Existentialism

Existentialism. Certain types of philosophical thinking which share a practical concern for the individually existing person and his freedom. The contemporary movement goes back to S. Kierkegaard, F. W. Nietzsche, and E. Husserl, whose Phenomenology provided a systematic method of describing the universal elements in human consciousness. The main body of Existentialist thinking seems to derive from the discovery of Kierkegaard by philosophers in Germany in the early 20th cent. and from the shattering of cultural values in Europe after the First World War.

The question of a Christian Existentialism has been prominent in Protestant theological debate. Opponents have claimed that Existentialism reduces theology to anthropology, dissolves the historical foundations of Christianity, and treats salvation as only a self-generated decision in favour of authentic existence. Supporters have held that an Existentialist standpoint is implicit in the NT, and that to acknowledge the salvation event as part of history only serves to confirm the radical nature of faith, locating salvation not in external events but in an encounter between God and our personal existence. Existentialism was condemned by the encyclical ‘Humani Generis’ (1950), but it continued to influence some RC theologians.