Abstract
Anthony Mellor’s Karl Rahner, Culture and Evangelisation at first glance presents a daunting prospect in its title alone. The sheer scope of a project heralded by such a title is immense. However, I was pleasantly surprised that within the first 60 pages Mellor outlines a practical theological project truly in the spirit of the German theologian Karl Rahner. These pages helpfully include a set of clear and concise definitions of the key theological concepts that occur within the work. There is also a detailed and explicit plan to address the problems of adult evangelization in the Australian context.
Having said this, there are several things about this book that bear consideration. It reads very much like a doctoral thesis. While the Lonerganian influences help with definitional clarity, they also add additional length that is not always relevant. Further to this point, Mellor demonstrates an extensive knowledge of the problems facing the project of evangelization since the Second Vatican Council, providing a detailed and extensive history of the concept of New Evangelization. When he moves on to a discussion of Rahner explicitly in Chapter 4, Mellor further demonstrates a wide-ranging reading of the existing English-language literature on Rahner’s theology. Though at times a little dense, he is very effective at blending different strands of thought into a cohesive position. However, he cites comparatively little of Rahner’s texts themselves. One is left asking whether Mellor is writing about Rahner’s mystagogy or Rahnerian mystagogy – a particularly ironic question, considering that on page 133 Mellor reminds the reader that Rahner himself discouraged the idea of a Rahnerian school of theology.
Mellor’s extensive reading does have significant rewards when he attempts to situate the Rahnerian discourse within the broader Catholic discourse. Mellor rightly identifies the misunderstandings that seem to permeate Benedict XVI’s understanding of Rahner’s theological project, and he also makes clear the extent to which the misuse of Rahner’s theology has given rise to significant critiques that have very little to do with the nature of Rahner’s thought. An example of this is the critique that Rahner’s theology is both too political and not political enough.
In conclusion, in the introduction to Foundations of Christian Faith: an introduction to the idea of Christianity (1978), Karl Rahner warns his audience that this is a book for those prepared to do some ‘strenuous thinking and some hard intellectual work’. I would make a similar observation about Mellor’s very dense and somewhat exhaustive text. Mellor clearly knows the challenges facing the project of New Evangelization, and he well understands the Rahnerian literature on the topic. However, this particular presentation requires no small amount of work from a reader, and only a reader prepared to do the strenuous thinking should pick it up.