Date of Award
Fall 2000
Document Type
Dissertation - Restricted
Degree Name
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Department
Theology
First Advisor
Hughson, D. T.
Second Advisor
Sedwick, Timothy F.
Third Advisor
Misner, Paul
Abstract
In the spring quarter of 1995 at Seabury-Western Theological Seminary, I was part of a seminar entitled "Anglican Identity," taught by Dr. Timothy F. Sedgwick, in which we examined the works of various key figures in the history of the Anglican theological tradition. When I began my doctoral studies at Marquette University the following fall semester, I was part of a class on "Church and the Modern World," under the direction of Dr. Paul Misner. I had intended to write my final paper for that course on the justifications of war offered by Church of England leaders during the period which began with the first World War and ended with the second. As I began to survey the literature of that period, the name that repeatedly appeared in almost every resource was that of William Temple (1881-1944), When I happened upon a brief pamphlet of Temple's speech in the House of Lords concerning the Nazi persecutions of the Jews, the focus of my paper quickly shifted to this aspect of Temple's public witness. In an attempt to understand the theological warrants for this particular speech, I began to read every work by William Temple I could find. Thus I began a conversation across space and time with an archbishop who had died well before I was born. The following fall semester (1996), I was part of the seminar on Church and State Relations under the direction of Thomas Hughson, S.J. Although I wrote on another major Anglican theologian in that class (the sixteenth century apologist Richard Hooker), it was at that time that how I would focus my study of Temple became clearer. I wanted to focus on the complementary of the roles of the religious and civic aspects of human life which I found to be so prevalent in Temple's writings. Added to this was a pair of questions that plagued me in many of my other theology classes: first, how does a particular theologian ( or theological school) define the notion of Church? And secondly, how does that Church relate to the society within which it is situated? Both of these seemed to be questions that could be answered in a definitive, once-for-all-time manner, but would have to be constantly rethought. The dissertation that follows stems from a set of four disagreements or dissatisfactions. These disagreements led me to undertake three tasks in support of my conviction that William Temple's work continues to be a resource for theological reflection more than half a century after his death. Finally, I have two modest hopes concerning the usefulness of what I have offered in the following pages...