Francesca Zaccaron Delivers Spring Toth-Lonergan Lecture

On Thursday, May 16, visiting Toth-Lonergan Professor Francesca Zaccaron, Ph.D., presented the spring Toth-Lonergan lecture: "Interiority as the Path to Democracy: Berdjaev and Lonergan in dialogue." Hosted by the Center for Catholic Studies, Zaccaron’s lecture considered the role of interiority in building democracy by imagining a dialogue between Bernard Lonergan and Nikolai Berdjaev in response to Jacques Maritain, exploring where these Christian philosophers converge.

Zaccaron began by introducing Nikolai Berdjaev’s perspective based on his essay, "On democracy," written in 1918 and published in 1923. In this work, the Russian thinker decries a certain version of democracy—on the spiritual, not political level—that attempts to rationalize everything related to the subject and society. It promises liberty and equality but in fact merely generates an autocracy of the people, in which the people, through an autocratic power, claim to hold a divine authority over justice and truth. Berdjaev finds at the root of this false notion of democracy a profound spiritual crisis, an emptying of human souls which flattens human creativity, cultural development and authentic freedom.

Lonergan, similarly to Berdjaev, understands the problem of democracy in terms of culture and the spiritual life. In the words of Lonergan, cosmopolis is not "an unrealized political ideal" but "a longstanding, nonpolitical cultural fact"—a dimension of consciousness, cultural force, and community that works to prevent the falsification of history, makes operative timely and fruitful ideas, and "takes aim at rationalizations that restrict our viewpoints" so as to "prevent  dominant groups from deluding mankind by the rationalizations of their sins." As Zaccaron explained, Lonergan sees cosmopolis as essential to reverse contemporary society’s decline, promote progress and so construct a genuine democracy. Yet according to Lonergan, a cosmopolis can only be built when subjects first of all become aware of their own interiority and spiritual life; only by the gradual process of conversion and interior purification can we become authentic subjects capable of making decisions that serve the common good.

Lastly, Zaccaron brought Jacques Maritain into the dialogue, asserting that the French Catholic philosopher would agree with both Berdjaev and Lonergan on the centrality of community, the role of culture, and the necessity of cultivating one’s spiritual life. For Maritain, democracy is foremost a tradition of social life and a philosophy based on the rights of a human being; but the human being as subject must live out these rights within a community to fully thrive. So, in Zaccaron’s analysis, these three men each express in their own style that the interior life of the individual human subject, with openness to conversion, must be primary in order to build and sustain democracy. Zaccaron concluded her talk with examples from Italian history and its path towards democracy.

Jonathan Heaps, Ph.D., Director of the Lonergan Institute at Seton Hall, said, "Zaccaron's lecture drew a whole series of illuminating connections between the thought of Lonergan, Berdjaev, and Maritain, and she provided quite moving examples from Italy's own struggle for democracy in the last century. She made it exquisitely clear how a democratic social order needs to be accompanied by a democratic culture, but also animated by a community of people pursuing spiritual authenticity."

Following the presentation, participants were invited to continue the conversation with Zaccaron and one another while enjoying coffee and refreshments. Attendees engaged in lively discussion, raising questions about the meaning of cosmopolis in the modern classroom and sharing their own witnessed experiences of how interdisciplinary education at Seton Hall fosters this community and conversion in the spirit of Lonergan, Berdjaev, and Maritain.

About the Toth-Lonergan Endowed Professorship

The Toth-Lonergan Professorship in Interdisciplinary Studies is an endowed visiting professorship named for Deacon William Toth and Father Bernard Lonergan, S.J., each man in his own way concerned with the interdisciplinarity required of an authentic Catholic University. The Toth-Lonergan Professorship brings a leading Catholic scholar to campus to articulate and strengthen the University's Catholic mission and its relevance for and influence on all other areas of the university. Zaccaron is the fifth Toth-Lonergan endowed chair and the first woman to hold this position. She can be contacted at [email protected]. 

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