When Tradition is Attacked

Throughout the society and within the Church we see the tradition that has been handed on being attacked and the call for emancipation is a radical call that is a frontal attack on the image of God within humanity. This is a real spiritual battle we have going on. What we see is our traditional value systems being unmasked and a rationalistic approach to the science of theology that refuses to live and work within the concept of mystery. So the result is only logical that man has to now become the creator of himself when he casts off tradition and churches do the very same when tradition is undermined and the job of recreating after one's own image is well underway. Where this happens in the life of the Church the result is that what has been true in the past must be recreated anew for the present and this is done according to preconceived designs by man's own rationalistic approach to theology. What this looks like is explained well by Pope Benedict in his book Principles of Catholic Theology. He reminds us that

This liberation of man from the soil of the earth, from the foreordination to which he owes his existence, is most evident in the notion of perfect dominion over life and death and in elimination of the distinction between man and woman: the goal of the total emancipation seems to be reached when man can be propagated by technical means, when he is no longer dependent on the fortuitousness of bios but, bringing all hidden things to light, designs himself in a way of thinking that does not look backward but takes as its sole measure the needs and hopes of the future.

Surely, we are able to see the truth in the above statement. The result of what is said above is often a driving force behind modern hermeneutics that simply tells us that it is past time for the Scriptures and the Church to get into line with this rationalistic attack on tradition and move forward and stop looking back. Listen to the debates presently going on in the Anglican Communion for instance. How many times are we told that we need to look forward and stop looking back? Or, another hermeneutical jump is to jump from the present immediately to scripture and begin to interpret it as if the Holy Spirit has been absent the past 2,000 years. The emancipation from tradition in the end is going to emancipate the Church from what it means to be human. The reality is spoken quite clearly when Benedict XVI said that man remains bound to the truth of his nature, to his creaturehood, and can find himself only when he finds this truth.