Hans Kung – författare

The Catholic Church has been nearly destroyed by its resistance to change, censured for its abuses. Pope Francis has promised reform: radical theologian Hans Küng here presents what Catholics have long been yearning for: modern responses to the challenges of a modern world.In 1962 the Second Vatican Council met in the hope they could, in the words of Pope John XXIII, ‘open the windows of the Church and let some fresh air in.’ Hans Küng and Joseph Ratzinger, the future pope, were both there.In Can We Save the Catholic Church? Kung relates how after fifty years the Church has only grown more conservative. Refusing to open dialogue on celibacy for priests; the role of women in the priesthood; homosexuality; or the use of contraception even to prevent AIDS, the Papacy has lost touch. Now, amid widespread disillusion over child abuse, the future of Catholicism is in crisis.Pope Francis seems sincere in his wish for a more compassionate Church. The time is ripe for reform, and here Küng calls for a complete renewal of the Church. As grassroots support grows Can We Save the Catholic Church? makes an inspiring and compelling case for offering a new Catholicism to the modern world.

As the twentieth century draws to a close and the rush to globalization gathers momentum, political and economic considerations are crowding out vital ethical questions about the shape of our future. Now, Hans Kung, one of the world's preeminent Christian theologians, explores these issues in a visionary and cautionary look at the coming global society. How can the new world order of the twenty first century avoid the horrors of the twentieth? Will nations form a real community or continue to aggressively pursue their own interests? Will the Machiavellian approaches of the past prevail over idealism and a more humanitarian politics? What role can religion play in a world increasingly dominated by transnational corporations? Kung tackles these and many other questions with the insight and moral authority that comes from a lifetime's devotion to the search for justice and human dignity.Arguing against both an amoral realpolitik and an immoral resurgence of laissez faire economics, Kung defines a comprehensive ethic founded on the bedrock of mutual respect and humane treatment of all beings that would encompass the ecological, legal, technological, and social patterns that are reshaping civilization. If we are going to have a global economy, a global technology, a global media, Kung argues, we must also have a global ethic to which all nations, and peoples of the most varied backgrounds and beliefs, can commit themselves. "The world," he says, "is not going to be held together by the Internet." For anyone concerned about the world we are creating, A Global Ethic for Global Politics and Economics offers equal measures of informed analysis, compassionate foresight, and wise counsel.

For Hans Kung, as for many other people, something can sometimes appear in Mozart's music which goes beyond the human dimension and gives intimations of a bliss which transcends even all music. In this short book he sets out to identify what it is. Much, he argues, has been written about Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, but relatively little about the religious dimension of his person and music. While it is completely taken for granted that Johann Sebastian Bach has Protestant roots and was a pious man, that Mozart was a Catholic and wrote music for masses is virtually ignored. So the first part of the book looks at Mozart's life and music from this perspective and asks how it contributes towards those 'traces of transcendence' which may be perceptible to those open to them. The second part sheds new light on Mozart's Coronation Mass by setting it against its contemporary cultural and political horizon and the critical confrontation with religion beginning at the time of its composition. Here is a work which is not only worthy to stand alongside Karl Barth's famous study, but which for many readers will even eclipse it.

One of the great classics of twentieth-century theology.

Is there life after death? This most universal of questions has puzzled and challenged every generation of men and women. If there is eternal life how do we start to comprehend this reality in the midst of a culture that has be dominated by rationalism and materialistic mind-set and in which our present life is continually improving, progressing to higher standards and better quality? Hans Kung discusses the medical, philosophical, and theological problems that arise from these age-old questions, and provides a thought-provoking analysis of the modern dilemma of the rethinking of ancient problems.

When it first appeared, in Germany in 1970 and in Britain in 1971, this book sparked off the greatest theological debate since the Second Vatican Council and finally caused the author to lose his licence from the church to teach. However, the question is still far from being settled: on the contrary, events of recent times from Pope John Paul II's nomination of bishops and statements on birth control to the publication of a world catechism and 'Veritatis Splendor' show that it has become an even ore urgent one. Long unavailable, 'Infallible?' now reappears with a new preface by Gerbert Gaaf and a survey of the discussion.

