For half a century Rene Girard s theories of mimetic desire and scapegoating have captivated the imagination of thinkers and doers in many fields as an incisive look into the human condition, particularly the roots of violence. In a 1993 interview with Rebecca Adams, he highlighted the positive dimensions of mimetic phenomena without expanding on what they might be. Now, two decades later, this groundbreaking book systematically explores the positive side of mimetic theory in the context of the multi-faceted world of creativity. Several authors build on Adams insight that loving mimesis can be understood as desiring the subjectivity of the other, particularly when the other may be young or wounded. With highly nuanced arguments authors show how mimetic theory can be used to address child and adult development, including the growth of consciousness and a capacity to handle complexity. Mimetic theory is brought to bear on big questions about creativity in nature, evolutionary development, originality, and religious intrusion into politics."

For half a century Rene Girard's theories of mimetic desire and scapegoating have captivated the imagination of thinkers and doers in many fields as an incisive look into the human condition, particularly the roots of violence. In a 1993 interview with Rebecca Adams, he highlighted the positive dimensions of mimetic phenomena without expanding on what they might be. Now, two decades later, this groundbreaking book systematically explores the positive side of mimetic theory in the context of the multi-faceted world of creativity. Several authors build on Adams' insight that loving mimesis can be understood as desiring the subjectivity of the other, particularly when the other may be young or wounded. With highly nuanced arguments authors show how mimetic theory can be used to address child and adult development, including the growth of consciousness and a capacity to handle complexity. Mimetic theory is brought to bear on big questions about creativity in nature, evolutionary development, originality, and religious intrusion into politics.

Thematically focused on the theology of redemption or what is called in theology "soteriology," each of the two sections of The Redemption addresses biblical literature and significant moments in the history of Christian theology, and especially the work of Anselm of Canterbury. The second part of the book presents a significant treatment of the problem of good and evil, and introduces the important category of cultural evil. Most significant from the standpoint of Lonergan's original contribution is the treatment accorded in both Part 1 and Part 2 to what he calls "the just and mysterious law of the cross." The treatment of biblical literature contains a valuable distinction between "redemption as end" and "redemption as medium." Beginning with theses 15-17 from Lonergan's Collected Works, The Incarnate Word, this volume also includes rare and never-before-published texts originally written in the late 1950s.

For the edition of A Second Collection prepared for the Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan, editors Robert M. Doran and John D. Dadosky have added archival materials directly related to almost every one of the papers, bringing the reader closer to the original compositions. The papers date from 1966 to 1973, and span the most creative period in Lonergan's development. Two major themes run through these papers: the primacy of the fourth, existential level of human consciousness, and the significance of historical mindedness with all its implications for culture, hermeneutics, and phenomenological thinking. The theme of conversion makes a grand entrance in 'Theology in Its New Context,' a paper that charted the course for the unfolding of Method in Theology. This new edition makes extensive use of original manuscripts, variants in drafts of the essays, and hand-written corrections.

For the edition of A Second Collection prepared for the Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan, editors Robert M. Doran and John D. Dadosky have added archival materials directly related to almost every one of the papers, bringing the reader closer to the original compositions. The papers date from 1966 to 1973, and span the most creative period in Lonergan's development. Two major themes run through these papers: the primacy of the fourth, existential level of human consciousness, and the significance of historical mindedness with all its implications for culture, hermeneutics, and phenomenological thinking. The theme of conversion makes a grand entrance in 'Theology in Its New Context,' a paper that charted the course for the unfolding of Method in Theology. This new edition makes extensive use of original manuscripts, variants in drafts of the essays, and hand-written corrections.

Method in Theology stands with Insight as Bernard Lonergan's most important work. It is Lonergan's answer to those who would argue that in this time of cultural change and dissolution, the believer is afloat on a sea of multiplying theologies, without rudder or compass. Lonergan was resolute in his refusal to be defeatist on this point. While agreeing that theology must continually change to mediate between religion and culture, he worked out an integral method to guide and control this ongoing process. Method in Theology is the fruit of this labour. This critical edition has benefited from extensive research into Lonergan's typescripts and from consulting the recordings from several institutes where he lectured over the course of the work's development. Lonergan's intention was to provide a set of methods that would guide a collaborative community in the ongoing construction of a theology that would move from recovery of the data through resolution of conflicts to contemporary formulations and applications. With this work, the cognitional theory of Insight: A Study of Human Understanding underwent a surprising set of developments in the form of what he calls functional specialization.

Thematically focused on the theology of redemption or what is called in theology "soteriology," each of the two sections of The Redemption addresses biblical literature and significant moments in the history of Christian theology, and especially the work of Anselm of Canterbury. The second part of the book presents a significant treatment of the problem of good and evil, and introduces the important category of cultural evil. Most significant from the standpoint of Lonergan's original contribution is the treatment accorded in both Part 1 and Part 2 to what he calls "the just and mysterious law of the cross." The treatment of biblical literature contains a valuable distinction between "redemption as end" and "redemption as medium." Beginning with theses 15-17 from Lonergan's Collected Works, The Incarnate Word, this volume also includes rare and never-before-published texts originally written in the late 1950s.

