If Radical Orthodoxy gives you a headache ...

Halden at Inhabitatio Dei (HT to Ben) gives a great post on radical orthodoxy. If like me you often find the radical orthodoxy movement a bit beyond you, Halden suggests why. (I guess one of the main reasons I enjoy the likes of Gunton, Hauerwas, Jenson, Zizioulas, etc is that they know how to write readable English. I find the likes of Milbank et al have not been able to do this).  In nine propositions he claims:

1. Radical Orthodoxy purports to be a theological theology. 
2. Radical Orthodoxy is a neoplatonic theology.
3. Radical Orthodoxy is a nostalgic theology. 
4. Radical Orthodoxy is a bourgeois theology. 
5. Radical Orthodoxy is a militant theology. 
6. Ironically, Radical Orthodoxy is thus an inherently violent theology. 
7. Radical Orthodoxy is a revisonary theology.
8. Radical Orthodoxy is an erotic theology. 
9. Radical Orthodoxy is a varied theology. 

Comments

[graham]

Yeah, I liked that list.

I also think that Gunton et al write far better than Milbank and co - and that's really saying something as I don't think that Gunton wrote very well!

[andy goodliff]

why don't you think Gunton wrote very well?

[Halden]

I too, would take The One, The Three, and the Many over Theology and Social Theory anyday.

[graham]

Andy, I'm afraid that - as valuable as I find his ideas and contribution (and I will thus not stop reading him - I've always just found him boring to read.

I have to intentionally wade through unti I can sit down with a Pint and then I go, "Huh, that's cool..."

Of course, these things are thoroughly subjective. I have two friends, one of whom thinks Barth is easier to read than JK Rowling, but has to plod through Calvin and one who is the exact opposite!

For me, I've always struggled to read Gunton, not because I don't understand him. I just don't enjoy him.

[fernando]

Neoplatonic, nostalgic, bourgeois and militant - that's a really good summary of my struggles with RO.