In preparation for the volume on Christianity to be published in `The Religious Situation of Our Time', Hans Kung here presents, in the same lucid style as his recent best-selling Credo, a study of seven of the greatest Christian thinkers.After 'A Brief Introduction to Theology' he begins with Paul, as a result of whose activity Christianity broke through to become a world religion. Then come Origen, who made a controversial synthesis between the Christian spirit and the spirit of antiquity, and Augustine, the father of Western, Latin theology. Thomas Aquinas represents the learning of the universities and papal court theology, and Martin Luther is introduced as representing a return to the gospel in a classic case of a paradigm shift. Schleiermacher is a theologian at the dawn of modern times, and the book ends at the opposite pole from him, with Karl Barth, standing on the threshold of post-modernity. An epilogue explains what theology is all about.

Hans Kung's Global Responsiblity, published in 1991, marked an important new stage in his work. On the one hand it led to his magisterial books on Judaism and Christianity, and on the other hand it led to the Declaration toward a Global Ethic, approved by the Parliament of the World Religions in 1993, and the setting up of the Global Ethic Foundation of which he is president. This book marks a further practical step forward. In it Kung enters into a detailed examination of current ethical issues in politics and economics in a way which will surprise those who regard him solely as a theologian. Discussed at every stage of its creation with experts in politics and economics, his argument shows a quite remarkable grasp of contemporary issues and has that professional touch which is so much a hallmark of all that he has written. Can politics break all the rules, whether in international politics, domestic questions or in their personal lives? Is power everything, and do the means justify the end? These are the questions dealt with in the first part, which offers historical surveys of Realpolitik and more idealistic attempts at an alternative along with discussions of the war in former Yugoslavia and the Gulf War. Is the welfare state doomed? Is the market a law to itself? Does the future lie with the transnational companies? How much scope is there fore ethics in a business world which increasingly seems to be dominated by financial scandals? These are the issues in the second part. As well as tackling all these difficult questions in depth, Hans Kung offers his own concrete suggestions for a more humane social order. His vision will fascinate all those concerned for a better world, of all religious beliefs or none. Hans Kung was President of the Global Ethic Foundation in Tuebingen, Germany.

The lectures collected in this volume shed some fascinating light on Hans Kung's career and present a moving picture of one of the greatest theologians of our time.

An important and comprehensive work on the crucial issues of reform facing the Catholic Church today.

Now, forty years since its original publication, Hans Kung's groundbreaking study--acclaimed as a model for ecumenical discussion--has become a classic work. Looking at the doctrine of justification as understood by the Protestant theologian Karl Barth in comparison to classic Roman Catholic theology, Kung found that the two had similar ideas about the main elements of justification. He argued there is fundamental agreement between Catholicism and Barth's doctrine and that the somewhat divergent viewpoints "would not warrant a division in the Church." This anniversary edition now features a new essay assessing Kung's work in light of contemporary ecumenical dialogues between Roman Catholics and Protestants.

"Presents the text of the 'Declaration' and a commentary on its evolution and significance.... The message of this book is very timely." -The Leading Edge

Swiss-German theologian Kung planned this massive synthesis of Christian history and systematic theology as a sequel to his On Being Christian (1976) and as a companion to Judaism (Crossroad, 1992). Ever the Catholic Church's "faithful critic," Kung displays a dazzling breadth of scholarship. Professor of ecumenical theology at the University of Tubingen, he bases his approach on five historical paradigm shifts: Jewish apocalyptic Christianity, early church ecumenism, the Roman system in the medieval papal church, the Reformation, and modern democracy. He notes dominant influences in each, presenting his convictions on the essence of Christianity and moving toward a polycentrism where Orthodox, Catholic, and evangelical traditions are not mutually exclusive. Over 30 diagrams and many stimulating "questions for the future" sidebars are included. Not all readers will accept the views of this Vatican II peritus (nor did the Vatican in 1973). But the work is a remarkable achievement for a church always in need of reform and reformers. Recommended for all theology collections

Hans Kung is undoubtedly one of the most important theologians of our time, but he has always been a controversial figure, and as the result of a much-publicized clash over papal infallibility had his permission to teach revoked by the Vatican. Yet at seventy-five he is also something like a senior statesman, one of the 'Group of Eminent Persons' convened by the UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, and a friend of heads of government like Tony Blair and President Mubarak of Egypt. In this fascinating autobiography he gives a frank and outspoken account of the first four decades of his life. He tells of his youth in Switzerland and his decision to become a priest; his doubts and struggles as he studied in Rome and Paris, and his experiences as a professor in Tubingen, where he received a chair at the amazingly early age of thirty-one. Most importantly, as one of the last surviving eye-witnesses he gives an authentic account of the struggles behind the scenes at the Second Vatican Council, in which he took part as a theological expert.Here it becomes clear just how major an influence he was, to the point of shaping the Council's agenda and drafting speeches for bishops to deliver in plenary sessions.With its rich thought and vivid narrative, Kung's book paints a moving picture of his personal convictions, and his struggle for a Christianity characterized not by the domination of an official church but by Jesus.

