Preface to the English Edition

Th e Metamorphosis of Finitude is part of a “triptych” of books. It was pre- ceded by Le Passeur de Gethsémani (Th e Guide to Gethsemane) and is fol- lowed by Les Noces de l’Agneau (Th e Nuptials of the Lamb). What runs through all three books is the conviction that the theologi- cal truths of the Easter Triduum (the Passion, the Resurrection, and the Eucharist) need to be examined in the light of philosophical experience (agony, birth, and the body). French phenomenology, which has long been important in France, and is perhaps even better known on the other side of the Atlantic, has been a great help in this respect. But it has not been a question of following one particular current of thought, if indeed phe- nomenology can be regarded as a current of thought. Th e new, in philoso- phy as in theology, cannot be formulated except insofar as it arises from what was there before. Th at is why we need to make our way through tradition—and take full account of it—in trying to say what the resurrec- tion could mean for us today. We must, however, take care. My “philosophical triduum” is not ad- dressed solely to philosophers, theologians, or even just to believers. Th e basic statements of Christianity are also part of the unfolding of a more general culture. If we forget that, we risk losing our rootedness in the old Europe, as much as in what became the New World and its continent. Th e challenge for Christian philosophy is not just to make it possible to believe Christian dogma but also and above all to make it credible. What it tells us, in particular here concerning the act of resurrection or of “rebirth,” is

ix not simply that we need to “believe” in it but also that we will come to “know” it. Past centuries have spent a good deal of energy in unfl agging attempts to formulate the resurrection, for their own time and with their own concepts (see, e.g., Irenaeus, Tertullian, St. Augustine, St. Th omas Aquinas, St Bonaventure). It would be strange today if we were to abandon this struggle for our own era simply because Christianity is more and more threatened, or because it is seen in some quarters as passé. Th e philosopher is found today in a new role, a challenging one for some readers certainly, but also a reassuring one for others. We can say that the era of the “philosophy of the threshold”—a philosophy that held itself back in the entrance porch of theology on the pretext that the phi- losopher is not a theologian—is today over and done with. It was certainly the strength of Bergson, Blondel, or Scheler, and even of Gabriel Marcel or Paul Ricœur, that they held back from theologizing, albeit leaving it to others to develop as theologians what they had not themselves considered (the mystery of the spiritual, for example, that Henri de Lubac was to de- velop from Maurice Blondel). Today, however, and particularly in France, the frontiers have apparently shifted, so that it has become important to reexamine one’s position. It has at last become possible, at least in certain places and in certain circumstances, to describe oneself as “at the same time” philosopher and theologian, and to take on due responsibility for such a claim. Th e fact is that anyone who does philosophy, anyone who takes philosophy as her or his employment, knows where and when phi- losophy is being done, particularly once she or he starts to theologize. Th e paradox remains: Th e more we do of philosophy, the better the theology. And this is true precisely as one comes to know or understand what can go together in the same book of philosophy and of theology. Th e real distinction to be made between philosophy and theology does not lie in a separation between works devoted specifi cally to their disci- plines according to a separation of the corpus that is only too familiar in French phenomenology. It lies in the “joint practice” of the one with the other, where we are all the better assured of their diff erences because they are acknowledged throughout. What follows, then, for the reader of English in this book, is the transla- tion of my Métamorphose de la Finitude—Th e Metamorphosis of Finitude. A reading of it should lead to the core, if not of all the mysteries of faith and its philosophical or theological formulations, at least to that of my “triptych.” Metamorphosis of Finitude (on birth and resurrection) can stand independently of Le Passeur de Gethsémani (anguish, suff ering, and death) and Th e Nuptials of the Lamb (the body and the Eucharist). Th e book was conceived and written so that it could also be read alone, taking up and x ■ Preface to the English Edition redeploying a “summary of fi nitude” as the horizon for a possible trans- formation through resurrection. Th e reader of the present book need not be too concerned with what went before and what comes after—albeit the translation and publication in English of the two other wings of the “triptych” is projected to follow this one. It is hoped that readers can sim- ply follow the path of the author, forging their way with reference to their own experience of life, as the writer has done before them, in the unfailing belief that the act of reading is a shared act of existence. A reading is shared between writer and reader certainly, but also perhaps with Him whose “metamorphosis” emerges as the turning point of Christianity—a notion at the heart of the present book. Th ere would not be any reading without an act of passage, of trans- fer, and of transmission—an act that in this case is allowed to us by the translation. Th e teacher and translator George Hughes has enthusiastically taken on the project of translating my book. He has not only rendered it accessible to anglophone readers but also brought out its strengths, which are grounded in personal experience as much as in the rigor of the reason- ing. Th e journey made by the author through the problems of fi nitude and resurrection was one that his translator was to undertake with him. I should like here to record my due thanks to my translator, in words that are inadequate to describe the friendship we share.

Mettray,  May,  Emmanuel Falque Dean of the Faculty of Philosophy Th e Catholic Institute of Paris

Preface to the English Edition ■ xi