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with this word. Thus the word is validated as the word because it touches and awakensthe silent, absolute truths of human existence.In light of this mystical understanding of the word, its absolute truth does not need to beargued: its mystical effect is its own validation and testimony. The nature of the mysticalvalidation of the word as experienced truth also implies the need for a mystagogicalprocess of biblical self-exploration and skilled direction. The truth of the word cannot, bythe very spiritual nature of the biblical text, be intellectually forced or emotionallyimposed on another. The Spirit-led, self-discovery of the absolute truth of one’s existencemay occur only in sacred space: the free interaction between the person and the wordthrough which God opens up his imminent Trinitarian being. This view clearly revealsthe Ignatian Rahner, and underlines why Rahner insisted, particularly in the latter stagesof his life, that the ongoing practice of the Exercises is important for the contemporaryChristian life.The incarnation of the wordRahner’s conviction is that the ultimate message from God must be embodied within areal person. The true and definitive ‘Word of God’ is not a verbal expression but theabsolute, whole-person communication of God by the act of going out of himself to theother (humanity) by actually becoming the other—in the person of Jesus Christ, God–humanbeing 33 . God gives himself fully to humanity in the life of Jesus Christ; Jesus, as ahuman being, gives himself fully to God in absolute surrender. On behalf of the whole ofhumanity Jesus ultimately fulfils the universal transcendent obligation and actualisation,the potentia oboedientialis 34 . On behalf of God, Jesus completes the work of ultimateontological and experiential unity between divinity and humanity. Human history is nowalso God’s history because God has entered time and space and has divinised and madesacred the mundane human journey. Humanity now has hope of true actualisation and33 K. Rahner, ‘The concept of mystery in Catholic theology’, Theological Investigations , Vol IV, Trans.Smyth , K. (London: Darton, Longman & Todd,1966), 112.34 Rahnerian transcendental terminology is discussed in the previous chapter on the experience of humanmystery.135
fulfilment in following the absolute self-giving of Jesus which triumphs over the commontemporal boundary of death and reaches towards the infinite horizon of eternal life 35 .Central to Rahner’s theology of the significance of embodied Word is the historicaldrama of the resurrection. The prophetic word—the discernment and public identificationof specific, one-off acts in history—is salvific in nature because these events address andresolve a particular question in relation to the major human existential angst: death as thebarrier to full meaning and actualisation. Ackley notes that Rahner views the resurrectionas the particular historical event thatsignals the definitive Word of God, the divine self-promise in both word and deedthat answers the radical question posed by death. The life and death of Jesus havesymbolic-sacramental significance for us in light of the resurrection as the sign ofGod’s salvific will that causes what it signifies 36 .Jesus is the ultimate, climactic Word of God: his resurrection speaks unequivocally tohumans as the validation of both the eternal nature of human being and God’s promisedwelcoming of humans into eternal life.Jesus is ‘both the definitive expression of God and the supreme fulfilment of humanity’ 37 .Human beings share in the ‘new miraculous humanity’ that Jesus inaugurates because theworld, created by God, has become God’s existential reality through Jesus’ interventionin human history. From the resurrection perspective, ‘God created the world andeverything in it with the possibility of being assumed by God to become the material foran Incarnation of the Word’ 38 . God has spoken the Word of his whole person through themedium of Jesus’ full participation in the human transcendental experience: Jesus hasbecome the absolute answer to human transcendental hopes, through the faithabandonmentof crucifixion, and the death-triumph of resurrection 39 .35 J. Ackley, The church of the word, 42-48.36 Ibid, 46.37 Ibid.38 Ibid, 48.39 For a fuller discussion of Rahner’s theological understanding of the salvific meaning of the death andresurrection of Christ see, J. O’Donnell, Karl Rahner – Life in the Spirit (Rome, Gregorian UniversityPress, 2004), 47-57 and in Rahner’s own words: ‘Interpreting and experiencing the words and deeds ofJesus today’ in Karl Rahner in dialogue, 231; K. Rahner, Prayers for a lifetime, Raffelt, A. ed. (Edinbugh:T & T Clark, 1984), 81.136
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‘A Spirituality of silence’An i
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Chapter 4: The human experience of
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Summary of thesis:This thesis offer
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The particular angle from which thi
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somewhat superseded by more recent
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Rahner: I have nothing against that
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One brief but notable spiritual inf
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dialectic between these two, has le
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odies of knowledge, history and alt
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superiors, having decided that he w
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High School Week, Rahner began his
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Earlier in this chapter, Rahner’s
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These anecdotes testify that Rahner
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As you see, at the top of the carto
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Central to Rahner’s thinking is t
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Kilby notes that in regard to this
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Introduced by Cardinal König to a
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influence will continue to spread a
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We see from Rahner’s pastoral con
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European power 4 , and that he was
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Over a period of days and weeks, th
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The outcome of this encounter: the
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Modras has pointed out that Ignatiu
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Rahner the Ignatian spiritual direc
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facilitate this joyful and liberati
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Rahner’s often-quoted comment tha
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The master of the Exercises in no w
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Endean argues that Rahner is interp
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The Ignatian Exercises—especially
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provision of appropriate spiritual
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their existential encounter, they a
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Chapter 3: Spirituality of silence
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which the spiritual pilgrim finds t
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Lord, to pray my whole life long wi
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Encounters with silence: strictures
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a long highway filled by a column o
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gaze; they prefer to stay safe, ris
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This experience is life’s true es
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Christians can experience the full
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Rahner does not claim for himself t
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example, it would limit God to say,
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will and love of God: then the diam
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Echoes of Ignatius’ Exercises are
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Chapter 4: The human experience of
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proximity, the silence that leads e
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‘listening to the freely proffere
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Level 1:PremoralStage 2:Instrumenta
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These new monastics see the local c
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eliefs that have been tried and tes
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of mature theological reflection co
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ecognised in his Christological ass
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inability or unwillingness of the e
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Kanyini—an Australian Aboriginal
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The film Kanyini demonstrates the c
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estless and always in a hurry to ge
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considered the sole and ultimate au
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We define spirituality as a conscio
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supportive conversation with expres
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A glance at table 4 75 (above), Hug
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In the worldview of contemporary Au
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It certainly seems somewhat disinge
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A good starting point for examining
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Christian contemplative-prayer trad
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Of course, a small number of the vi
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For better or for worse, and despit
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energy, intellect, prayer, love and
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Rahner, K. Karl Rahner - Prayers an
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Kelly, G.B. (ed.). Karl Rahner - th
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Van Vorst, B. ‘Kung and Rahner: d
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Harden, J.A. ‘Ignatian Spirituali
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Tyson, P. ‘Contemporary Australia
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