Pro Ecclesia: A Journal of Catholic and Evangelical Theology

Near the end of his book on holiness, John Webster writes that “a crucial aspect of holiness is an increase in concentration: the focusing of mind, will and affections on the holy God and his ways with us.” In this article, I briefly explore a few ideas in Thomas Aquinas’ exegetical work (chiefly in his commentaries) that constellate around the idea of holiness as concentration. I suggest that “concentration” offers a fruitful way to speak of a saintly analogy to divine simplicity. Not even saints are simple in the strict sense, but they can be sincere and pure, with their energies gathered together in a unified pursuit of a single, divine object. I then offer a reading of the famous Milanese garden scene in the Confessions, arguing that Augustine's conversion is paradigmatic of concentration, before concluding with an amendment and a commendation.

Charles Wesley's doctrine of Christ has long been regarded as “paradoxical” by commentators such as John Lawson, S.T. Kimbrough, Paul Chilcote, and Jason Vickers. This paper will propose an alternative reading of Wesley's hymns on the nativity, suggesting that such poetic contrasts do not constitute paradox but are best read in light of the theology of Chalcedon and its subsequent debates. The paradoxical reading of the hymns bears a formal resemblance to two historically troublesome positions: the conjunction of irreconcilable natures as found in Nestorius, or the idea that a hypostasis corresponds to a singular physis as found in Severus of Antioch. This paper will read a selection of Wesley's more “paradoxical” claims alongside the christology of Cyril of Alexandria and Maximus the Confessor to show that what appears as paradoxical—the contrasting predicates of Jesus Christ's two natures—is precisely the form of utterance that the hypostatic union enables.

Steven Duby repeatedly insists on a conception of divine aseity that maintains God's being is complete without reference to another, such that his being neither entails nor precludes the existence of the world. He argues that the “specification” of God's decretive “tendency” toward creation cannot be considered an ingredient of the divine actus purus, lest it render creation absolutely necessary, or result in some divine composition. This article argues that this way of framing the issue presents a false dilemma. In dialogue with several of Duby's Reformed interlocutors, the article suggests the dilemma may be resolved when the decretive act of God is parsed synchronically through an “instants of nature” framework. This way of conceiving the divine will ensures that God's innate indifference is upheld alongside his actual non-indifference towards creation, in a way that poses no threat to his aseity or eternally actualized perfection, nor to the genuine contingency of creation.