Complicating the Reception of Lonergan on ‘Sacralization and Secularization’

Abstract

The core of Bernard Lonergan’s 1973 lecture entitled ‘Sacralization and Secularization’ is his fourfold distinction between: (a) a sacralization to be dropped; (b) a sacralization to be fostered; (c) a secularization to be welcomed; and (d) a secularization to be resisted. Drawing on elements found in Lonergan’s broader corpus, noted scholars Robert Doran and John Dadosky have presented detailed interpretations of this work. Conversant with both approaches as well as with contemporary debates in political philosophy and theology, my response aims to complicate their insightful albeit relatively heuristic treatments. More specifically, my interpretation of Lonergan’s fourfold distinction culminates with an account of democracy and human rights that clarifies and expands Dadosky’s notion of a fourth stage of meaning and Doran’s conception of social grace.