Margarita Mooney, Ph.D. Professor of Practical Theology, Princeton Theological Seminary Founder and Executive Director, Scala Foundation Being Human in the Modern World: The Enduring Importance of the Idea of the Person Abigail Adams Institute Faculty Colloquium Dates: February 28 and 29, 2020 Cambridge, MA By Invitation—Please contact Margarita if you wish to know more about attending this colloquium. What do current political debates, cultural changes and institutional shifts have to do with debates about the very essence of what it means to be human? This seminar will consider important academics, theologians, and engaged social critics who all shared an enduring concern about affirming the dignity of each person while also affirming that our full human personhood develops through relationships characterized by self-giving, communities of virtue, and an opening our souls to divine transcendence. The common commitment to the person as a subject and object of free action, and the person as a center of meaning and value, and endowed with dignity by a creator inviolable nature of the person has translated into varying political and ethical projects of enormous significance in the 20th century. This colloquium will raise questions will focus on the nature of inter-subjectivity, communion and love; and the relationship between these questions and culture and politics in modernity, in particular debates on freedom, identity, authenticity, education and politics. Session I: Introduction to Personalism Personalism is a term used to refer to a philosophical approach to social and political questions that emphasize the inviolability of the person, the fundamental relationality of persons, and the person as a subject and object of free action, and the person as a center of meaning and value, and endowed with dignity by a creator and has the capacity for love and self-communication. The objectives of this first session are 1) to review the main ideas and thinkers associated with personalism broadly speaking; 2) to discuss why a personalist view of philosophical anthropology matters for modern culture and society; and 3) reflect on whether and how personalism is relevant to our work as teachers and scholars. In this session, we will read both the introductory and concluding chapter to the Burgos book on personalism and two recent popular pieces on personalism’s continuing relevance today. Burgos’s introduction to personalism is theoretically deep while covering a broad range of authors. His conclusion attempts to synthesize major currents in personalism, acknowledge major critiques, and argue for personalism’s continuing relevance in modern politics, society and culture. Brooks and Mooney discuss how personalism may form a response to the fragmentation in American culture and education. Juan Manuel Burgos, An Introduction to Personalism. The Catholic University of America Press. 2018. “Chapter 1: Origins” (pp. 1-30). What are the major similarities that lead one to identify a school of philosophy called personalism? If theistic commitment were so important to many personalists, must one be a theist to be a personalist? How might personalists respond to the critique that theism reduces man’s freedom by making him dependent on an external actor? What were some other philosophical schools of thought personalists were united in critiquing? If personalism arose as a response to liberal individualism and various forms of atheist revolutionary philosophy and politics (Marxism and communism), what are the major political movements or philosophical currents today that might explain the resurgence of interest in personalism? Juan Manuel Burgos, An Introduction to Personalism. The Catholic University of America Press. 2018. “Chapter 4: Personalist Philosophy: A Proposal” (pp. 178-233). What are some of the main criticisms of personalism? In spite of the weaknesses of personalism, why is the question of the human person particularly relevant for modernity? Is personalism too radical, or not radical enough in its critique of modernity? Should the biographies (religious commitments, political project, social engagements, etc.) of famous personalists become relevant to our assessment of the value of personalism for politics, culture and communities of faith today? David Brooks. “Personalism: The Philosophy We Need.” New York Times, Op-Ed page, June 14, 2018. (1 page) Margarita Mooney. “Being Human in the Modern World: Why Personalism Matters for Culture and Education.” Published by the online journal by Public Discourse, June 25, 2018. URL: http://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2018/06/21942/ (3 pages) Why do Brooks and Mooney think that personalist philosophy is relevant to American society? What might a person-centered view of education look like? Session II: Philosophical Anthropology and the Crisis of Modernity The objectives of this session are to: 1) to identify different understandings of philosophical anthropology in modernity; 2) consider some ways that those understandings of philosophical anthropology have impacted culture, politics, education, the family, and communities of faith; 3) understand the relationship between philosophical anthropology and the shift from divine transcendence to divine immanence; 4) to examine the result of a philosophical rejection of metaphysics on culture and politics. Max Scheler. “Man and History.” Chapter IV, pp. 65-93 in Philosophical Perspectives. Translated from the German by Oscar A. Haac. Boston: Beacon Press, 1958. (28 pages) According to Scheler, what are the five versions of philosophical anthropology at work in modern thinking? How do each of these views human interactions with other animals, God/the divine, and inanimate objects? Which of these five views of the person have come to dominate in particular fields of the university (economics, philosophy, humanities, natural sciences, etc.?) Are there other views of the human person we can identify today that are not mentioned? August Del Noce, Crisis of Modernity, Chapter 1 “The Idea of Modernity” pp. 1-18. Why is divine immanence and how is it different than divine transcendence? Why does del Noce think that the philosophy of modernity ends a denial of divine transcendence or metaphysics, and why was a shift from divine transcendence to divine immanence so significant for politics and culture? How are the political movements del Noce (not only political revolutionary movements but also the ascendance of scientific rationalism more generally) related to the shifting philosophical anthropology described by Scheler (in particular the shift from homo sapien to homo faber)? Why does del Noce think that so much of modern culture has been reduced to power struggles? Session III: Emmanuel Mounier Emmanuel Mounier was one of the leading French personalists (along with Jacques Maritain and Gabriel Marcel). Mounier was also one of the first to refer to himself as a personalist and publish a book with personalism in the title. The goal of this session to understand some of the political, cultural and social forces that personalists critiqued. In this session we also begin to ponder the relationship between subjectivity, inter-subjectivity, and freedom in social and political relationships. Emmanuel Mounier, Personalism. London: Routledge and Kegan, 1952. pp. “Informal Introduction to the Personal Universe,” (pp. vii-xx) “Embodied Existence”, (3-16) and “Communication,” (17-32); (45 pages) Juan Manuel Burgos, An Introduction to Personalism. The Catholic University of America Press. 2018. “Chapter 2: French Personalism” (pp. 64-84 on Emmanuel Mounier: Communitarian Personalism). (20 pages) Why does Mounier claim that personalism opposes determinism and idealism? What does Mounier mean we need to grasp man in his totality? What are some approaches to knowledge that can help us grasp man in his totality? What is Mounier’s view of the relationship between person, community and freedom? What kind of social progress or political order is compatible or incompatible with Mounier’s view of the person? According to Mounier, are there ways in which our nature as humans is weakened or diminished by our social relations or mis-use of freedom? If the person is ultimately fulfilled through communication with others—both inter-subjective and embodied, material forms of exchange—does that necessarily lead to socialism? In translating values into political action, does Mounier’s personalism open more doors to collectivism than to upholding individual freedom? It is possible to critique individualism without embracing a totalitarian form of collectivism or communitarianism? Session IV: Love, Identity and Being The goal of this session is to compare personalist thinkers on identity and love with other modern currents in philosophy, including existentialist and post-modernist views of the person, subjectivity and identity. Some general questions across the readings are: What is the relationship between self-love and self-giving or personalists and existentialists? Is there a difference between inter-subjectivity and inter-dependence? Is dependence on God radically different than inter-dependence among humans? How do inter-dependence and inter-subjectivity matter for social and political order? Dietrich von Hildebrand. The Nature of Love. Translated by John F. Crosby with John Henry Crosby. South Bend: St. Augustine’s Press. 2009. Pp. 203-208; 211. (6 pages) What are difference views of subjectivity in transcendent and immanent humanism, or theocentric versus egocentric (or anthropocentric)