, without discarding our inherited customs, we need constantly to be returning to our sources in Golden Greece and the Old/New Testament. If this is accurate, then our history can be understood as a series of evangelical revivals (of biblical faith) and cultural renaissances (retrieval of the classics.)

This fascinating model gives a novel way to evaluate developments of the second Vatican Council. One might identify three distinct forces at work in the renewal that led to and sprang from that momentous event: return to the Gospels, “resourcement” as a retrieval of ancient sources (especially the Fathers), and an updating or modernizing of our faith. The dominant, fashionable trend in the wake of the councils emphasized updating to the detriment of resourcement. Specifically, there emerged an emphasis upon the historicity of faith and dogma and an eagerness to deconstruct what was seen as a stale, rigid, ossified, Tridentine, Baroque Church. The battle call was to de-Hellenize the faith. Influential thinkers like Lonergan, Rahner and Dewart wanted to free theology and practice from imprisonment in antiquated concepts and rituals. Ironically, this group failed to see that they themselves were largely being swayed by currents of contemporary history that are, in large part, hostile to our ancient faith.

Happily, a countervailing school (DeLubac, Balthasar, and the brilliant young Ratzinger) were moving in an entirely different direction: more deeply into the sources, especially the Church Fathers who themselves were a providential articulation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ using Greek culture. This, of course, is the consistent Catholic way and the trend that has guided the magisterium through the persons of John Paul and Benedict and their collaborators. Meanwhile, most of the Christian academia has been in explicit or implicit retreat from the tradition of metaphysics, scholasticism, and the Fathers. Academic theology largely severed or ignored its roots in ancient philosophy and became enamored with the practical sciences of politics and psychology. Just recently, the General of the Jesuits expressed nostalgia for liberation theology which was itself largely a politicization of the faith.

Contemporary renewal movements are also illuminated by the new Brague model. Many of the most powerful are evangelical in nature as they return to the Gospels in a literal manner, especially Pentecostalism and the Neocatecumenal Way. The weakness of these currents is a tendency to primitivism (rejection of post-Apostolic Church developments), emotivism and anti-intellectualism. By contrast, we find in the Communion and Liberation Movement less evangelical intensity but a profound appreciation of culture in all its forms. Closely related to the Communio or Resourcement School of Theology, this group represents a kind of a cultural renaissance as it draws trustingly from contemporary and classic sources for spiritual and intellectual enlightenment and refreshment.

John Paul was at heart an evangelical, equally at home with Billy Graham, charismatics, and NeoCats; by contrast, Benedict is quintessentially a classicist, reading the Gospels through the lens of the Fathers, the ancients, and the very finest of our cultural heritage.

Partnering with the evangelicals and the “culturals,” we can enjoy both refreshments: that of revival and that of renaissance. It is a good time to be Catholic! Thanks Remi Brague!