Douglas Knight

There’s another city that Benedict XVI would like to visit soon: Istanbul. The date he has in mind is November 30, the feast of St. Andrew, who is the patron of the ecumenical patriarchate of Constantinople. Patriarch Bartholomew I has already invited the pope. And he has already sent to Rome, on June 29, the [...]

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The decisive beginnings of the ontological articulation of the Fathers of the Church are seen, says Zizioulas, in the theological work of St Ignatius of Antioch and St Irenaeus of Lyons. On the basis of the Johannine identifications of Christ with life, and truth, and upon their identification of life with being for ever, these [...]

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The ‘Sons’ post (below) received two comments. I’ll call them A and B. Here they are again:
(A) “The academic community needs to be more sensitive to language use. Instead of sons why not use gender-neutral terms ‘children’ or ‘heirs’ or ‘beloved ones’? By insisting on using sons it subtly reinforces the superiority of the male [...]

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We spend our whole time resisting the dichotomies of form and content, or substance and methodology, that we are offered in every intellectual form. This is just how it should be. The whole Christian gospel may be summed up like this: There is no division between content and form, between method and truth – in [...]

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The ever-excellent Peter Leithart has been reading Aristotle Papanikolaou’s new book Being with God: Trinity, Apophaticism, And Divine-Human Communion.
Papanikolaou is comparing the trinitarian theology of Vladimir Lossky and John Zizioulas. According to Papanikolaou:
Zizioulas “emphatically affirms that an energy is never apersonal. The energies of God are communicated only through the persons of [...]

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We believe that the Windsor Report offers in its Sections A & B an authentic description of the life of the Anglican Communion, and the principles by which its life is governed and sustained. We accept the description offered in Sections A & B of the Windsor Report as the way in which we would [...]

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Help! We are already into the second half of April. In January I wanted to get straight into the doctrine book, provisionally entitled The Apprenticeship, but the other books have got in the way. The first and second books, The Eschatological Economy and the collection on Zizioulas, have demanded so much time, that I have [...]

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The resurrection of Jesus was not the general resurrection, but the provision of a longer gentler way to the general resurrection. This resurrection, that is both commenced and delayed, is the mode of God’s hidden work of holding and training a people. By the resurrection, the crucifixion of Christ was lifted from Christ and placed [...]

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Jesus was abandoned by all. He was hung on the cross to display his complete isolation and shame. All resources of support drained away from him, until he had nothing. In this visible world he was cleared out of all resources of public reputation and recognition. He descended through all intermediary levels of status [...]

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Jesus is handed over to the world. He is made passive. Passivity and passion become his action. Although Jesus is the circumcision, baptism and anointing, he is circumcised, baptised and anointed. Although he is the resurrection, the one who may never die, he suffers and dies. He suffers the world. If we are allowed [...]

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My wonderful Eerdmans editor asked me whether I could change some of my references to ’sons’ to ’sons and daughters’ to make it seem a bit more fair. On the spur of the moment I couldn’t say why I didn’t want to make the change. But now I have found the admirable Ken Collins [...]

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Roman Catholics need to revisit their universities in the United States, promoting a genuine difference in scholarship and curriculum so that in five generations a Catholic intellectual culture might possibly be present and transformative of society. The Christian Church at the heart of the university will facilitate such genuine developments that can only enrich intellectual [...]

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To the extent that the church of England bishops only go to church of England parishes and churches, they have forgotten what the office of bishop is. To the extent that Methodist bishops (in the States) only go the Methodist congregations they have not understood that office of bishop is intrinsically ecumenical, because it is [...]

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The one Son does not replace the many people who belong to him. He is the guarantor of their continuing manyness. He starts a community, and is its definition, but he does not represent its end. He rather grows and expands it without limit. The manyness of these witnesses to the Son, themselves provided by [...]

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Christian ministry in a pluralistic society begins with the capacity to speak the faith intelligently and persuasively to ourselves and to one another within the household of faith. We should not be ashamed or concerned to have this as our primary goal. For the pluralism the Gospel seeks to address is as omnipresent as the [...]

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