Sub lumine fidei

New Sub Lumine Fidei series. Theology is the science of faith.

How these two terms relate to each other is the ‘alternative’ history of two thousand years of Christianity.

Sub lumine fidei is the answer that comes from Dei Verbum, when it asks that, in the light of faith, theology might read and interpret "every truth contained in the mystery of Christ" (n. 24).

In Him, personal and human history finds its fulfillment and synthesis. This series of books aims to follow this path, presenting individuals and ideas that have marked important stages in theology in its efforts to scrutinize the mystery of man in the mystery of Christ. The series is written by Archbishop Rino Fisichella and is published by Edizioni San Paolo.

“What the world needs …”  This expression occurs repeatedly in the writings of Benedict XVI. The pillars of thought that he wanted to leave as a legacy are concentrated on the centrality of Jesus Christ which must never be obscured by the vicissitudes of Church history; in the great challenge of evangelization that Christians are called to carry out through a lifestyle consistent with the Gospel; in an attempt to find the positive elements of modernity so as to once again bring out the great novelty of the Christian faith.

This is why he was also the great defender of Europe, he wanted to ensure that Europe would not forget its origins and the responsibility to which it is called. Having chosen the name of Benedict, the first great architect of evangelization, this book brings us back to his far-sighted vision capable of uniting the contemplation of love and its spreading throughout the world. Benedict XVI left us on 31 December 2022, the day on which the Church celebrates the memorial of Pope Saint Sylvester, who is remembered for two things: the first Council celebrated in Nicaea in 325 from which the profession of faith in the divinity of Jesus Christ was made and the condemnation of Arius whose Arian heresy denied the divinity of Jesus.

With the death of Benedict XVI we can say that the direct testimony of the theologians most involved in the Second Vatican Council comes to an end. Archbishop Fisichella, one of his closest collaborators, gives us in this volume a unique and original synthesis of the thought of this great theologian and Pope, considered by many to be a ‘Father of the Church’.                                          

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John Paul I went down in history as the ‘Smiling Pope’. Together with his spontaneous smile, which was neither studied nor formal, he also displayed another precious quality: simplicity.

This book contains many testimonies of those who knew him. It emerges that Albino Luciani had made evangelical simplicity a program of life since his seminary days, a program which he did not give up on, either as Bishop of Vittorio Veneto or as Patriarch of Venice, despite being a man of great culture and a fine theologian.

But it was above all in his 33 days of his pontificate that the whole world had the opportunity to appreciate the simplicity of this Pope, particularly during his Wednesday catechesis sessions, where he addressed the faithful in simple language, unusual in the rigid protocol of the day.

The then-Cardinal Archbishop of Milan, Giovanni Colombo, said of him: “The new Pope is a much more cultured man than he lets on. His warehouse is incomparably better stocked than his shop window."

This book, which is enriched by the personal memories of the author, who is the promoter of the cause of beatification of Albino Luciani, allows us to experience first-hand the humble and simple sanctity of a Pope who, despite the brevity of his pontificate, wrote an important page in the history of Church.

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The theme of Tradition, often underestimated today, is one of the most important references in theology and in the Magisterium. However, it has to be recognized that ‘Tradition’ is an unclear concept, especially when its contents have to be determined.

What does Tradition consist of? How do you interpret it? Under what conditions can it be modified? This book aims to answer all these questions, which are asked in the daily life of the Church, and sets out guidelines for understanding how to approach Tradition and how to interpret it.

A significant contribution to this topic, according to the author of this book, is the Commonitorio of Vincent of Lérins, a work from the 5th century, whose great insight is that sacred Scripture must be inserted, read and interpreted in the light of Tradition.

This profound intuition, forgotten for centuries, was re-proposed by Vatican II, in Dei Verbum, although to date it has been only partially understood and implemented.

Insofar as it echoes the Gospel of the Word made flesh, Tradition, despite its name, is the most dynamic of realities, always straining towards the future by virtue of its inseparable link with the past. To use an appropriate medieval aphorism -  if today we are able to see further and deeper it is because "we are like dwarfs on the shoulders of the giants" who preceded us.

