Vierteljahresschrift für das Gesamtgebiet der katholischen Theologie
Begründet von Kardinal Leo Scheffczyk • ISSN 0178-1626
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Abstract

Veit Neumann:
The Tamed Magic of the Word
Are Theologians the Better Writers?
(FKTh 2014-2, p. 99–112)

Theologians and authors alike are joint by the problematic exposure to language. Though either of both admittedly have to deal with the dynamic (the “magic”) of the word in a different manner. For the author, the appropriate word must be capable of interpreting existence and thus alleviate existence, however without being technocratically strangulating or dissolving the boundaries of “magic”. For the theologian word has the function of being the carrier of insight into faith. The difficulty of the dynamic of the word – that all great things are and are not made – can be dissolved in the Marian stance of “allowing all things to take their course”: “Be it done to me according to Your word”. As it appears, theologians could be the better authors, the road to that goal is a long one though: Theologians could in many ways make existence more accessible, whilst authors, due to their tendency to bourgeois literary writing, conceive words as the symbol for the need for salvation. To begin with we must address the way pastoral care and theology deal with words, which have a reciprocal effect. Earnest criticism would have practical consequences: Raised awareness of dealing with words in academic studies; for formation in preaching, pastoral care courses and prayer. One should also note though, that many an author is equally affected by the religious quest to elucidation of existence.

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