scholarly journals Gratia praesupponit naturam

Diacovensia ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 81.-93.
Author(s):  
Boris Vulić

In the article, the contemporary lack of representation of the axiom “grace presumes nature” is recognized as a providential opportunity for its renewal in theology and spirituality. After indicating some of the causes for neglecting this scholastic axiom, the second chapter interprets its theological interiority through an attempt to answer the inexhaustible question of the relationship of grace and nature. The third chapter brings further clarification through the axioms “grace does not destroy nature” and “grace perfects nature”. In analogy with Christ’s incarnation, it becomes apparent that nature, or creation, should always be understood in the perspective of grace, which is the first fact of the history of salvation. The restoration and deepening of these axioms contributes to linking the entire history of salvation, but also the history of theology and spirituality, and to a deeper understanding of what is truly natural and what is divine, graceful, and what as a gift and opportunity defines a man to the very foundation of his created nature.

2017 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 205-222
Author(s):  
Michael D. Terranova

In his deceptively simple, but really extremely rich, sonnet, “Why are wee by all Creatures waited on?”, John Donne uses all the tools of prosody available to him and plays with the English and Italian forms of the sonnet to give a rich meditation on the order of creation, the history of salvation, and the relationship of nature and grace. He begins with what seems an irenic scholastic discussion, asking why humans are able to subjugate elements and animals which are purer and stronger than they. In the third quatrain, however, he shifts to a deep moral plaint. At the same time, he interweaves the philosophical idea of the Great Chain of Being with the theological distinction between nature and grace. He does so by employing both the Italian and the English sonnet forms simultaneously. The Italian sonnet poses and then resolves the question about the order of nature, while the English sonnet takes the question of the order of nature up into the question of the order of redemption. In the final couplet, he goes beyond both the metaphysical question and the moral plaint by turning the reader's attention to the Incarnation, in which God subjects Himself to both that which is lower and that which is worse than Himself. In doing so Donne transforms the images he evokes in a poem surprisingly devoid of his typical metaphysical conceits into one sustained conceit which elicits in the reader a humble awe before the Divine condescension.


Author(s):  
Michael A. Gomez

This prologue provides an overview of the history of early and medieval West Africa. During this period, the rise of Islam, the relationship of women to political power, the growth and influence of the domestically enslaved, and the invention and evolution of empire were all unfolding. In contrast to notions of an early Africa timeless and unchanging in its social and cultural categories and conventions, here was a western Savannah and Sahel that from the third/ninth through the tenth/sixteenth centuries witnessed political innovation as well as the evolution of such mutually constitutive categories as race, slavery, ethnicity, caste, and gendered notions of power. By the period's end, these categories assume significations not unlike their more contemporary connotations. All of these transformations were engaged with the apparatus of the state and its progression from the city-state to the empire. The transition consistently featured minimalist notions of governance replicated by successive dynasties, providing a continuity of structure as a mechanism of legitimization. Replication had its limits, however, and would ultimately prove inadequate in addressing unforeseen challenges.


Author(s):  
Alexander Vatlin ◽  
Stephen A. Smith

The essay falls into two sections. The first examines the history of the Third International (Comintern) from its creation in 1919 to its dissolution in 1943, looking at the imposition of the Twenty-One Conditions on parties wishing to join the new International in 1920, the move from a perspective of splitting the labour movement to one of a united front in the early 1920s, the shift to the sectarian ‘third period’ strategy in 1928, and the gradual emergence of the popular front strategy in the mid-1930s. It examines the institutions of the Comintern and the Stalinization of national communist parties. The second section looks at some issues in the historiography of the Comintern, including the extent to which it was a tool of Soviet foreign policy, conflict over policy within the Executive Committee of the Comintern (ECCI), and the relationship of ECCI to ‘national sections’, with a particular focus on the Vietnamese Communist Party. Finally, it discusses problems of cultural and linguistic communication within the Comintern.


Author(s):  
Debra Parkes

Abstract This paper considers the role that litigation might play in ending the human rights crisis of solitary confinement in Canada while also examining the relationship of prisoner rights litigation to broader, anti-carceral social movements. The paper proceeds in four parts. The first section provides a brief overview of the widespread use of solitary confinement in Canada’s federal prisons and in provincial and territorial jails. Next, current litigation seeking an end to solitary confinement in the federal prisons system is located in the context of a long history of prisoner rights litigation in both the US and Canada. The third section considers the possibilities and challenges of pursuing prisoner rights litigation with broader critiques of the carceral state in mind. The paper ends with examples of anti-carceral lawyering efforts and identifies some elements of a prison abolitionist lawyering ethic.


Paleobiology ◽  
1980 ◽  
Vol 6 (02) ◽  
pp. 146-160 ◽  
Author(s):  
William A. Oliver

The Mesozoic-Cenozoic coral Order Scleractinia has been suggested to have originated or evolved (1) by direct descent from the Paleozoic Order Rugosa or (2) by the development of a skeleton in members of one of the anemone groups that probably have existed throughout Phanerozoic time. In spite of much work on the subject, advocates of the direct descent hypothesis have failed to find convincing evidence of this relationship. Critical points are:(1) Rugosan septal insertion is serial; Scleractinian insertion is cyclic; no intermediate stages have been demonstrated. Apparent intermediates are Scleractinia having bilateral cyclic insertion or teratological Rugosa.(2) There is convincing evidence that the skeletons of many Rugosa were calcitic and none are known to be or to have been aragonitic. In contrast, the skeletons of all living Scleractinia are aragonitic and there is evidence that fossil Scleractinia were aragonitic also. The mineralogic difference is almost certainly due to intrinsic biologic factors.(3) No early Triassic corals of either group are known. This fact is not compelling (by itself) but is important in connection with points 1 and 2, because, given direct descent, both changes took place during this only stage in the history of the two groups in which there are no known corals.