Method in Theology stands with Insight as Bernard Lonergan's most important work. It is Lonergan's answer to those who would argue that in this time of cultural change and dissolution, the believer is afloat on a sea of multiplying theologies, without rudder or compass. Lonergan was resolute in his refusal to be defeatist on this point. While agreeing that theology must continually change to mediate between religion and culture, he worked out an integral method to guide and control this ongoing process. Method in Theology is the fruit of this labour. This critical edition has benefited from extensive research into Lonergan's typescripts and from consulting the recordings from several institutes where he lectured over the course of the work's development. Lonergan's intention was to provide a set of methods that would guide a collaborative community in the ongoing construction of a theology that would move from recovery of the data through resolution of conflicts to contemporary formulations and applications. With this work, the cognitional theory of Insight: A Study of Human Understanding underwent a surprising set of developments in the form of what he calls functional specialization.

In the mid- to late-1930s, while he was a student at the Gregorian University in Rome, Bernard Lonergan wrote a series of eight essays on the philosophy and theology of history. These essays foreshadow a number of the major themes in his life's work. The significance of these essays is enormous, not only for an understanding of the later trajectory of Lonergan's own work but also for the development of a contemporary systematic theology. In an important entry from 1965 in his archival papers, Lonergan wrote that the "mediated object" of systematics is Geschichte or the history that is lived and written about. In the same entry, he stated that the "doctrines" that this systematic theology would attempt to understand are focused on "redemption." The seeds of such a theology are planted in the current volume, where the formulae that are so pronounced in his later work first appear. Students of Lonergan's work will find their understanding of his philosophy profoundly affected by the essays in this volume.

A companion to Philosophical and Theological Papers 1958-1964 (Volume 6 in the Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan series), this anthology contains Lonergan's lectures on philosophy and theology given during the later period of his life, 1965-1980. These papers document his development in the discipline during the years leading up to the publication of Method in Theology, and beyond to 1980 when he was more engaged in his writings and seminars on macroeconomics. Philosophical and Theological Papers 1965-1980 is divided into five sections, forming units on the basis of dates. The three central sections are each a set of lectures respectively given at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Gonzaga University in Spokane, and Trinity College (University of Toronto). Although there is some repetition amongst the lecture sets and in relation to other more familiar works, this repetition displays occasional new turns of phrase that the careful reader will note. In at least one instance, familiar material suddenly opens out onto expressions not to be found anywhere else in Lonergan's work. Other very interesting developments regard the movement from speaking of the immutability of dogmas to their permanence of meaning and the permutations among 'real self-transcendence,' 'performative self-transcendence,' and 'moral self-transcendence.'

A Third Collection, prepared for the Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan by editors Robert M. Doran and John D. Dadosky, is a helpful companion to volumes four and thirteen in the series. The volume contains fifteen papers, written between 1974 and 1982, and includes some of his most important shorter writings such as "Prolegomena to the Study of the Emerging Religious Consciousness of Our Time" and "Natural Right and Historical Mindedness." The relevant archival entries are specified, so that readers can consult them. The papers in this volume rehearse in a new key the themes of a lifetime. Without in any way going back on the major emphases of Lonergan's early work - cognitional theory and then the exploration of a fourth, existential level of consciousness - they are focused more on love and on the movement from above downwards in consciousness. Community is emphasized as the context and the fruit of the emergence of authentic subjects.

The Incarnate Word contains the first four of five parts in Bernard Lonergan's De Verbo Incarnato, a Latin textbook for the course he taught at the Gregorian University in Rome. Fully translated and annotated, it brings to a wider audience Lonergan's major contribution to Christology, the doctrine concerning the person of Christ. In this work, Lonergan applies his unique theory of consciousness to the question of the nature of Christ, the book offers a rich and provocative treatment of Christ's consciousness and his human knowledge. The Incarnate Word presents the original Latin and the first-ever English translation of the text on facing pages. The volume includes not only the final text of De Verbo Incarnato but also material which Lonergan had rewritten or eliminated from the 1964 Gregorian University edition.

Continuing where Volume 23 left off, Volume 24 of the Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan traces the background to Lonergan's notion of functional specialization as it emerges in his Latin courses and seminars on method. This volume contains editorial reports based on Lonergan's handwritten notes for two courses in 1963, both entitled "Method in Theology." Also included is the lecture "De Notione Structurae," dating from 1964, along with an English translation on facing pages. Together with Volumes 22 and 23, Early Works on Theological Method 3 provides readers with a thorough presentation of the data on Lonergan's development through the 1960s as he worked out what became the classic book Method in Theology (1972).

Insight is Bernard Lonergan's masterwork. It aim is nothing less than insight into insight itself, a comprehensive view of knowledge and understanding, and to state what one needs to understand and how one proceeds to understand it.

In Lonergan's own words: 'Thoroughly understand what it is to understand, and not only will you understand the broad lines of all there is to be understood but also you will possess a fixed base, and invariant pattern, opening upon all further developments of understanding.'

The editors of the Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan have established the definitive text for Insight after examining all the variant forms in Lonergan's manuscripts and papers. The volume includes introductory material and annotation to enable the reader to appreciate more fully this challenging work.

Bernard Lonergan (1904-1984), a professor of theology, taught at Regis College, Harvard University, and Boston College. An established author known for his Insight and Method in Theology, Lonergan received numerous honorary doctorates, was a Companion of the Order of Canada in 1971 and was named as an original members of the International Theological Commission by Pope Paul VI.