The Grammar of a Cultural Act: A Review of Matthew John Paul Tan's <em>Justice, Unity, and the Hidden Christ</em>. Eugene: Pickwick Publications, 2014.
Main Article Content
Abstract
This review engages claims about the form and telos of an act made by Matthew John Paul Tan in his Justice, Unity, and The Hidden Christ, against the backdrop of the fate of social justice and ecumenism after Vatican II. Tan argues that a post-conciliar failure to consider the social context and the cultural presuppositions of an act has led to the Church becoming a chaplain of the capitalist order of Liberalism rather than an embodiment of a distinct ‘politics’ of Christ. This review takes up a conversation with Tan’s thesis, focusing on the cultural construction of an act, the role of practices in the mediation of faith and belief, and the way in which Christianity can be a properly social embodiment, not of the practices of liberal capitalism, but of the practices of Love.Â
Article Details
- Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work (See The Effect of Open Access).