Creative Fidelity

by Gabriel Marcel, Robert Rosthal (Introduction), Merold Westphal (Preface)

These lectures and essays were regarded by Marcel as the best introduction to his thought. Creative Fidelity not only deals with perennial themes of faith, fidelity, belief, incarnate being, and participation, but also includes chapters on religious tolerance and orthodoxy and an important critical essay on Karl Jaspers.

Genres: Philosophy, Religion

261 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1964

About the author

Gabriel Marcel (1889–1973) was a philosopher, drama critic, playwright and musician. He converted to Catholicism in 1929 and his philosophy was later described as “Christian Existentialism” (most famously in Jean-Paul Sartre's “Existentialism is a Humanism”) a term he initially endorsed but later repudiated. In addition to his numerous philosophical publications, he was the author of some thirty dramatic works. Marcel gave the Gifford Lectures in Aberdeen in 1949–1950, which appeared in print as the two-volume The Mystery of Being, and the William James Lectures at Harvard in 1961–1962, which were collected and published as The Existential Background of Human Dignity.

Reviews

[Mason Kelso]

While most think of Sartre, De Beauvior, and Camus when speaking of 20th century French existentialism, Gabriel Marcel was an open challenger to the secular philosophy of his day. From his phenomenology to his metaphysics, he is egregiously underrated and often overlooked in existentialist circles. In my opinion, Creative Fidelity is a necessary reading in order to understand the contrast between Christian and atheistic existentialism. Marcel's concept of continual fidelity to the other, or the "Thou", in the face of personal autonomy is beneficial for understanding the full scope of options for those struggling with life's absurdity and interpersonal connections.

[Erik]

Recommended by James Schall in Another Sort of Learning, Chapter 15, as one of Fourteen Books on the Value and Defense of Human Life.

[David Tye]

Marcel's notion of "creative fidelity" is the principle on which I have tried to live out my married life. This is a very deep meditation on the meaning of promise.