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476 BOOK REVIEWS Soskice's essay, "Fides et ratio: The Postmodern Pope" (292-96), provides a brief and jaunty summary of the encyclical's main goals, with special interest in its analysis of our cultural malaise, mixed in equal parts of nihilism and despair, and in its recommendation to return philosophy to its large-scale interests in fundamental and final questions. A task for the future, one I have yet to see taken up with the energy it deserves in the now extensive literature on the encyclical, and certainly absent from this volume, is discussion of why none of the encyclical's exemplars of philosophy done well are taken from what is sometimes (misleadingly) called the Anglo-American analytical tradition. There is a tendency among Catholic philosophers to think that the only Egyptians who need to be despoiled are the phenomenological (Husserl, Scheler, Heidegger, and after) and hermeutical (Levinas, Ricoeur) ones; and that those best equipped to do the despoiling will always be Thomists of one stripe or another. The pope's own philosophical work shows that a rich harvest can be reaped in this way. But I suspect that there is more to be said about what the ratio evident in the work of philosophers (some Catholic and some very much not) such as Elizabeth Anscombe, Peter Geach, Michael Dummett, Philippa Foot, Alvin Plantinga, and Peter van lnwagen might have to offer to the tasks limned by Fides et ratio. It may be that the editors of this volume, being as I think English, are in a good position to take up that task in future volumes in this series. This is, then, a mixed bag, as are all such collections. Some of the individual contributions provide deep and useful insight into the encyclical and the issues it propounds. Yet the volume's truly distinctive {if somewhat puzzling) contrib~tion is the new translation it provides. University ofIllinois at Chicago Chicago, Illinois PAUL}. GRIFFITHS God, Evil, and Innocent Suffering: A Theological Reflection. By JOHN E. THIEL. New York: Crossroad Publishing Company, 2002. Pp. 192. $24.95 (paper). ISBN 0-8245-1928-0. The modern project known as "theodicy" has been with us a long time-at least since Leibniz's book ofthat title published in 1710. The theological appeal of this project is undeniable. No religious person wants to believe that his or her God is a monster who sends planes crashing into buildings or wills a child's death by cancer. On the other hand, theodicy's critics-and they have been many-have wondered if the price to be paid is too great. Is not the God of theodicy a rationalized deity, constructed according to human needs and purposes? Don't pious attempts to make sense of evil tend toward rendering it BOOK REVIEWS 477 tolerable? It is understandable if some prefer to endure the mystery of evil in faith, rather than offering blasphemous explanations for its existence. John Thiel's God, Evil, and Innocent Suffering is one long, determined effort to resist the temptations of theodicy. Thiel seeks to offer a theological account of evil and suffering that "move[s] within the language of scripture and tradition," its rationality governed by "the most basic Christian claims of faith" (3). At the same time, Thiel is not entirely happy with the ways in which the classical tradition has approached these issues. His book seeks to chart an alternative course within the tradition that can better address the mystery of evil. The key term of his inquiry is found in the book's title: innocent suffering. Thiel argues that for much of the tradition, there is really no such thing as innocent suffering. Augustine believed that most human suffering could be accounted for on the basis of the Fall. This theological answer reflects a deep religious urge to see God as just and loving. If innocent suffering exists, then God is indeed a monster; so if God has the character we attribute to him, then suffering cannot be innocent. As Thiel rightly says, "the denial of innocent suffering lets the Christian God be the Christian God" (12). But this orthodox explanation does not sit well with our experience...

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