Herbert McCabe
Personal Information
Description
Herbert McCabe was born in Middlesbrough in the North Riding of Yorkshire.He studied chemistry at Manchester University, but influenced by Dorothy Emmet switched to philosophy. He contributed a number of pieces to Humanitas, and became friends with Eric John among others. McCabe joined the Dominicans in 1949, where under Victor White he began his lifelong study of the works of Thomas Aquinas. Born John Ignatius McCabe, his novice master, Columba Ryan, gave McCabe the religious name Herbert, perhaps ironically, in honour of Saint Herbert of Derwentwater, a seventh-century Lakeland hermit. Ordained in 1955, was a pastor in Newcastle for three years before being assigned as chaplain to De La Salle College, where one of his pupils was Terry Eagleton. In 1965, he was sent to Cambridge as editor of the journal New Blackfriars in 1965 but was removed in 1967 following a now-famous editorial in that journal in which he criticised the theologian Charles Davis for having left the Catholic Church. Davis left publicly, denouncing the church as corrupt. McCabe countered that of course the Church was corrupt but that this was no reason to leave it. He was reinstated three years later, and began his editorial that month in characteristically combative style: "As I was saying, before I was so oddly interrupted...." He spent many years teaching at Blackfriars, Oxford University, writing four books, The New Creation, a study of the Sacraments, in 1964; Law, Love and Language, on the centrality of language in ethics, in 1968; The Teaching of the Catholic Church, a short catechism, in 1986; God Matters in 1987; and God Still Matters, a collection of his articles, in 2002. He was a member of the Slant group, and combined a commitment to the thought of Aquinas and Wittgenstein with a socialist political stance. McCabe's sermons were carefully prepared and delivered with great intelligence and wit. A major theme was a caution against making God a god, of reducing the Creator to an object within this world, and thus committing idolatry. In 1974 McCabe became an Irish citizen.
Books
The good life
"The Dalai Lama once wrote that the object of human existence was to be happy. This sounds extremely glib as happiness in the popular imagination is a feeling and in the words of the song 'the greatest gift that we possess'. On the other hand, von Hugel wrote 'Religion has never made me happy; it's no use shutting your eyes to the fact that the deeper you go, the more alone you will find yourself' This small masterpiece by the late Fr Herbert McCabe of the Dominican order steers a steady courss between these two extremes. We feels instinctively that human beings are designed to enjoy themselves and to be happy and yet we are told that suffering is good for the soul. But in the Catholic tradition the true object of human existence is the vision of God and nothing less than this will ever make us truly happy. But Fr McCabe explores much deeper issues. Is Happiness a pleasure or a pain? You hardly know. Certainly it is not a comfort for comfort spells seciurity and hapiness can take you out of yourself to a degree where all secutiry is left behind. Behind a feeling of exultation, you can sense the flame of incandescent terror. This short book is entirely original and will further enhance McCabe's posthumous reputation."--Bloomsbury Publishing.
God Still Matters (Continuum Icons)
"Herbert McCabe, who died in 2001, was one of the most intelligent Roman Catholic thinkers of the twentieth century. An influence on philosophers such as Anthony Kenny and Alasdair MacIntyre he was also befriended by poets and literary critics such as Seamus Heaney and Terry Eagleton. Equally at home in philosophy and theology, he despised jargon and intellectual posturing as a substitute for reason and argument. At the time of his death, he left a wealth of unpublished material- so outstanding in its quality and originality that it is surprising that it was never published in book form. This is now put to rights. In God Still Matters we have the chance to read McCabe on the topics that interested him most - philosophy of God, Christology, Fundamental theology, Sacramental theology and ethics. No-one who reads this volume will doubt that McCabe was one of the outstanding Christian thinkers of his generation and the epitome of Dominican intellectual openness and rigour."--Bloomsbury Publishing.
