"Quest for the Living God" by Elizabeth Johnson

The fact that this book warranted the Catholic bishops of this country to condemn it was enough for me to buy the book! I did not expect to "learn" anything "new" from the book since I was acquainted with the literature. But, I surely wanted to read it to further my disbelief in the hierarchy. They surely can only be summed it as stupid!

At any rate, the "Quest for the Living God" deals well with two notions: (1) God, by definition, is unknowable, and (2) as humans, we have to reference what we cannot know because that is the way our brain works. We reference in words what is in our mind and we have no choice but to reference even what we cannot know or name. In short, we are in a bind: we are forced to do something that leads to inherent contradictions.

Given that we are forced to use language even for what we cannot know, the author's approach to this issue is to discuss God by referencing different images or metaphors that capture "something" of what we reference we use the term, "God". She discusses these metaphors within the context of the Judaeo-Christian biblical literature. In contrast to the Medieval and Scholastic approach of attempting to reference God through philosophical categories, she understands "God" within the context of scriptures.

It is unbelievable that anyone would have a problem with her approach!