Kung sketches out a new theology of Women in the Church. This is not stridently feminist but sees the role of women as being vital for the development of the Church as an institution and for preaching the Christian Gospel. For two years Kung guided a research project on Women and Christianity, funded by the Volkswagen Foundation. For most of the religions of the world, women are a problem. From time immemorial they have been subordinate to men, second class in the family, politics and business with limited rights and even limited participation in worship. It is not only in Christianity that equal rights for women has been a scandalously neglected issue. By an examination of the history of women in Christianity, Kung points to the scandals of the past. The prohibition of women servers at Mass and of the ordination of women to the diaconate and the priesthood are symptomatic of a male dominated Church, which takes a consistently 'negative' attitude towards contraception, abortion and divorce. Roman Catholic Canon Law is androcentric and male dominated.From his position of intellectual freedom, as an independent Professor at the University of Tubingen, Kung is free to analyse the mistakes of the past and to sketch out a new theology of Women in the Church. This is not stridently feminist but sees the role of women as being vital for the development of the Church as an institution and for preaching the Christian Gospel.

Hans Kng (1928-) is one of the most distinguished and widely-acclaimed theologians of the twentieth century. He has committed himself to a Christian Church full of life and freedom and humanity. His ideas have been warmly received and appreciated by people throughout the world and have stirred the imaginations of Christians and non-Christians alike. But why have his ideas also met with such opposition and even outright hostility from many Church authorities? And what does Hans Kung himself make of these personal attacks? In this simple, personal and often moving testimony, Hans Kng describes his fundamental convictions and reveals why, despite all the difficulties he has to face, he is still committed to the Christian way. What Hans Kng has thought, experienced and expresses in this book will help others in their search for personal values and a sense of direction - and also help them realise the unique value and importance of the Christian way.

Tracing the Way is the product of a lifetime of experience. In researching and compiling this book Hans Kung has traveled to every corner of the globe in search of God in his many guises. Kung casts an analytical eye over the major world religions and offers a view of the present and what that means when measured against the past. Kung surveys, as succinctly as possible, the historical stages of each world religion and analyses their major paradigms and paradigm shifts. For the present can be understood only in the light of constellations from the past which have persisted side by side with each otherTracing the Way attempts to understand the religions as objectively as possible and discusses the social, political and historical contexts of the many forms of belief that exist today.

Provides a picture of the Church's theological image as expressed in the historical forms it has taken through the centuries from the present day back to its origins. The book uncovers, for both Protestant and Roman Catholic, some lessons about the community to which he or she belongs.

After two volume of autobiography, Hans Kung now write a short personal statement of his Christian belief. Hans Kung is one of the most celebrated theologians of the Roman Catholic Church today. His audience which is strong within his own Church is every bit as strong among Christians of other denominations and indeed among those at the frontiers of organised religion. From the start, he has been a rebel, being Swiss and a lover of personal freedom. Many of his books like "Infallible?" and "On Being a Christian" have rocked the Papal boat. Now after publishing two magnificent and acclaimed volumes of memoirs, Kung has written a much shorter and more personal book to explain his own beliefs. If one sets aside all scientific knowledge and learning, all formal theological language and the skilful construction of theories, what remains as the core of faith? What do we need for our lives? What is indispensable to us?. Kung writes of trust in life, joy in life and suffering in life and in so doing writes a summa of his faith - and life.

In 1993, the World Parliament of Religions endorsed the "Declaration towards a Global Ethic" composed by Hans Küng. In it, representatives from all the world's religions agreed on principles for a global ethic and committed themselves to directives of non-violence, respect for life, solidarity, a just economic order, tolerance, and equal rights and partnership between men and women. But the declaration was just the first step. In HOW TO DO GOOD AND AVOID EVIL, Küng, probably the most famous living Roman Catholic theologian, and Rabbi Walter Homolka, head of Germany's rabbinical seminary and distinguished professor, draw on the Jewish tradition to show the riches that Judaism can offer people of all faiths and non-believers in achieving these directives. The authors make the case for binding values and basic moral attitudes, which can be found in Judaism's universal message of a better world where actions speak louder than words. Exploring Judaism's focus on ethical conduct over declarations of faith, the authors show that making ethical decisions is indispensable in an ever-changing world.