Learning Outcomes
Upon completion of this course, students should be able to:
-Record contemporary literature
-Compare relationships of different points of view that are expressed in terms of understanding the religious phenomenon
-Approach critically and based on Orthodox theology principles some views related to understanding the religious phenomenon
-Aknowledge and value onto-theology significane within the context of science of Theology
Course Content (Syllabus)
Onto-theology is the main axis-terminoloy of this course. This mode of theology values the enypostatic assembly of knowledge with experience in the open body of the Word of God as expressed in the patristic tradition and as such, it can be present today in dialoge.
The enypostatic incarnation of the Word of God is considered to be the center for the integration of human individualities. In the dialogue of religions, the "enypostaton" gets a new meaning, implying that there is no human nature that is religiously non-existent, as far as the metaphysical element in humans is inherently obvious and universally accepted.
The issue of the exclusivity of monotheism is a great concern among western theologians, such as J. Ratzinger and H. Vorgrimler, who stand critically against the phenomenon of religious pluralism, in particular against the reduction of Christian completeness, as far as the person of Christ is regarded.
The text of the Roman Catholic Church Dominus Jesus and its opposition to the theory of religious relativism are also examined. The comprehensive pluralism of theologizing in Orthodoxy with main reference to the open divine-human body, that embraces the whole humanity called, is the meeting point of religiosity with en-christianized theology. This genuine paradoxical theology, that is examined in this course, sets as a reference point to the affectation of humanity by the en-naturalized (in it) God-man, which remains even today the most beneficial universal mystery.
Finally, the proposal of the course could be concentrated on the fact that the holy spiritual "ontology of patristic theology" is sought after by contemporary religiosity too, as far as the believers continuously manage, in a ascetic way, their co-enypostatic concurrence in the catholic place of ecumenical God-humanity and not the division and lack of freedom of man and their world.
Additional bibliography for study
P. MISCHE-M. MERKLING, Global Civilisation? Τhe Contribution of Religions, New York, 2001.
L. BOFF, Holy Trini-ty, Perfect Community, Maryknoll NY, Orbis, 2000.
M. LΑCUGNA, God For Us: The Trinity and Christian Life, New York, NY: Hartper Collins 1991.
Th. J. SCIRGHI, The Trinity: A Model for Belonging in Contemporary Society, in: The Ecumeni-cal Review 54 (2002) σ. 333-342.