The Human Person and a Culture of Freedom

American Maritain Association Publications

by Peter A. Pagan Aguiar And Terese Auer

Twenty-first-century society faces profound challenges, and the future seems anything but secure. The rapid advance of technology has far outpaced mankind's moral and religious development. There is greater material wealth now than in past centuries, yet poverty remains an international problem. Wars persist and global peace seems increasingly unattainable as terrorism and civil strife become more prevalent. Numerous forms of entertainment made possible by modern industrialization and technology divert attention away from the things that really matter and invert the objective hierarchy of values. Underlying all these threats to the foundations of civilization one can find one or another theoretical conception of man and human freedom.

This volume presents a rich and diverse collection of essays on the theoretical foundations of human freedom. From several distinct perspectives, the authors examine various aspects of the deeper anthropological questions at the root of a number of critical social challenges confronting modernity. Readers interested in educational theory, church and state, the nature of love and friendship, questions of authority and the common good, law and human rights, and virtue theory and the various types of freedom will find this collection of special interest.

Contributors Montague Brown, Romanus Cessario, O.P., Gavin Colvert, John Conley, S.J., John Cuddeback, Christopher Cullen, S.J., Raymond Dennehy, Heather Erb, Desmond Fitzgerald, Francis Cardinal George, O.M.I., Carson Holloway, Brian Hughes, Piotr Jaroszynski, David Klassen, Steven Long, Ralph Nelson, Alice Ramos, and James V. Schall, S.J.

ABOUT THE

Peter A. Pagan Aguiar is professor of philosophy at Aquinas College in Nashville. His articles have appeared in The Thomist, National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly, and in previous volumes published by the American Maritain Association. Terese Auer, O.P., is a member of the Dominican Sisters of St. Cecilia Congregation in Nashville. She holds a Ph.D. in philosophy from the Center for Thomistic Studies at the University of St. Thomas, Houston. She has taught at the high school and college levels for the past 30 years and currently chairs the bioethics department at Pope John Paul the Great Catholic High School in Dumfries, Virginia.

312 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2009

Reviews

[Steve · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not for the faint of heart or the untrained philosopher/theologian. Several of the essays rely on significant previous familiarity with philosophy and philosophers, and in a very limited band consisting primarily of Aristotle, Aquinas, and of course Jacques Maritain (it is published by the American Maritain Association). Similarly, the thinking and sources are unabashedly Roman Catholic. That is fine if one is a Roman Catholic, but the lack of engagement with the larger world of thinking around issues of human freedom, even with other Christian viewpoints, ends up being a deficiency in the book. The focus, almost obsession, with abortion in the final few essays leaves one wondering about the myriad of other practical issues that could have also been addressed but were not (free speech vs hate speech, privacy and censorship in an online environment, protests and counter-protests, etc.). In the end, it felt like nothing more than the musings of a group of narrowly focused ecclesiastical specialists that have, to one extent or another, lost touch with how their thinking connects with the actual real world.