Matthew Mckinnon

In Story and Spirit: a Narrative Approach to Theological Anthropology Matthew Mckinnon

In conversation with postmodern theory and philosophical anthropology, this book is a discussion of academic theology that situates the religious understanding of a person within a postmodern discussion. The project is interdisciplinary in nature, asserting its relevance within the broader concerns of constructive theology, philosophy, and literary theory. The attempt to construct a theory of the person is limited to finite, static moments, stressing the notion that the self is a series of interpretations and reinterpretations. The project approaches the problem of the person not as one of ontology (being) or epistemology (knowing), but rather of meaning. The relationship of the narrative paradigm to pneumatology recognizes the need for openness to meaning, correction, and interpretive inspiration that is the work of spirit. It stresses the spiritual orientation of the narration of self in the connectedness characterizing the emergence of the self and the other. Spirit becomes the normative criterion by which an apophatic anthropology approaches the self and the other within the reciprocity that characterizes their relationship.