Theopolitical Imagination: Christian Practices of Space and Time

by William T. Cavanaugh

A critique of modern Western civilization, including contemporary concerns of consumerism, capitalism, globalization, and poverty, from the perspective of a believing Catholic.

Responding to Enlightenment and Postmodernist views of the social and economic realities of our time, Cavanaugh engages with contemporary concerns--consumerism, late capitalism, globalization, poverty--in a way reminiscent of Rowan Williams (Lost Icons), Nicholas Boyle (Who Are We Now?) and Michel de Certeau. "Consumption of the Eucharist," he argues, "consumes one into the narrative of the pilgrim City of God, whose reach extends beyond the global to embrace all times and places." He develops the theme of the Eucharist as the basis for Christian resistance to the violent disciplines of state, civil society and globalization.

Genres: Theology, Politics, Religion, Philosophy, Catholic, History, Nonfiction

130 pages, Paperback

First published February 1, 2003

About the author

Dr. William T. Cavanaugh, Ph.D. (Religion, Duke University; M.A., Theology and Religious Studies, Cambridge University) is Associate Professor of Theology at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Reviews

[Kenny · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thought-provoking explication of the relation of the church to the modern state, with a narrative summary of the process of the development post Enlightenment. Helpful in understanding the compromises the Church has made in its accommodation to the contemporary state. Many profound insights but a difficult read—could have been made more accessible with some editing.

[Brian · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent read. Traces the way the state has tried to take over the role of “Savior.” Highlights specific events that led to our current situation and gives examples of where the church has allowed it to happen. I have a few little nitpicks here and there, mostly due to my Protestant understandings of Eucharist bumping up against his Catholic understandings, but that aside, I think this is an important read for the whole church catholic. It may be a little too technical for a typical small group study, but I think it’s worth the work in order to mine the many gold nuggets throughout. The evangelical world, especially, would benefit from understanding the importance of the Lord’s Supper and it’s effect on the world... if we wonder why our culture is going downhill, this is the first place we need to look.

[Steve · Rating 4 out of 5]

William T. Cavanaugh addresses politics under 3 heads, attempting to offer a perspective that avoids privatising the church and a state-society complex with the church as a department .

1. The myth of the state as saviour

2. The myth of civil society as free space.
“We must cease to think that the only choices open to the church are either to withdraw into the private or ‘sectarian’ confinement, or to embrace the public debate policed by the state.” 90

3. The myth of globalization as catholicity.

[Isaiah Padgett · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really good collection of three essays from Cavanaugh. A bit repetitive between some of the points, but a nice intro to Cavanaugh's thoughts of the state as arbitrator of social groups and soteriological usurper, the neoliberal project, and the Eucharist as the alternative to the state's claims upon the individual.

[Jacob Aitken]

Cavanaugh gives a theological critique of democratic capitalism and the modern state. He reworks the notion of "time" and "space" around the Eucharist, in that the Eucharist, the body of Christ, gives new time and new space for the acting out of public life. He begins with his famous essay on the so-called Wars of Religion. Contra the established myth, says Cavanaugh, the wars were not wars about religion, but came after the creation of the modern state and were tools of the modern state to fight against religion. The state's goal was to mask its own violence by cloaking the wars as "religious."

Cavanaugh, while likely an anabaptist in terms of politics (I realize he is a confessional Roman Catholic), gives an unusually astute analysis of different political options. Most anabaptists incompetently rail at "Constantianism" (note this term is almost never defined), usually with some heretical "fall of the church from the apostles" garbage, and then package that off as "a new and bracing political theology." Cavanaugh is much more mature than that. He notes the Church using the sword is not an option, but realizes that most alternatives to this are either neo-conservatism or privatism. Anabaptists have not been consistently able to give a good alternative to Constantianism without going into pietism. Cavanaugh's discussion is worth reading on this point.

Per the Eucharist:
The Eucharist is the public acting out of the Christian story. Salvation is the restoring of unity through the participation in Christ's body (13). The body of Christ is the locus of participation between God and man. The Eucharist overcomes the dichotomy between local and universal (113). It takes scattered communities and re-focuses them towards a center. The whole body of Christ is present in each Eucharistic assembly. The Eucharist "bends" space; the more I am tied to the local the more I become aware of the universal.

