Folia Theologica 21. (2010)
Barbour Hugh O.Praem.: The Cosmology of Catholic Communications: Postmodern Kerygma? A Reflection by a Disciple of SS. Albert the Great and Thomas Aquinas
160 Hugh BARBOUR to desire, to abhor, to obtain, to act. The angelic role of these Christians is not in virtue of the powers of their unaided human bodies, but through the instruments of cyber optics and space technology. They can imitate the mighty angels, the messengers of truth and love, as those who use the media to attack the Gospel use them in imitation of the principalities and powers, the fallen opponents of the angels in their struggle for the allegiance of human race. This Catholic use of communications might then be called a new "astrology of the media," the imaginum scientia, the intermediate science of the use of images by the concinator, the preacher of the Word, to direct human hearts to the love of God and to deliver them from the Evil One. Before we conclude our considerations, however, it would be good to point out and summarize the work of one contemporary Catholic thinker in the field of metaphysics and semiotics. If the medium is the message, that is if the powers of communication themselves can indicate the power of divine, angelic, and human intelligence in directing the movements of the human soul, then it is good that we understand the philosophical iter which has led human thought to the present juncture. The French Catholic academic Jean Borella in his magnificent work La crise du symbolisme religieux10 has traced in our own day the way back to the use of communicative signs and symbols as the means of discovering the presence and revelation of God in human experience. He offers five movements in the history of modern and contemporary European thought, leading to the recovery of what was only apparently lost in the Copernican revolution and its philosophical ramifications. To this end he makes use of the familiar semiotic triangle of referent, meaning, and signifier. His account can provide a fine, if perhaps provisional philosophical account which can encourage those of the household of the faith who deal in the production of the media of communications. First: The denial of the referent or the destruction of the mythocosm (La négation du référent ou la destruction du mythocosme): The cosmological revolution effected at the end of the Renaissance and the beginning of the Modern period led to the denial of any genuine theophany or natural revelation of God in the cosmos. The old order of intelligent beings, moving the celestial and terrestrial bodies to their fulfillment was replaced by a mute universe, driven by 10 10 Éditions Harmattan, 2009.
