Is Christian brotherhood exclusive or universal?
Comments: Although this book was written alalmost all fifty years ago, it still speaks quite forcefully today–perhaps it is even more relevant to our global village with its global conflicts. Ratzinger begins by examining understandings of brotherhood from Ancient Greece to modern Marxist and Liberal traditions and highlights the tendency towards understanding brotherhood as either something closed in on itself, yet full of meaning and ethical ramifications, or something so open and nebulous that it becomes a synonym for “humanity”–though these impulses have often been held together in a sort of dualism. He then proceeds to argue that the Christian idea of brotherhood, based on God’s fatherhood of Jesus Christ, has the potential to be universal while remaining concrete. Using Karl Barth’s doctrine of election, Ratzinger argues that Christian brotherhood is not automatically universal, because we are not naturally in Christ and thereby children of God. Christian brotherhood is therefo