God, Christ and us
"Here is a collection of Herbert McCabe's more popular spiritual writings. McCabe was highly regarded as a writer on philosophy and theology but in true Dominican tradition (the Order of Preachers) he was also a brilliant preacher. He always preached in a lively and witty way - his style has been compared to that of G.K. Chesterton. This collection of his sermons and spiritual addresses are never platitudinous or short of ideas, filled with questions, arguments and solid intellectual content. The major influence on McCabe was the Bible but he was also a devoted admirer of the thought of St Thomas Aquinas, whose ideas saturated his public speaking. From the Bible, McCabe derived the notion of God leading us to happiness through the work of grace and through the life and teachings of Jesus. From Aquinas, McCabe derived a hatred of idolatry, a powerful sense of the incomprehensibility of God and a recognition that we depend on God's gracious revelation of himself rather that what we can work out on the basis of our limited understanding. A presiding theme in this book is that we are saved because of the life of someone fully human. God, Christ and Us communicates the essence of the Gospel in an original and compelling way. It can therefore be mentioned in the same breath as works by Dean Inge, Donald Soper, H.A. Williams and Leslie Weatherhead."--Bloomsbury Publishing.
The People of God
This book is a study of the sacraments as mysteries of human unity. Father McCabe, a Dominican priest, was a frequent contributor to the "Clergy Review" and "Blackfriars.”
The new creation
"A reissue of McCabe's study of the sacraments and what it means to live in the Church and the Church's world, The New Creation explores how human beings can reach real unity with one another and the world around them through the Spirit of Christ.The New Creation engages with themes like the Word of God, the Son of God, the meaning of community and communion and the sacraments as mysteries of human unity; the place of physical healing in the redeemed world and the Old-Testament and pagan religious foundations upon which modern Christianity is built. There is a humane simplicity in McCabe's insights into all of these subjects, similar to that found in the Gospels, which provides the reader with clarity on inherently complex theological issues.'Christ is present to us in so far as we are present to each other' as McCabe tells us and this book plainly and vividly encourages us to find the company of both." -- Publisher's description.
Law, love, and language
"What is ethics all about? In this book Herbert McCabe suggests that it is about loving, obeying laws and talking to people. In doing so, he offers an introduction to ethical thinking for anyone with a serious interest in moral philosophy. He does so as someone who writes with a Christian audience in mind. Most of his arguments, however, do not presuppose a believing Christian readership."--Bloomsbury Publishing.
On Aquinas
"The revival of interest in Aquinas has run simultaneously with the rise of interest in Aristotle, on whose philosophy Aquinas based his own. On Aquinas is a masterly work of exposition written with breathtaking clarity. By the use of simple modern analogy Mccabe brings Aquinas`s thought to life and underlines the crucial influence of Aquinas on our own contemporary thought. It is rare to find a work of philosophical exposition which is exciting to read. Even those who are unfamiliar with Aquinas will find this book gripping. Published posthumously, this study is thoroughly rewarding and will increase McCabe's reputation as one of Britain's finest theologians of recent years."--Bloomsbury Publishing.
God Matters (Contemporary Christian Insights)
"Seldom have God matters been treated with such verve, sense, rigour and humour as in the collection of writings by Herbert McCabe. This book demonstrates the depth and clarity of his theology and philosophy of God, his appetite for controversy, both political and theological, as well as a traditional catholic concern for prayer, liturgy, Mary and St Dominic."--Bloomsbury Publishing.
What is Ethics All About?
Father McCabe, a well known British writer and lecturer of the Dominican Order, aims at explaining, in the five essays that comprise this book, the different ways in which one may think of ethics, rather than at formulating a definition of ethics, or at applying Christian principles to moral problems. The first essay considers love as a basic model for ethics. The second discusses the idea that ethics is essentially a matter of observing the basic laws of human nature. The following three chapters are concerned with the relationship of ethics to communication -- with the fact that man makes use of conventional signs and symbols -- and with the significance of the fact that men communicate not only in such symbols, but also through Jesus who is ""the communication of the Father."" McCabe is a sufficiently good writer, and certainly a sufficiently articulate exponent of ""communication in Christ"", to attract a readership.