Abstract:

Christian conceptualizations of world order have been fraught with differences in scriptural interpretations and doctrinal disagreements about the church’s responses to the global challenges of modernity. This article explores the Catholic Christian perspective of the papacy with regard to world order, and compares and contrasts it with the views of liberal Catholic Christian theologian Hans Kueng. It concludes that most liberal Catholics and Protestants share the Kuengian approach to world order while most conservative Protestants and Orthodox Christians would agree with some of the Vatican’s positions. Notwithstanding these disagreements, dialogue in action among Christians and members of other world religions continues to occur on many occasions. As long as understanding and knowledge about “the other” is sought without unacknowledged group biases, interreligious dialogue can result in a process that inspires a structure of peace among the religions—whether the participants accept pluralism as an ultimate truth about religion or not.

Author: Joseph Masciulli