The Historical Supernatural and the Church

Main Article Content

Adolfo Galeano Atehortúa

Abstract

The profound cultural change we are undergoing, due to the transition from modernity to postmodernity, poses a new challenge to ecclesiology: The transition from a metaphysical understanding of the Church to a salvific-historical one, already suggested by Second Vatican Council. Modernity wanted to eliminate the supernatural, but de Lubac’s and von Balthasar’s Nouvelle Théologie rose to that challenge. The article aims to present theology from the perspective of the historical supernatural, which was addressed by von Rad in exegesis and by Fackenheim and Heschel in Jewish theology. Within Catholicism, the issue of the supernatural in history was addressed by Daniélou and von Balthasar. Bearing this in mind, after considering the crisis of culture in modernity, the article first addresses, based on the aforementioned authors, the historical supernatural according to the Holy Scriptures. Then, it considers the historical supernatural as the humus of the Church, which provides both an identity of her own and a source of resilience to significant changes throughout history. To understand the development process of the Church, it is compared to the work of creation, considering new biblical hermeneutic. Just like cosmos is the clay that the Lord uses to create the human being, because we are all made of star stuff, so is history the one that the Spirit uses to build the Church. Regarding biblical hermeneutics, the article considers that the interpretation of the Old Testament remains within the New Testament, that is, that the writers of the latter read the first, just like the prophets read the traditions of Israel. It is not intended to present the Church that is being developed in postmodernity, but only to introduce her historical supernatural foundation. Neither it is the purpose to address the ecclesiology developed by theologians of science, though it considers some of their ideas regarding such issue.

Keywords:
Historical Supernatural Postmodernity Eschatology Evolution Einsteinian Universe Ecclesiology

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Article Details

Author Biography

Adolfo Galeano Atehortúa, Universidad de San Buenaventura

Doctor en Teología por la Universidad Gregoriana de Roma, Italia. Licenciado en Teología por la misma Universidad. Licenciado en Filosofía en la Universidad de San Buenaventura, Colombia. Actualmente es profesor de teología en la Universidad San Buenaventura, Colombia.