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"The Church will go out to meet the non-Christian of tomorrow with the attitude expressed by St. Paul when he said: What therefore you do not know and yet worship [and yet worship!] that I proclaim to you (Acts 17:23). On such a basis one can be tolerant, humble and yet firm towards all non-Christian religions."
Karl Rahner, (1966) Theological Investigations, Vol. V.
(16) Now while Paul was waiting for them at Athens, his spirit was being provoked within him as he was observing the city full of idols.
(17) So he was reasoning in the synagogue with the Jews and the God-fearing Gentiles, and in the market place every day with those who happened to be present.
(18) And also some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers were conversing with him. Some were saying, "What would this idle babbler wish to say?" Others, "He seems to be a proclaimer of strange deities,"--because he was preaching Jesus and the resurrection.
(19) And they took him and brought him to the Areopagus, saying, "May we know what this new teaching is which you are proclaiming?
(20) "For you are bringing some strange things to our ears; so we want to know what these things mean."
(21) (Now all the Athenians and the strangers visiting there used to spend their time in nothing other than telling or hearing something new.)
(22) So Paul stood in the midst of the Areopagus and said, "Men of Athens, I observe that you are very religious in all respects.
(23) "For while I was passing through and examining the objects of your worship, I also found an altar with this inscription, 'TO AN UNKNOWN GOD ' Therefore what you worship in ignorance, this I proclaim to you.
(24) "The God who made the world and all things in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands;
(25) nor is He served by human hands, as though He needed anything, since He Himself gives to all people life and breath and all things;
(26) and He made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined their appointed times and the boundaries of their habitation,
(27) that they would seek God, if perhaps they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us;
(28) for in Him we live and move and exist, as even some of your own poets have said, 'For we also are His children.'
(29) "Being then the children of God, we ought not to think that the Divine Nature is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and thought of man.
Acts 17:16-29, New American Standard Bible
Paul is against the idolatry in Athens, idolatry in the sense of the veneration or worship of created things. However, it seems that Paul acknowledges that those in Athens do (also) worship the "true" God, even if they lack the Christian understanding of said God. In verse 17:28 Paul says, "for in Him we live and move and exist, as even some of your own poets have said". So Paul also seems to accept they have at least some genuine insight into this God.
This rather suggests that non-Christians can be worshipping the true God, even if, from the Christian perspective, they have an inadequate understanding of this God.
The approach of Karl Rahner would seem to be preferable to the moronic bigotry of certain Protestants. (Without mentioning any names...)
Karl Rahner, (1966) Theological Investigations, Vol. V.
(16) Now while Paul was waiting for them at Athens, his spirit was being provoked within him as he was observing the city full of idols.
(17) So he was reasoning in the synagogue with the Jews and the God-fearing Gentiles, and in the market place every day with those who happened to be present.
(18) And also some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers were conversing with him. Some were saying, "What would this idle babbler wish to say?" Others, "He seems to be a proclaimer of strange deities,"--because he was preaching Jesus and the resurrection.
(19) And they took him and brought him to the Areopagus, saying, "May we know what this new teaching is which you are proclaiming?
(20) "For you are bringing some strange things to our ears; so we want to know what these things mean."
(21) (Now all the Athenians and the strangers visiting there used to spend their time in nothing other than telling or hearing something new.)
(22) So Paul stood in the midst of the Areopagus and said, "Men of Athens, I observe that you are very religious in all respects.
(23) "For while I was passing through and examining the objects of your worship, I also found an altar with this inscription, 'TO AN UNKNOWN GOD ' Therefore what you worship in ignorance, this I proclaim to you.
(24) "The God who made the world and all things in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands;
(25) nor is He served by human hands, as though He needed anything, since He Himself gives to all people life and breath and all things;
(26) and He made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined their appointed times and the boundaries of their habitation,
(27) that they would seek God, if perhaps they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us;
(28) for in Him we live and move and exist, as even some of your own poets have said, 'For we also are His children.'
(29) "Being then the children of God, we ought not to think that the Divine Nature is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and thought of man.
Acts 17:16-29, New American Standard Bible
Paul is against the idolatry in Athens, idolatry in the sense of the veneration or worship of created things. However, it seems that Paul acknowledges that those in Athens do (also) worship the "true" God, even if they lack the Christian understanding of said God. In verse 17:28 Paul says, "for in Him we live and move and exist, as even some of your own poets have said". So Paul also seems to accept they have at least some genuine insight into this God.
This rather suggests that non-Christians can be worshipping the true God, even if, from the Christian perspective, they have an inadequate understanding of this God.
The approach of Karl Rahner would seem to be preferable to the moronic bigotry of certain Protestants. (Without mentioning any names...)
