{"id":241150,"date":"2022-01-10T21:23:12","date_gmt":"2022-01-11T03:23:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mindseyemag.com\/magazine\/?p=241150"},"modified":"2026-04-29T04:17:52","modified_gmt":"2026-04-29T09:17:52","slug":"the-monstrosity-of-christ","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mindseyemag.com\/magazine\/the-monstrosity-of-christ\/","title":{"rendered":"The Monstrosity of Christ"},"content":{"rendered":"

Image Source<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

What matters is not so much that \u017di\u017eek is endorsing a demythologized, disenchanted Christianity without transcendence, as that he is offering in the end (despite what he sometimes claims) a heterodox version of Christian belief.<\/i>
\n\u2014John Milbank<\/b><\/p>\n

To put it even more bluntly, my claim is that it is Milbank who is effectively guilty of heterodoxy, ultimately of a regression to paganism: in my atheism, I am more Christian than Milbank.<\/i>
\n\u2014Slavoj \u017di\u017eek<\/b><\/p>\n

In this corner, philosopher Slavoj \u017di\u017eek, a militant atheist who represents the critical-materialist stance against religion’s illusions; in the other corner, “Radical Orthodox” theologian John Milbank, an influential and provocative thinker who argues that theology is the only foundation upon which knowledge, politics, and ethics can stand. In The Monstrosity of Christ, \u017di\u017eek and Milbank go head to head for three rounds, employing an impressive arsenal of moves to advance their positions and press their respective advantages. By the closing bell, they have not only proven themselves worthy adversaries, they have shown that faith and reason are not simply and intractably opposed.<\/p>\n

\u017di\u017eek has long been interested in the emancipatory potential offered by Christian theology. And Milbank, seeing global capitalism as the new century’s greatest ethical challenge, has pushed his own ontology in more political and materialist directions. Their debate in\u00a0The Monstrosity of Christ<\/i>\u00a0concerns the future of religion, secularity, and political hope in light of a monsterful event\u2014God becoming human. For the first time since \u017di\u017eek’s turn toward theology, we have a true debate between an atheist and a theologian about the very meaning of theology, Christ, the Church, the Holy Ghost, Universality, and the foundations of logic. The result goes far beyond the popularized atheist\/theist point\/counterpoint of recent books by Christopher Hitchens, Richard Dawkins, and others.<\/p>\n

\u017di\u017eek begins, and Milbank answers, countering dialectics with “paradox.” The debate centers on the nature of and relation between paradox and parallax, between analogy and dialectics, between transcendent glory and liberation.<\/p>\n

Short Circuits series, edited by Slavoj \u017di\u017eek<\/i>