Either relational contact with God is seen to be existentially attainable or God will become
increasingly irrelevant to contemporary society. For Church identity and effectiveness as she
serves the world, it is vital that God's initiating power can be seen to impact on this world.
As response to fourteen symptoms the Church faces as 'crises,' an inclusive hermeneutic
seeks fresh categories for a foundational spirituality capable of catalysing reform and
transformation. This comprehensive foundational hermeneutic hypothesised is grounded on
three foundational categories of experience, relationality and spiritual intuition. Any reception
of such transcendence has to occur subjectively ‘in experience.’ Evasive as it is, experience
is posited as a foundational category that needs to be rehabilitated through fundamental
philosophy and theology, as well as interdisciplinary explorations. It will be shown that the
challenges facing the contemporary Church are rooted in lost experience of transcendence.
However the entry point experience provides is never to become narcissistically selfreferential
but aims to establish a reciprocal relationship in faith. As an overarching category,
dynamic relationality will need to be socially transformative. The deep 'God-person' relational
mode, as it synthesises both human capacities and spiritual faculties, is experienced
interiorly and as such is called spiritual intuition. It is argued that the notion of, and capacity
for, intuition has been widely ignored and eroded. It is demonstrated that a 'reasonable
intuition' is a more synthetic faculty 'naturally' open to illumination and infusion by the Spirit
than an excessive traditional Church reliance on the workings of reason-intellect. Here the
witness of the life of St Francis of Assisi allows simpler and accessible entry into the
categories of affective experience and spiritual intuition under overarching relationality.
Francis as model, when compared to other Saints, substantiates the three foundational
categories. The conclusion chapter tests the foundational theory as it is applied to the
fourteen challenges the Church faces. The results of this study, and its applications, offer a
promising, fruitful humble metaphysic as 'solution' for the ‘Church in the world’ much in line
with Pope Francis' recent approaches. / Christian Spirituality, Church History and Missiology / D. Th. (Christian Spirituality)
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:unisa/oai:uir.unisa.ac.za:10500/19100 |
| Date | 06 1900 |
| Creators | Thönissen, Cornelis Jacques |
| Contributors | Lombaard, Christo |
| Source Sets | South African National ETD Portal |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Format | 1 online resource (xviii, 680 leaves) |
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