The Conversation of Faith and Reason: Modern Catholic Thought from Hermes to Benedict XVI

by Aidan Nichols

Fr. Aidan Nichols' book The Conversation of Faith and Reason has extreme relevance today as Catholics continue to come to grips with moral relativism and conscience in an increasingly secular world where at times reason and science are pitted against religion. Just as secularism and modernity can tear at the fabric of faith, liturgy pulls faith and reason together. Aidan Nichols charts the development of the faith and reason through the key figures who set the terms of the debate between faith and reason where official Catholic teaching is concerned, and whose theologies influenced modern theological thought as the twentieth century drew to its close in the encyclical letter Fides et ratio (1998) of John Paul II. This study will awaken a long needed English language interest in modern Catholic thought and illustrates how liturgy sometimes is being misunderstood as being merely a morally edifying or socializing human institution. The Conversation of Faith and Reason is a superb and balanced study by one of the great theological minds in English-speaking Catholicism. It is a testimony to serious and rigorous thinking, presented in elegant language.

232 pages, Paperback

First published April 19, 2011

About the author

John Christopher "Aidan" Nichols O.P., S.T.M. (born 17 September 1948) is an English academic and Catholic priest.

Nichols served as the first John Paul II Memorial Visiting Lecturer at the University of Oxford for 2006 to 2008, the first lectureship of Catholic theology at that university since the Reformation. He is a member of the Order of Preachers (Dominicans) and is the Prior of St Michael the Archangel in Cambridge.

Reviews

[Nathan Suire · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great text on 19th and 20th century Catholic philosophy and theology. What is the proper relationship between faith and reason? After surveying many Catholic thinkers, Nichols argues that Gilson’s position is the best…. At times Nichols is not the most clear writer and often his sentences are clunky. Nevertheless it is still a great text on an often overlooked time period.