Newman: A Guide for the Perplexed

by McIntosh, Mark

• ISBN13: 9780567372475
• ISBN10: 0567372472
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2016-12-08
• Publisher: Bloomsbury T&T Clark

Summary

John Henry Newman's legacy as a theologian, historian, and spiritual teacher presents itself to contemporary students through the inescapable prism of his person. Few theological writers of the modern era carry with them such a biographical pungency that even mature scholars (such as Frank M. Turner in his unfortunately tendentious 2002 biography) are lured by Newman the human being - even as they struggle to discern the coherence of Newman's thought. Rather than fight against this grain, or sequestering Newman's magnetic biography away in a preliminary "life of" chapter, Mark McIntosh harnesses the personal interest and intrigue of Newman's life in assisting students to get through the difficult features of Newman's thought. By proceeding through Newman's most enduring works chronologically, he can show the dramatic personal background and inner momentum that help to make sense of the cardinal's sometimes allusive style and his often cloaked polemical agenda - features that regularly make a deeper understanding of Newman quite elusive.

Author Biography

Mark A. McIntosh is Professor of Theology at Loyola University Chicago, USA. McIntosh has served as Chaplain to the House of Bishops of the Episcopal Church, USA and as Canon Theologian to the Presiding Bishop and Primate of the Episcopal Church. His monographs include The Blackwell Guide to Christian Theology (Blackwell, 2007), Discernment and Truth: The Spirituality and Theology of Knowledge (Crossroad/Herder, 2004), Mysteries of Faith (Cowley, 2000), Mystical Theology: The Integrity of Spirituality and Theology (Blackwell, 1998), and Christology from Within: Spirituality and the Incarnation in Hans Urs von Balthasar (Notre Dame, 1996; paper ed., 2000). He holds degrees in History and in Theology from Yale University, USA, the University of Oxford, UK, and the University of Chicago, USA.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1: "Newman's Reading and Reading NewmanChapter 2: "The Oxford Movement: Gazing into the Strange Mirror of History"Chapter 3: "Faith, Doubt, Reason, and the Mystery of the Holy"Chapter 4: "Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine"Chapter 5: "Newman the Novelist: A Theological Imagination"Chapter 6: "The Idea of a University"Chapter 7: "The Apologia as Guide to the Grammar of Assent"