Conclusion:
In many ways this book is simply magnificent. Unlike many pacifistic and anabaptist thinkers, Cavanaugh is able (with varying degrees of success) to offer a critique of modern liberal society. The critique of the State as mythos is beautiful. His discussions on globalism and the Eucharist offer much food for thought.

Cons:
Is this 120 page book worth the $50 selling price? No. This is partly why I despise academia. They are largely irrelevant to the rest of humanity because of stuff like this. But, reader cheer up, one can easily get Cavanaugh's "word for word" arguments by buying two other books that will cost around $40. He writes the same essays in *Radical Orthodoxy: A New Theology* and *Being Consumed.* So in a sense, *TheoPolitical Imagination* can be avoided.

Also, I am not quite sure he fully rejects modernity's values. One instance is when he refers to the medievals using the Eucharist to exclude Jews (116). Is he honestly saying that we should include Jews at the table? To be fair, he doesn't actually say that, but it's hard to draw any other conclusion. This is the Lord's table for Christians. Excluding Jews isn't bigotry. It is simply a corrollary of the defintion of what it means to be a Christian, something a Jew would agree with!

--
Jacob Aitken

[Andrew Marr · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book collects three inter-related essays about the relationship of the Church with the world. "The Myth of the Sate as Savior" is a cogent argument against the notion that the "liberal" state has saved the world from religious violence. An outline of the actual alignments of the religious wars of the 16th & 17th centuries makes it crystal clear that the war was not between two religious groups but a power struggle among emerging states that were doing anything they could to solidify their power. The wars fought between these states since suggests they whatever they have saved us from (probably nothing at all) they have not saved us from violence but actually has greatly escalated it. The state also commits the violence of separating people and groups from one another, fragmenting all of us into individuals who, as individuals, relate directly to the State. (Quite a devilish parody of the individual relationship with God that unites us with all other people) "The Myth of Civil Society as Free Space" looks at a couple of ways that the Church has understood its role in the public sphere. He discusses John Courtney Murray and suggests that Murray's notion that the Church could witness freely by appealing to reason accessible for all just does not work as a witness of discipleship. Cavanaugh has more sympathy with Harry Boyte who tries to build up grass-roots activism. Boyte's thoughts are being used in a program called Public Achievement which is being used in many Catholic schools in Minnesota. The commitment and idealistic commitment to helping others is impressive but there is no real ecclesiastical basis to support this work. "The Myth of Globalization as Catholicity" debunks the notion that globalization is bringing people together by demonstrating that it pulls people apart, most particularly the poor and small farmers and the like who are victims of economic extraction. To all three of these problematical situations Cavanaugh proposes the Eucharist as a sign of genuine Catholicity and means of gathering people for a renewed society. In this respect, he follows in the footsteps his fellow Minnesotan, Virgil Michel, a monk of St. John's Abbey, Collegeville and pioneer of the liturgical movement integrated with social issues of his day. In two essays, he notes the distinction between lieu (place) and espace (space). Place is what can be mapped on a grid. No two people or things can occupy the same place. Space is infinitely expandable and it is in space that the Eucharist takes place. It is the Eucharist that brings the universal to every local space so that every local space participates in receiving the Gift of Christ so that we can share this Gift with all comers, extending to all of the least of Christ's brothers and sisters.

[Toby · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an important read. Cavanaugh outlines the history of the development of the modern state, and points his readers in the right directions for further research. He carefully articulates and defends the thesis that the modern state was designed and developed self-consciously seeking to take the place of the Church, defining "religion" into a subordinated and neutered discipline of personal study and practice.

The latter half of the book interacts with various attempts by Christians to deal with this situation. Cavanaugh offers a "third way," seeking to ground the Church's response in the action, theology, and social realities of the Eucharist. Seems like a good start, but it also seemed like he stopped a little short of offering an explicit way forward. But his criticisms of the other popular attempts of Christians to either make peace with the state or merely find an anonymous place at the table of the world, are thoughtful and worthwhile.

[Anthony · Rating 3 out of 5]

The author’s theological critique is impressive. What I missed were solutions that are workable. It is well and good to insist the church be the church and be an adjunct of modern secular society. But what role then should the church play? I also sensed very little critique of the church as a political institution in its own right. Part of the radical orthodoxy movement in theology, with similar problems other works in the movement have - extremely clever and at first very beguiling…but then I am left with the important question: what is to be done?

