Two Prosōpa, one Prosōpon; the Christology of Nestorius of Constantinople

This paper will outline the controversy of Nestorius versus Cyril concerning the enumeration of persons in the Incarnate Christ. Key terms of the debate will be identified with the aim of establishing their meaning according to Nestorius. It will then be argued that Nestorius of the Bazaar remained committed to the basic tenets of orthodox Christianity as his commitment to true and complete natures (fully God, fully man), a single unified subject (a single Person in Christ), and a mutual use of attributes formed the basis of his Christology, even if their theological reconciliation came short of a complete and perfect synthesis.

Divine Impassibility: A Comparison of Weinandy's and Culpepper's Perspectives on Whether God Suffers

From being generally regarded as a philosophical and theological impossibility, since the late nineteenth century the idea that God suffers has become popular and attractive among a vast array of Christian theologians. Due to this shift, many theologians no longer see the need to argue for it and divine passibility has even been called the ‘new orthodoxy.’ The matter has not yet been laid to rest and is made more complex because the terms ‘suffering’ and ‘impassibility’ are used with a variety of connotations. At the heart of the debate is the desire to assert God’s personalised love for all human beings. If suffering is intrinsic to love, as some ‘passibilists’ state, only a suffering God can also be a God who loves humankind absolutely and unconditionally. Also at stake is the salvation of human beings. For some, a suffering God necessarily implies His lack of transcendence and thus His impotence. From their perspective, Jesus suffers only in His humanity. The divine attributes of omnipotence and immutability are wholly unaffected by the crucifixion. For others, the intimacy of the hypostatic union makes it possible to attribute suffering to the Son in His divinity. Furthermore, by deciding to grant free will to humankind, God makes Himself vulnerable; the eternal knowledge of the divine permission for evil establishes an ‘eternal wound’ in God. This essay will examine the contrasting positions of Thomas Weinandy and Gary Culpepper to assess how it can be said that God must or must not suffer.

Applying Deontology to Determine What Ought to be Done

This paper will broadly outline the theory of deontology with a specific focus on how the categorical imperative can be applied in moral decision making. The theory will then be applied to an issue to determine what course of action is consistent with the theory. Two strengths and two weaknesses that can be found in the literature will be considered and how the theory of deontology can be applied in a future teaching career to make ethical decisions will be discussed.

Kuhn the Contextualist?

According to Kuhn’s account of the nature of scientific paradigms, how one experiences the world varies drastically from one context to another depending on the accepted paradigm of the context in question. In other words, one’s pre-existing conceptual structure concerning the world not only acts as an epistemological framework for its possible understanding, but also fundamentally affects the phenomenological observations of the world as something; this latter function of the conceptual structure motivates the view that mature scientific paradigms/theories and the data of scientific observation/experimentation are essentially two sides of the same coin. What is interesting, then, is that even between different historical eras that generally regarded the world in clearly incompatible ways, albeit still informed by paradigms, Kuhn still attributes scientific knowledge to each. To make sense of this, the explanatory resources of epistemological contextualism are used to specify potentially one way in which epistemic standards for knowledge must change between different historical eras for one to justifiably claim scientific knowledge within these different contexts. As we shall see, the argument for Kuhn’s account of paradigm being contextualist in character is apparently best made through the notion of doubt-driven context-shifts as actualising change in the form of P between different contexts in which “S knows that P” is asserted. As such, this paper first explores Kuhn’s account of scientific knowledge and paradigms before considering how the account can be considered contextualist in nature. Moreover, other context-concerned systems, such as Traditional, and Subject-Sensitive Invariantism, are briefly investigated to substantiate claims of what cannot be accurately ascribed to Kuhn’s epistemology.

Why is Love Considered the Greatest of the Theological Virtues?

This paper will, after providing a succinct yet necessary definition of Christian caritas, offer three reasons for why love is considered to be the greatest of the theological virtues. First, upon attainment of eternal beatitude in heaven, caritas is not abandoned like faith and hope, but finds it fulfillment. Secondly, caritas is the only theological virtue which is chiefly concerned with the salvation of one’s neighbour. And thirdly, caritas enables man to live out the commandments of God in their fullness, thereby beginning the process of his divinization.

In Defence of Moral Realism: Examining Harry J. Gensler’s Critique of Cultural Relativism and Subjectivism

This paper will explore the nature of morality by providing a critique of cultural relativism and subjectivism and then arguing that moral realism provides a more coherent account of the nature of morality. The claim that moral realism provides a more coherent account of the nature of morality than cultural relativism or subjectivism is based on the arguments from moral progress, moral disagreement and moral semantics; and moral experience.

An Examination of the Significance of the Trinitarian Theology of St. Augustine

Despite the noble efforts of modern Christian theologians in attempting to revive popular level interest in the classical Christian doctrine of the Trinity, there has been within the everyday praxis of the individual Christian a discernible neglect and ignorance of this cardinal doctrine. However, with the 20th century advent of Freudian and Jungian psychology, a new opportunity has arisen for a Trinitarian revival in the popular consciousness of the faithful. Due to an increasing level of interest in the notion of understanding the conscious and unconscious cognitive processes that govern the human psyche, there arose an indubitable opportunity for a re-examination of the Trinitarian theology of those writers who based their Trinitarian discourse upon the self-consciousness of man as created in the image of God. Therefore, the essential function of this paper is to explore the Trinitarian theology of St. Augustine, who being the originator of psychological analogies in Trinitarian discourse warrants exceptional contemporary interest given the aforementioned increased receptivity to psychological self-awareness.

The Taste and Perfume of the Virgin: Mary and the Nuptial Meaning of Eucharistic Sacramentality

If we are to understand the Eucharist as the Body of Christ, it is necessary to explore how Mary’s own body participates in the Eucharistic mystery. Such a discussion was prominent during the Middle Ages, but today there is very little attention given to the relationship between Mary and the the Eucharist. This paper will explore this subject through the lens of a theology of the sacramental principle. By examining recent papal documents as well as John Paul II’s Theology of the Body, this paper will argue that Mary is the perfect fulfilment of the sacramental principle. The sacramental principle fulfilled is a principle that is nuptial, where the Eucharist expresses the wedding point between God and creation. It is Mary who unveils this mystery in her own person and body.

Contrasting Two Ideas of the Human Person, Social Constructionism and Realism, by Their Similarities in Idolatry and Iconography

This essay will seek to contrast two ideas of human person, social constructionism and realism, through assessing similarities found in their aesthetic notions of idolatry and iconography, respectively. The essay will explore Michel Foucault’s social constructionism and Aristotle’s realism; in particular, how their ontological conclusion stems from their epistemological framework. The essay will consider what is meant by iconography and idolatry, relying on Jean-Luc Marion’s God Without Being[1] to show how idolatry mirrors social constructionism and how iconography mirrors realism, evincing the contrast between them