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In a period like ours, characterized by a profound crisis of meaning, by the fragmentation of knowledge, by the dominance of digital culture, it is more necessary than ever that faith and reason restart their dialogue, without trying to dominate each other.

What is at stake, if truth be told, is the knowledge of truth, without which human freedom is pure illusion.

But how should faith and reason return to the table of dialogue? This is the fundamental question - the wooden knot - addressed in this volume. In the long historical journey that has marked the relationship between faith and reason, and which the author traces in the text, a fundamental stage was reached with the publication of John Paul II's encyclical Fides et ratio in 1998. This important document of the Magisterium, as the volume well demonstrates, was an attempt to offer support for the journey in search of truth and the unity of knowledge, so dear to ancient and medieval tradition, understood in the light of God's revelation. By opening itself to the truth of revelation, reason is not excluded from faith and in the same way, if faith is to correspond to its true nature, it cannot ignore reason.

Faith and reason must walk together if they want to shed light on that one truth that is at the heart of the passionate search for meaning of every human being.

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For more than 2000 years, the Church, thanks to her priests, has lived out the command of Jesus Christ to commemorate his death and resurrection. The Eucharist and priesthood are, in fact, the heart of the Christian faith. That’s why it is necessary, as the author does in this volume, to contemplate with an ever-new perspective what we can define as the ‘mystery of the altar’. Among the many formulations with which the Church has given voice to her faith in the Eucharist, the ancient expression ‘bread of life’, more than any other, summarizes the reflections contained in this book. The two terms refer to what is essential for the mind to grasp if it is to express the profound meaning of this mystery: the desire for life and the means to achieve it. Like the prophet Elijah, believers are also called to nourish themselves with bread to be able to enter the desert of life. If the call to always allow oneself to be amazed by the Eucharistic mystery is true for every believer, it is even more so for the priest. The mystery that his vocation represents becomes understandable only in the light of the Eucharist, the supreme gift that Christ made of himself to his Church.

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“Our first word is the word ‘beauty’”. It was with this expression that Hans Urs von Balthasar, a unique figure in the last century, launched a real theological revolution. In what can be considered his most significant work, Gloria, he retraced the path of beauty as a form of revelation of Trinitarian love. Rediscovering the profound impact that he had on the theology of the 20th century could contribute to a real progress of thought beyond any confessional confines. That is the objective of this volume, in which the author, a ‘disciple’ of von Balthasar, proposes interesting keys to understanding the entire theological work of this ‘great son of the Church’, as John Paul II defined him. Von Balthasar restored that long and fruitful patristic tradition which immersed itself in mystery through meditation on Sacred Scripture. His works express the richness of the Old and New Testaments as found in the commentaries of the Fathers of the Church and the great Master of Biblical Studies. Not only theology, but culture in general can find in him a key to understand how a Catholic leaves nothing to chance in giving voice to his own intelligence and in knowing how to compose a symphony even with the most disparate instruments.

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Presenting all of John Paul II's magisterium is no easy task. In the span of almost 27 years of his pontificate, this great holy Pope, left no less than 14 Encyclicals and many other documents, consisting of Apostolic Exhortations, Letters, Motu Proprio, catecheses and homilies... This book, for the first time, proposes a clear and complete synthesis of the teaching of John Paul II. It does so starting from the Encyclicals, which the author (at the time one of Karol Wojtyla's closest collaborators), rereads from an original and interesting perspective. It is well expressed in a line from one of John Paul’s last poetic works, Roman Triptych, ("your name is written deep within me").  John Paul II was convinced that within everyone, believer or not, there is a familiar presence that arouses curiosity, desire, nostalgia... the name of God. For this reason he always indicated  “Jesus as the main path of the Church and of each human being", because Christ is the new man to whom we should look. This is a book that provides an important retracing of the salient stages of Karol Wojtyla's long pontificate, in which this holy Pope was able to grasp the great cultural and social challenges of the contemporary world.

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