[Matthew Richey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thought-provoking. Cavanuagh sees the state as a bad copy of the church that offers us mythical salvation from violence by monopolizing violence and free space by inventing religion as a private matter and then banishing from the public domain. Globalization is not a force that is opposed to these myths it rather reinforces them and offers us a myth of "catholicity" by the destruction of the local.

[Thomas · Rating 5 out of 5]

Cavanaugh pushes against various myths of the state, offering in turn an brief account of the church as a public body on its own terms which does not need to be validated by the public body of the nation-state since, with Augustine, a true state would promote the honor of God and so the modern nation-state fails to be truly uphold justice and truth. This book serves as an excellent primer for political theology from a Catholic perspective.

[meredith fleming]

I bought this at a thrift store without reading the back and was disappointed to find the only theology discussed was Christianity, specifically Catholicism. I enjoyed the commentary on consumerism and found the last chapter to be the most engaging. I don’t agree with most of Cavanaugh’s opinions and there was so much room for improvement but it was an interesting perspective regardless!

[Zach Hollifield · Rating 4 out of 5]

Just excellent. I do not agree with everything Cavanaugh says but his primary points in each essay are right on. He offers a crucial Christian understanding of globalism and the modern state which the Church would do well to adopt.

[Doug · Rating 5 out of 5]

Coincidentally, I just finished this Cavanaugh book as Brad Littlejohn raved about his rereading of Cavanaugh's Torture and Eucharist. It must be a sign.

In many ways, Theopolitical Imagination is a short form of Torture and Eucharist, though don't miss either. Torture and Eucharist provides much more of an empirical grounding in the theological politics of Chile, a key move that woke me from my conservative slumbers years ago.

Theopolitical Imagination's great virtue is how Cavanaugh successfully marks the biblical antithesis between Church and State, God and Mammon in making a subtle and understated case for a form of Christian anarchism. Here's a representative quote:

"Clearly Christians have to an alarming degree adopted the salvation mythos of the state as their own, and submitted to the state's practices of binding. We submit to these practices, even give our bodies up for war, in the hope that the peace and unity promised by the state will be delivered....[T:]he state mythos and state religio are distortions of our true hope, and that the Christian tradition provides resources for resistance." (52)

[Jon · Rating 4 out of 5]

What Cavanaugh does here, he does really well. His outlines of the Enlightenment political project and globalization are superb. His critique of church ambitions in those arenas was more nuanced than I had read before. His proposal for the church (that it be universal through the concrete particularly of the liturgy) remains vital. I give only 4 stars, however, because it still seems clear that church united in liturgy might be required to deal with Leviathan and Cavanaugh does not make clear what it should do. In other words, the church is its own culture - great; how does that culture interact with predominant cultures outside its walls?

[Colby · Rating 5 out of 5]

Cavanaugh does not disappoint in this blindingly fast little theo-political pamphlet (right around the 100 page mark). Through meticulously precise and innovative moves he unravels the historical project of nation and national identity and reveals the unspoken underpinnings that the construct rests on. A helpful parallel to his "Myth of Religious Violence," Theopolitical draws out the specific imaginative functions which are required to create concepts like "nation" and "border" and baptize them as sacrosanct and violence worthy paraments of the modern national project.

An excellent, if not required, read for students of politics, theology or history.

[John Roberson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a fantastically revolutionary book. Cavanaugh offers a history of how the modern nation-state redefined 'religion' to consolidate political power and examines several ways Christians work at public political engagement. Instead he offers the Eucharist as our central political force. Fundamentally he's asked whether we are Americans first or Christians first, and the revolutionary freedom he's offering to us in the Eucharist is the chance to be Christians first. Be warned that this is a really dense, intellectual book.

[Chase Roden · Rating 4 out of 5]

These essays don't go together as well as I'd like, and Cavanaugh doesn't really make his point convincingly, but his thoughts on the role of the state and church are very compelling. I would like to know more about how he believes the Eucharist can bring about a practical change in action.

[Scott · Rating 2 out of 5]

Technical argument. Lost me--I reckon I'm more of a "big picture" thinker than I realized..

[Douglas Wilson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Provocative

[Brian Thatcher · Rating 3 out of 5]

It could go up to 5 stars in future readings. It dealt with things I haven't read too much about. The language was different and I had trouble grasping a few things. Definitely recommend though.

[Carolyn · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent. Great insight into the theological structure of the modern political state.