Realist Christian Theology in a Postmodern Age

This book cuts new ground in bringing together traditional Christian theological perspectives on truth and reality with a contemporary philosophical view of the place of language in both divine and wordly reality. Patterson seeks to reconcile the requirements that Christian theology should both take account of postmodern insights concerning the inextricability of language and world as well as taking God’s truth to be absolute for all reality. Yet it is not simply about theological language and truth as such. Instead Patterson asks: where does language fit in divine and human reality? Patterson’s discussion straddles realist, liberal-revisionist and postliberal theological schools, and critiques their various positions before going on to utilise selectively their insights to develop and apply a theological model of ‘language-ridden’ reality. This model affirms that worldly reality has a radical dependence on God. Finally, the book explores the theological and ethical implications of the model it proposes.

• Takes theology and philosophy seriously on their own terms while aiming at an interpenetration of theological and philosophical theories • Takes theology seriously in a philosophical debate within which it is usually patronised or ignored • Suggests a fruitful programme which is not only coherent in itself but also draws out the theological and ethical implications of the place of language in divine and worldly reality

Introduction; 1. The task of theological realism; 2. The dilemma of postliberal theology; 3. Interpreting the truth; 4. The anatomy of language-riddenness; 5. The nature of theistic realism; 6. Becoming persons; 7. Becoming the Church; Conclusion; Select bibliography; Index.