Preserving the Common, Producing Difference: Neo-Calvinism and the Cultural Turn in the Humanities

ARCU lecture by Dr. Ryan C. McIlhenny
Associate Professor of History and Humanities
Providence Christian College
2013–2014 ARCU lecturer – bio

Listen: audio of lecture and question-and-answer session

Abstract:
A crucial element often missing in the contemporary discussions about Christ and culture is a robust definition of culture. This address offers an updated definition that evaluates traditional evangelical understandings on the topic with contemporary cultural studies and critical theory. Culture, as I propose, is the purely phenomenal identity that springs from human interaction with the created order. Such a definition affirms the common and shared/undifferentiated activities of both Christians and non-Christians that, nonetheless, produce different cultures, preserving the neo-Calvinist emphasis on structure and direction.

Lecture presented by the ICS Centre for Philosophy, Religion and Social Ethics at the Toronto School of Theology boardroom, 47 Queen’s Park Crescent E., Toronto, Thursday March 20, 2014. 7:30 PM.

Rights and Worlds: The Political Significance of Belonging

Rights and Worlds: The Political Significance of Belonging.  Paper presented by Shannon Hoff at Guelph University, January 17, 2014.

View: on Youtube

Listen: audio file of the lecture

Modernity is characterized by an assertion of the individual as a singular unit of significance and its various systems (political, legal, economic, and so on) have taken their lead from the idea of the individual as the bearer of rights. This modern prioritization of the individual, however, while a powerful accomplishment, is also problematic: it does not adequately recognize how the individual it prioritizes would itself point to other contexts of significance by which its identity is constituted and made meaningful. This paper will explore this basic tension between these two visions of selfhood – one expressed in terms of "rights" and the other in terms of "worlds". It will show how care for these basic worlds of significance is necessary for the very operation of rights, and it will point to various ways in which the significance of these "worlds" could be politically recognized and protected.

Truth Matters: Knowledge, Politics, Ethics, Religion

Truth Matters: Knowledge, Politics, Ethics, Religion. Lambert Zuidervaart, Allyson Carr, Matthew J. Klaassen and Ronnie Shuker, editors. McGill-Queen's University Press. January 2014

A pioneering study of why truth is important in philosophy, public culture, and everyday life.

Find it at: McGill-Queen's University Press

Also see: Truth Matters Interdisciplinary Conference

Why should we seek and tell the truth? Does anyone know what truth is? Many are skeptical about the relevance of truth. Truth Matters endeavours to show why truth is important in a world where the very idea of truth is contested.

Putting philosophers in conversation with educators, literary scholars, physicists, political theorists, and theologians, Truth Matters ranges across both analytic and continental philosophy and draws on the ideas of thinkers such as Aquinas, Balthasar, Brandom, Davidson, Dooyeweerd, Gadamer, Habermas, Kierkegaard, Plantinga, Ricoeur, and Wolterstorff. Some essays attempt to provide a systematic account of truth, while others wrestle with the question of how truth is told and what it means to live truthfully. Contributors address debates between realists and anti-realists, explore issues surrounding relativism and constructivism in education and the social sciences, examine the politics of truth telling and the ethics of authenticity, and consider various religious perspectives on truth.

Most scholars agree that truth is propositional, being expressed in statements that are subject to proof or disproof. This book goes a step farther: yes, propositional truth is important, but truth is more than propositional. To recognize how it is more than propositional is crucial for understanding why truth truly matters.

Contributors include Doug Blomberg (ICS), Allyson Carr (ICS), Jeffrey Dudiak (King’s University College), Olaf Ellefson (York University), Gerrit Glas (VU University Amsterdam), Gill K. Goulding (Regis College), Jay Gupta (Mills College), Clarence Joldersma (Calvin College), Matthew J. Klaassen (ICS), John Jung Park (Duke University), Pamela J. Reeve (St. Augustine’s Seminary), Amy Richards (World Affairs Council of Western Michigan), Ronnie Shuker (ICS), Adam Smith (Brandeis University), John Van Rys (Redeemer University College), Darren Walhof (Grand Valley State University), Matthew Walhout (Calvin College), and Lambert Zuidervaart (ICS).

The Annihilation Of Hell: Universal Salvation and the Redemption of Time in the Eschatology of Jürgen Moltmann

The Annihilation Of Hell: Universal Salvation and the Redemption of Time in the Eschatology of Jürgen Moltmann. Nik Ansell. Paternoster Press, 2013.

Find it at: Wipf and Stock

For Jürgen Moltmann, Hell is the nemesis of Hope. The “Annihilation of Hell” thus refers both to Hell’s annihilative power in history and to the overcoming of that power as envisioned by Moltmann’s distinctive theology of the cross in which God becomes “all in all” through Christ’s descent into Godforsakenness. The negation of Hell and the fulfillment of history are inseparable. Attentive to the overall contours and dynamics of Moltmann’s thinking — especially his zimzum doctrine of creation, his eschatologically oriented philosophy of time, and his expanded understanding of the nature-grace relationship — this study asks whether the universal salvation that he proposes can honor human freedom, promise vindication for those who suffer, and do justice to biblical revelation. As well as providing an in-depth exposition of Moltmann’s ideas, The Annihilation of Hell also explores how a “covenantal universalism” might revitalize our web of beliefs in a way that is attuned to the authorizing of Scripture and the spirituality of existence. If divine and human freedom are to be reconciled, as Moltmann believes, the confrontation between Hell and Hope will entail rethinking issues that are not only at the center of theology but at the heart of life itself.