Halík's most recent book has a cover that depicts rays of sunlight streaming through deep woods.
We are in the midst of a crucial, epoch-making moment for Christianity. Forces like secularization, globalization, pandemic, war, and political upheaval have radically transformed the world in which we live. How will the Church respond to these challenges? Will it fall into irrelevance, or will it undergo a reformation? The Afternoon of Christianity: The Courage to Change, takes on these pressing questions, framing the Church’s current situation as a crossroads: one path leads to division and irrelevance, while the other leads to a deeper, more mature form of Christianity.
“The Afternoon of Christianity serves to shine a light on the hope that is in the Church and the world,” writes Daniel Cosacchi. “[Tomáš] Halík’s ecclesiology is one that is badly needed in today’s Church, and one from which we must all learn if we are to be the community that we are called to be.”
In The Afternoon of Christianity, award-winning Czech theologian Tomáš Halík reflects on the challenges faced by the Church, both past and present. Drawing on sources ranging from the Bible and Christian theology to classic literature and modern psychology, Halík insists that Christianity must transcend itself, opting for a disposition of openness and dialogue over isolation and parochialism. It is only after this kind of reformation that Christianity can overcome the challenges posed by our present circumstance.
William A. Barbieri Jr. calls the book “a visionary product of a major thinker whose work cannot be pigeonholed as religious or spiritual but rather, by interweaving philosophy, theology, sociology, and psychology, seeks to address the human condition in toto.” Echoing this praise, Janet Soskise comments that "Tomáš Halík is one of the most important public intellectuals of our time, heroic in his engagement with the most challenging questions for church and society."
By renewing and reforming its faith, Halík argues, Christianity can do the remarkable work of helping humankind move beyond a clash of civilizations to embrace one other’s differences and share in a universal fraternity.
About the author: Tomáš Halík is a Czech Roman Catholic priest, philosopher, theologian, and scholar. He is a professor of sociology at Charles University in Prague, pastor of the Academic Parish of St. Salvator Church in Prague, president of the Czech Christian Academy, and a winner of the Templeton Prize. He is the author of many books, including Touch the Wounds, From the Underground Church to Freedom, and I Want You to Be. His books have been published in twenty languages and received many awards, including the Foreword Reviews’ INDIES Book of the Year Awards in Philosophy and in Religion.
The Afternoon of Christianity will be released March 1, 2024. For more information, or to request a review copy, contact Michelle Sybert, msybert@nd.edu, 574-631-4910.