Author(s):  
Ted Geier

Covers the long history of the Smithfield animal market and legal reform in London. Shows the relationship of civic improvement tropes, including animal rights, to animal erasure in the form of new foodstuffs from distant meat production sites. The reduction of lives to commodities also informed public abasement of the butchers.


Author(s):  
Terence Young ◽  
Alan MacEachern ◽  
Lary Dilsaver

This essay explores the evolving international relationship of the two national park agencies that in 1968 began to offer joint training classes for protected-area managers from around the world. Within the British settler societies that dominated nineteenth century park-making, the United States’ National Park Service (NPS) and Canada’s National Parks Branch were the most closely linked and most frequently cooperative. Contrary to campfire myths and nationalist narratives, however, the relationship was not a one-way flow of information and motivation from the US to Canada. Indeed, the latter boasted a park bureaucracy before the NPS was established. The relationship of the two nations’ park leaders in the half century leading up to 1968 demonstrates the complexity of defining the influences on park management and its diffusion from one country to another.


1990 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 89-90
Author(s):  
Dennis Michael Warren

The late Dr. Fazlur Rahman, Harold H. Swift Distinguished Service Professor of Islamic Thought at the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, has written this book as number seven in the series on Health/Medicine and the Faith Traditions. This series has been sponsored as an interfaith program by The Park Ridge Center, an Institute for the study of health, faith, and ethics. Professor Rahman has stated that his study is "an attempt to portray the relationship of Islam as a system of faith and as a tradition to human health and health care: What value does Islam attach to human well-being-spiritual, mental, and physical-and what inspiration has it given Muslims to realize that value?" (xiii). Although he makes it quite clear that he has not attempted to write a history of medicine in Islam, readers will find considerable depth in his treatment of the historical development of medicine under the influence of Islamic traditions. The book begins with a general historical introduction to Islam, meant primarily for readers with limited background and understanding of Islam. Following the introduction are six chapters devoted to the concepts of wellness and illness in Islamic thought, the religious valuation of medicine in Islam, an overview of Prophetic Medicine, Islamic approaches to medical care and medical ethics, and the relationship of the concepts of birth, contraception, abortion, sexuality, and death to well-being in Islamic culture. The basis for Dr. Rahman's study rests on the explication of the concepts of well-being, illness, suffering, and destiny in the Islamic worldview. He describes Islam as a system of faith with strong traditions linking that faith with concepts of human health and systems for providing health care. He explains the value which Islam attaches to human spiritual, mental, and physical well-being. Aspects of spiritual medicine in the Islamic tradition are explained. The dietary Jaws and other orthodox restrictions are described as part of Prophetic Medicine. The religious valuation of medicine based on the Hadith is compared and contrasted with that found in the scientific medical tradition. The history of institutionalized medical care in the Islamic World is traced to awqaf, pious endowments used to support health services, hospices, mosques, and educational institutions. Dr. Rahman then describes the ...


Author(s):  
Andrey Varlamov ◽  
Vladimir Rimshin

Considered the issues of interaction between man and nature. Noted that this interaction is fundamental in the existence of modern civilization. The question of possible impact on nature and society with the aim of preserving the existence of human civilization. It is shown that the study of this issue goes towards the crea-tion of models of interaction between nature and man. Determining when building models is information about the interaction of man and nature. Considered information theory from the viewpoint of interaction between nature and man. Noted that currently information theory developed mainly as a mathematical theory. The issues of interaction of man and nature, the availability and existence of information in the material sys-tem is not studied. Indicates the link information with the energy terms control large flows of energy. For con-sideration of the interaction of man and nature proposed to use the theory of degradation. Graphs are pre-sented of the information in the history of human development. Reviewed charts of population growth. As a prediction it is proposed to use the simplest based on the theory of degradation. Consideration of the behav-ior of these dependencies led to the conclusion about the existence of communication energy and information as a feature of the degradation of energy. It justifies the existence of border life ( including humanity) at the point with maximum information. Shows the relationship of energy and time using potential energy.


Author(s):  
Cristina Vatulescu

This chapter approaches police records as a genre that gains from being considered in its relationships with other genres of writing. In particular, we will follow its long-standing relationship to detective fiction, the novel, and biography. Going further, the chapter emphasizes the intermedia character of police records not just in our time but also throughout their existence, indeed from their very origins. This approach opens to a more inclusive media history of police files. We will start with an analysis of the seminal late nineteenth-century French manuals prescribing the writing of a police file, the famous Bertillon-method manuals. We will then track their influence following their adoption nationally and internationally, with particular attention to the politics of their adoption in the colonies. We will also touch briefly on the relationship of early policing to other disciplines, such as anthropology and statistics, before moving to a closer look at its intersections with photography and literature.


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