The new ontology of meaning proposed by Fr Cornelius Ernst OP as a means of articulating the Thomistic synthesis in the idiom of the modern era coheres around ecclesiology. Drawing upon the linguistic philosophy of Ludwig Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations, Ernst sees meaning as the distinctively human praxis by which man ‘subdues’ and ‘transcends’ the world to which he belongs, thereby transposing it into the world that belongs to man. The Church, as the Body of Christ – who is personally the ontological meaning of history – is the distinctively Christian linguistic community of meaning, in which ultimate meaning – the ‘meaning of meaning’, i.e. God – is present in each successive era. Established in the illuminating event of Christ's incarnation, the Church is the sacramental institution that makes present Christ's re-integration of the plurality of human meanings, realising itself as a concrete community within the world, and realising the world authentically within itself. As the sacrament of the Trinitarian mediation of meaning, therefore, the Church is irreducibly both human institution and mystical communion, serving as the ontological a priori of faith, and thus the authentic locus of Christian theology.

Music, and particularly song, is an act of love that has to be sustained in being by the love of the singer. Music also moves one to contemplate the Other. Hence it may be appropriated as an analogy for exploring the theology of creation as a sustained loving act of the Triune God. Building on Clement of Alexandria's image of Christ as the New Song, the analogy is further developed to explore the theology of the new creation, in which the gracious work of the sanctification of the human person is also a sustained loving act of the Holy Trinity. The end of this is that the Christian should become taken up into the New Song, and become part of it.

Introduction (And Abstract)

My reflections are rooted in the spiritual suffering of impasse experienced by women in today's Church. Against the background of Constance Fitzgerald's seminal article, “Impasse and Dark Night,” I will engage Edward Schillebeeckx's category of negative contrast experience in conjunction with what Beverly Lanzetta has named the via feminina to begin to envision what may be fermenting in this dark night. Then, moving from individual to communal contemplation, I will discuss the role of Critical Christian communities in Schillebeeckx's theology, with attention to his analysis of the cross-grained nature of Church history in which genuine tradition includes “breaks.” Finally, drawing on the experiences of “Circles of Women Seeking Wisdom” with which I am involved, I will examine how critical communities of women in the Church constitute a mysticism of resistance with potential for ecclesial transformation.

A defining moment for the Dominican Order was its defense of Thomas Aquinas. The General Chapters of Paris in 1286 and Saragossa in 1309 legislated that all friars promote and defend Thomas’ teachings. Surprisingly, however, little has been written of the contributions of Meister Eckhart to this critical debate. Eckhart was a renowned preacher, master of Paris, provincial of Saxony (1303–1311), and vicar for three master generals. This lecture will offer a brief survey of the controversy, exploring the values Dominicans found in Aquinas’ thought, and consider Eckhart's use of Aquinas. Finally I will indicate some themes in this debate that I believe are still valuable in contemporary Dominican studies.