Thinking about Thinking: What Kind of Conversation is Philosophy?

8. The Universality of a Christian Philosophy

123 e i g h t The Universality of a Christian Philosophy Two central questions that I will engage in this chapter are: (1) To what extent is philosophy necessarily universal? And (2) does the philosophy of those who belong to the worldwide community of Christians (the Catholica) distinguish itself in this respect? Beginning with some remarks about the universality of philosophy, I must then also consider the relationship between philosophy and faith, and I will do this by focusing especially on its Christian versions. I will argue (1) that Christian philosophers are necessarily influenced by their faith and (2) that the authenticity of Christian philosophers is not endangered by their faith commitment. universality The universality of philosophy can be approached from various angles , such as its subject matter (what are the material and the formal objects of philosophy?), its claim (are its statements universally valid?), its audience (to whom should philosophers speak?), the thinker (from which stance and in the name of whom does a philosopher speak?), 124 The Universality of a Christian Philosophy its method (must a philosopher be guided by experiences, principles, and a logic that are available and acceptable to all people?), its language (in which language—Greek, Latin, German, English, French, Italian, Chinese, or other—must a philosopher speak or write?), and the soil from which it emerges. It is not difficult to add several other angles of approach, such as the context in space and time, the expectations a philosophy raises, the limits it cannot surpass, and so on. However, I will not try to be complete in my attention to certain aspects and conditions that may be responsible for the extent to which philosophy is universal or not. But faith deserves special attention, because it has such a profound impact on the entire life of the faithful, including those who dedicate themselves to the praxis of thought. Is faith an impediment or an incentive, or is it indifferent with regard to the universality of an authentic philosophy? the subject matter of philosophy Western philosophy emerged from amazement about the cosmos as composed of parts and elements in amazing connections and movements . Parmenides and Heraklitos tried to understand how all things (ta panta) form one whole (to pan) while being related to one unifying principle (e.g., einai, the logos, Moira, movement, polemos, to hen) that also differentiates them. Throughout its history, philosophy has maintained this all-encompassing character. Clear examples are to be found in the programs and systems that were presented by modern thinkers from Descartes and Spinoza to Fichte and Hegel, but even postmoderns who insist on the fragmentation and differential pulverization of human thought continue to extend their thinking to the ultimate horizon of the universe in which we live. True, the claims of philosophy have never included all the details of the universe—in fact, they have become even more modest since abandoning many issues to the sciences—yet philosophy continues to search for the all-encompassing and basic principles and the ultimate limits of all that is. The universal and unifying character of philosophy seems to belong to its essence. The Universality of a Christian Philosophy 125 philosophy’s claim Philosophy claims to speak the truth when it states its theses as valid for all human individuals and communities. History, hermeneutics, and cultural relativism have shaken our confidence in our ability to capture universally valid truths, but we still teach and publish our findings as worthy of being known by anybody who can read, and we still try to convince students and colleagues that at least some of our statements are valid for everyone. If we are doubtful about certain theses or if we accept amendments, we implicitly agree that our convictions are judged by the truth itself, whose verdicts should be accepted by all who genuinely seek the truth. Perhaps we are more intensely aware than past generations that all philosophies are conditioned by inherited, communitarian, cultural , and personal biases, but even so we cannot stop considering them to be biases with regard to the unbiased truth, which keeps us searching for it. We consider all those biases to be particular and partial—albeit bent or contaminated—modes of access to the one genuine and overall truth, which gathers its friends through affinities that connect their theoretical approaches. Such a view is justified if we may postulate that the truth...