Coming Soon: Values In A Time of Upheaval

In January of 2010, shortly after starting this blog, I posted a brief book review of Values In A Time of Upheaval , a collection of essays on political philosophy by Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger (now Benedict XVI).  A recent conversation with a friend on Facebook prompted me to pick the book up off the shelf, dust it off, and read through it again.  So I did, as it became my source of intellectual stimulation during 30+ hours of air travel this past week.

As I mentioned in the review, the Holy Father’s collection is an incredibly timely book.  Upheaval seems to be exactly what we are seeing in our culture at nearly every turn. In the area of politics in particular, it seems every day that we are becoming more a nation of men and less a nation of laws.  The world, and our society, seem to be changing in so many ways, and few of those changes appear to be for the better.   So, as I was thinking and praying for my next blog topic, it struck me that reviewing the book in greater depth would be perfect.

For the next few weeks, I’ll be taking each of the Holy Father's essays, doing my best to summarize them (without sacrificing the rich genius of his work), and offer my humble commentary.  I’ll begin this week with the chapter that impacted me the most, Chapter Four.  This chapter, the fourth essay in the collection, entitled What is Truth? The Significance of Religious and Ethical Values in a Pluralistic Society, explores the relationship between truth and the democratic process, and how that relationship must remain in proper perspective in order for a society to survive.

Stay tuned over the next few weeks to explore this and the rest of Pope Benedict XVI's essays on political philosophy, and please chime in with any comments or thoughts about his work.

+AMDG+