The Phenomenology of John Paul II: Conference Review

During the past two days, Duquesne University hosted a conference on the phenomenology of Pope John Paul II. I would certainly judge the conference as a whole to have been very well executed with a outstanding turnout (some 400 registered), with presenters from a wide variety of universities across America and a couple from Europe (Leuven and the International Theological Institute in Austria), and of course three impressive keynotes: George Weigel, Avery Cardinal Dulles, S.J., and Jean Bethke Elshtain. It certainly is encouraging to see John Paul's philosophy to be more of a force in the philosophical community in America than I would have initially expected.

However, the content of many of the papers I heard certainly didn't surprise me. With the particular focus of the conference on John Paul's phenomenology, his phenomenological strain certainly was well represented, but nevertheless, still accurately portrayed, i.e., always balanced with his ultimate philosophical foundation in Thomistic metaphysical realism. This certainly is key for Wojtyla in his philosophy, which arguably may have in some ways hindered him from adopting the full fruits of phenomenology, but is always important to keep in mind.

Wojtyla's phenomenology, it is well known, began with his Habilitationshrifft (second doctoral dissertation) on Max Scheler. Now, I certainly am interested in John Paul's philosophy in itself, but this relation between Wojtyla and Scheler (if anyone knows my philosophical interests) was of particular interest to me throughout the course of the conference. There was a presentation on the criticisms of Scheler Wojtyla lays out in his Habilitation, which was certainly helpful; as well as a panel discussion the following morning precisely aimed toward addressing this relation. Now, my sympathies on the issue, it is true, lie with Scheler. This of course, was not the opinion of most of the presenters, nor, most likely, with the majority of the conference attendees who probably have never read any of the Scheler's work, and who are probably only familiar with the Pope's criticism. This is understandable (though it may not be ideal). It is one thing, however, that attitude to exist amongst the attendees, but it seems less tolerable when it exists among the scholars. And perhaps it doesn't necessarily exist--perhaps these scholars have carefully weighed the arguments and made a careful philosophical judgment on the issues that apply. The impression, however, I get is that when dealing with the philosophy of a previous Pope, some issues are not weighed appropriately, specifically among catholic scholars, because there seems to be this unconscious (maybe even conscious) tendency to always be in favor of the Pope. For, of course, "the man is infallible!" "It would be heresy to do otherwise. " Now, these tendencies--if they exist--are absurd, for these essentially philosophical writings do not deal with dogmatic issues. And quite frankly, if these tendencies do exist, I do not think Wojtyla himself would approve of our possibly preferring his philosophy over other positions due to matters of faith, and not reason, strictly speaking.

But that's if these tendencies and tensions exist. Far be it from me to claim them so. But this Scheler-Wojtyla debate is an interesting one because some people are more or less sympathetic and seem to adopt a stance in relation to Scheler based on just how much Wojtyla himself adopted Scheler. So it seems that among catholic thinkers, the debate on how positively we are to look on Scheler comes down to the debate on how positively did Wojtyla look upon Scheler. Again, if you know anything of my philosophical interests, I look upon Scheler far more positively than Wojtyla in fact did, and am not fearful to claim my views on how Wojtyla has misread Scheler.

Josh Miller (Duquesne), one of the presenters of the panel discussion mentioned above, holds similarly as I, but perhaps not to the same degree. I highly applaud his presentation for the courage to actually mention how he thought Wojtyla was wrong on one of the issues I do--and yet so diplomatically, and carefully, and, I might add, convincingly! But I'm partial, and one of the perhaps the very few, if any, that didn't need convincing.

I am currently working on the third revision of my paper on my defense of Scheler against Wojtyla's critique and plan to present it for the ACPA (American Catholic Philosophical Association) conference next October in Milwaukee.

Nevertheless, John Paul was an excellent philosopher and scholar who had the amazing personality to love in all he did. His tender and careful dealing with even thinkers so often dismissed as "enemies," such as Kant, is surely an inspiration for philosophers, as well as how he always maintained an eye on Christ in his work.
In Memoriam. Thank you Pope John Paul II.