Döllinger’s attempt at mediating between humanistic concerns and Roman
Catholic ecclesial interests in defining the purpose of higher education holds
important lessons for our day.
Chapter 12 concludes the volume with Russell Hittinger’s analysis of Jean
Paul II’s humanistic theology, which affirms the importance of Christian
humanist ideals for modern society. Pope John Paul’s essential humanist
convictions, his Christological anthropology, and reason–faith synthesis
played a key role in diagnosing the central malaise of modernity, namely a
distorted view of humanity’s nature and purpose. Building on John Paul’s
analysis, Hittinger argues that only Christian anthropology is able to redirect
and ameliorate the distorted humanism of modernity.
As the different confessional affiliations of our authors indicate, the
re-envisioning of Christian humanism intended with this book is conducted
ecumenically, drawing on Eastern-Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Anglican,
Reformed, and more broadly evangelical perspectives, to demonstrate that
Christian humanism is the common expression of Christianity in all of its
various manifestations. Aside from the contributors to this volume, a number
of agencies and individuals have helped in the production of this work.
My thanks go to my faculty colleagues at Trinity Western University for
their support of the original lecture series behind this book, which would
have been impossible without thefinancial support of the Canadian Research
Council via the Canada Research Chair for Interpretation, Religion, and
Culture. Thanks are due also to my research assistant Natalie Boldt for her
tireless help with this volume, to Stephen Dunning for improving its quality,
and to my editors Tom Perridge and Karen Raith at Oxford University Press
for their efforts in seeing it published.
Introduction 15