I preached (and organized worship) this last week, so I was bit out of time for blogging. But I have still been reading. Here is the short of it.
A bit ago over at generousorthodoxy we were talking about objectivity and truth, and it turned toward phenomenology, and Ken Archer’s great post on Husserl. After reading it I thought of all the connections between phenomenology and Wittgenstein and then I came across Wittgenstein and Phenomenology. A great read comparing Later W. with Husserl, Heidegger, and Merlou-Ponty.
But that was all just on a whim. I’ve also been reading Speech and Theology: Language and the Logic of Incarnation by James K.A. Smith, and also his edited Radical Orthodoxy and the Reformed Tradition. The latter is a great volume. Most of the summaries of RO are fair, and it really lays out what is at issue between the two tradition. Very refreshing, although currently I’m leaning more toward the RO side because some of the Reformed emphases on creation lean toward natural theology and sustaining the status quo. One author put the matter well: while the RT worries about secularization (fallen/sinful tendencies or directions of creational orders), RO promotes sacralization (bringing all nihilisms back into connection/suspension with the divine (1440).
I’m reading the former volume with great interest for two reasons. He has this great reading of Augustine (Ch.4) that will help with the paper I’m writing. But also he presents an incarnational account of language contrasted to Pickstock’s Eucharistic account in After Writing. Smith also (in RO&RT) criticizes RO Platonism (and offers an alternative, creational account in his Introducing RO) which I find very interesting. I’m trying to figure out if RO participatory ontology is necessary for their larger project, as well as the connection between Christianity and Platoism, both of which effects our understanding of language, knowledge, and how God and creation, and so ultimately redemption. So right now i’m thinking that Pickstock account in much too determinate (relying on the Hight Roman Rite) while Smith’s is too indeterminate (Incarnational, but without any determinate theory of the incarnation [which isn’t really possible], but also w/o any historical, scriptural, ethical, sacramental connection to the Church, except Augustine/Kiekegaard).
anyway, i’m still working through it and this is all off the cuff. I’ll write a really paper about it when I’m done. But hey, this is all for fun anyway. I’m not even in school.