Abstract

These two handsome tomes, printed in double columns and bound with German thoroughness, introduce an impressive survey of the basic themes of Christian theology, which will be completed in six volumes and published simultaneously in five other European languages. A set of systematic essays in alphabetical order, they are translated from the original texts of expert contributors for whom the Catholic tradition of theological thinking has been expanded by Vatican Council II beyond a juridically controlled scholasticism and whose broadly concordant views do not exclude individual differences in articulating individual problems. The disciplined study today of the authentic sources of Christian truth is salted with an unsanctimonious awareness of the personal problems posed by life and thought in a changing world. The Editors’ General Preface confesses that present-day developments in theological investigation may be characterized as.