Authenticity and Christian Personalism

Eduardo J. Echeverría Authenticity and Christian Personalism The dignity of man rests above all on the fact that he is called to communion with God. Such dignity is grounded and brought to perfection in God.The truth is diat only in die mystery ofthe incarnateWord does die mystery ofman in reality become clear. ' According to CharlesTaylor, at the heart ofmodern culture and society is the fundamental notion ofindividualism, ofself-fulfillment and self-realization.2 For decades now this notion has been the subject ofvigorous debate among philosophers, theologians, and social, cultural, and political theorists. In particular, for many, individualism and its offshoots of subjectivism and relativism have severely weakened the moral, cultural, and social foundations ofthe free societies. At least this is how its critics, its "knockers," asTaylor calls tiiem, see individualism and its implications for human life and meaning. "Individualism involves a centering on the selfand a concomitant shutting out, or even unawareness, ofgreater issues or concerns that transcend the self, be diey religious, political, historical. As a consequence, life is narrowed or flattened" (Taylor 1 99 1 : 14). logos 2:4 fall 1999 98 LOGOS By contrast, the supporters of individualism, its "boosters," as Taylor calls them, see individualism as "the finest achievement of modern civilization" (Taylor 1991 :2). This is simply because it has meant an expansion offreedom, ofself-determination, ofchoice, of self-expression. "We live in a world where people have a right to choose for themselves their own pattern of life, to decide in conscience what convictions to espouse, to determine the shape oftheir lives in a whole host of ways that their ancestors couldn't control" (Taylor 1991:2). InTaylor's outlook, boosters and knockers are both correct. Individualism is not an unambiguously good thing; it is a mixture of much that is admirable and much that is debased.Taylor's assessment of individualism has, however, merits of its own worth examining. He attempts to retrieve the moral ideal ofaufhenticity, asTaylor calls it, which he says is the driving moral force behind individualism and its related goals ofself-fulfillment or self-realization. Retrieving this ideal, saysTaylor, will help us "to see that the issue is not how much ofa price in bad consequences you have to pay for the positive fruits [of individualism], but rather how to steer these developments towards their greater promise and avoid the slide into the debased forms" (Taylor 1 99 1 : 1 1—1 2). Will the moral ideal of audienticity help us to avoid the slide to the debased forms of individualism? Quite simply, will it help stop freedom from deteriorating into a license to do whatever we like? This is the critical question before us now, and my analysis ofTaylor's view will serve as a foil to Jacques Maritain's Christian personalism. My analysis asks, first, what is, according to Taylor, the moral ideal ofauthenticity? Second, I consider his criticisms ofthis ideal's slide to a radical anthropocentrism, relativism, subjectivism, and other debased forms ofauthenticity.Third, I ask whether he is right in claiming that this moral ideal will help to accomplish his stated goal of distinguishing deviant and legitimate expressions of this ideal. AUTHENTICITY AND CHRISTIAN PERSONALISM In my short analysis of his views, I argue that Taylor is really working with two ideals ofauthenticity. One ideal exalts self-determining freedom to an absolute autonomy and subverts the very conditions in human life essential to attaining our true and full humanity. In short, there is no self-transcendence in this ideal of aufhenticity. The dignity of human beings lies in their autonomy and self-sufficiency , responsive to and indebted to none but themselves. Taylor rejects diis interpretation ofthe ideal and opts for a second ideal of authenticity where the idea ofself-transcendence is central to achieving our authenticity. I agree with this second interpretation and the concomitant idea ofresponsible freedom underlying it. Yet Taylor's criticism of die first ideal does not get at its root problem—detaching human freedom from its essential and constitutive relationship to truth. Following this brief analysis ofTaylor's views, I argue that the Christian personalism of Jacques Maritain does manage, among other things, to show that the order...