The Ambiguity of Being: Lonergan and the Problems of the Supernatural. By Jonathan R.Heaps. Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 2023. Pp. ix, 240. $85.00.

Among the various attempts to address the modern controversy surrounding the relationship between the natural and the supernatural, Jonathan Heaps's contribution stands out for what I consider his key insight: that this controversy reached a stalemate owing to what Heaps calls ‘methodological myopia’ (p. 7)—a failure to distinguish between the medieval and modern problems of the supernatural. Heaps demonstrates how previous efforts tried to resolve the modern problem by retrieving a medieval, metaphysical solution to a medieval question: how God can act in human action? The modern question, though intrinsically related, is distinct: what is God doing in human action? The subtle inflection of this question emphasises that the modern problem is radically hermeneutical: it pertains to human freedom and its products (cultures) as mediated and constituted by meaning. Accordingly, attempting to solve a hermeneutical (diachronic, ‘what’) problem with a metaphysical (synchronic, ‘how’) solution is ineffective. Heaps's overall argument is lucid and persuasive, incrementally leading to his conclusion. Building on what Bernard Lonergan called ‘the theorem of the supernatural’, he proposes that making explicit the entitative disproportion between the absolutely supernatural (God) and creation in the thirteenth century solved the medieval problem of understanding God's action in the world. Thereby the scholastics were able to clarify that God is the transcendent cause that acts in and through created causes by causing both their existence and their causation (whether ‘necessary’ or ‘contingent’), in accordance with their natures. Thus, the natural and the supernatural do not compete but concur, and, in the case of free rational creatures, cooperate with each other. This medieval development, Heaps suggests, created the possibility of asking the modern ‘what’ question of the supernatural that follows upon the medieval ‘how’ question. The metaphysical solution also implied an ontological ambiguity that could neither be fully identified nor resolved from the medieval vantage point. This ambiguity lies in the pre-philosophical decision either to trust the ultimate meaningfulness of the cosmos (and, by extension, the meaningfulness of free human agency) or to deny it, thereby bracketing—and de facto eclipsing—the transcendent. Favouring the former alternative, Heaps works towards both integrating and transcending the medieval solution to the problem of the supernatural. In particular, he argues that because human free acts are mediated by meaning and motivated by value, only a hermeneutical theology of culture(s) can adequately address the modern question of what God is doing in and through human agents in history. The book is divided into four parts, each illuminating and distinguishing various aspects of the two problems of the supernatural, as well as their solutions. The argument culminates in Heaps's constructive proposal, reviewed and elaborated in the concluding chapter. Part one examines the de facto intractability of the modern controversy surrounding the supernatural, showing how its more recent resurgence, primarily in the anglophone world, re-enacts rather than advances its twentieth-century predecessor—the 1940s controversy of Surnaturel in France. This recent reemergence pivots between two divergent camps: neo-de Lubacians (such as John Milbank) and neo-neo-scholastics (such as Steven A. Long). Although it occurred in a new context for theology—marked by globalisation, secularism, individualism, decolonisation, multiculturalism, and pluralism—this resurgence did not advance the solution because neither side adverted to the difference between the medieval and modern problems. Implicitly or explicitly, the proposed solutions therefore remained grounded in the metaphysical, theological, and philosophical strategies of the 1940s (pp. 19, 29). Part two focuses on Lonergan's Thomist retrieval of the problem of the supernatural, as presented in his early theology, especially in Grace and Freedom. Heaps's exposition skilfully moves from the via inventionis, which emphasises theological and philosophical developments, to the via doctrinae, which provides a synthetic analysis by reducing the problems to their metaphysical principles. Heaps highlights that Lonergan's appropriation of St Thomas's mature position on grace includes applying the theorem of the supernatural to the question of divine and human cooperation. What Heaps terms the ‘specific medieval problem of the supernatural’ (‘How does God's grace make a difference?’) is shown to be a further determination of the ‘generic medieval problem’ (‘How does God's action make a difference?’) (e.g., see pp. 43, 53). Correspondingly, St Thomas's theory of divine agency through secondary causes—wherein God works instrumentally, by application, and by cooperation (p. 99)—undergirds the medieval affirmation of both human freedom and the necessity of grace (see especially pp. 82-91 and 95-98). To explain this medieval solution to the problem of the supernatural, Heaps judiciously uses Lonergan's theorem of extrinsic predication/denomination, clarifying that contingent effects are predicated of divine agency as ‘simultaneous in truth’ (pp. 93-95, 102). Part three clarifies Heaps's insight into the ambiguities of being, ‘rendered thinkable by the medieval solution to the medieval problem of the supernatural’ (p. 111) but brought to light only by the modern philosophical mentality that emerged alongside the new ideal of science (pp. 112-117, 130). He explains: ‘There is the general ambiguity regarding the explicability of the universe (if any), and alongside it, the specific ambiguity of human freedom and its purpose (if any)’ (p. 108). This twofold ambiguity yields two basic modern alternatives: to affirm or to deny the fundamental meaningfulness and purposefulness of the universe and human agency. Philosophy, now separated from theology, asserts its methodological independence by privileging the via inventionis and brackets the question of God (pp. 122, 126, 129-130). However, Heaps proposes that the decision either to trust in the fundamental intelligibility of the world (that it has sufficient reason for existing) or to deny it is pre-philosophical (pp. 116, 119-120, 155, 211). In particular, it involves choosing one's horizon for determining freedom's significance: whether it is to be exercised arbitrarily or not (p. 122). Situated within the horizon of trust in the meaningfulness of the cosmos (as in Maurice Blondel), the modern problem prompts a search for the difference that divine action makes in history (pp. 131-145). Conversely, situated within the horizon of distrust (as in Jean-Paul Sartre), it leads to a nihilistic denial of this difference, rendering such a search an absurd project (pp. 145-158). In Part four, Heaps proceeds ‘by metaphysical analysis’ (p. 177) to elaborate on why the medieval problem of the supernatural is irreducible to and thus irresolvable by medieval metaphysical solutions. Assisted by Lonergan's Thomist metaphysics of rational freedom (especially in Verbum) and, only tacitly, by his intentionality analysis, Heaps presents a number of modern determinations of the problem of the supernatural, which together form the backbone of his heuristic that anticipates the modern solution to the modern problem. Most importantly, he argues that asking what God concretely makes human freedom and its products to be is to inquire about their meaning, particularly as constitutive of cultures (p. 190). Therefore, ‘the modern problem of the supernatural is irreducibly, radically hermeneutical’ (p. 189). In a pedagogically admirable (but somewhat dissonant with his historically-minded trajectory) manner, Heaps clarifies numerous points relevant for his argument, including the progression from being-understood to being-conceived, and the basic analogy between being-affirmed (critical understanding) and being-valued (willing) in metaphysical terms, such as verbum mentis, processio operati, and processio operationis of intelligere, as well as actus perfecti (sic) and actus imperfecti (sic) of the velle (e.g., see pp. 197-203). This quite technical but illuminating analysis demonstrates how ‘the very substance of the act of willing and so the autonomy of its determinate “ought” is a meaning’ (p. 201). Consequently, ‘free human actions show themselves at once mediated by, but also fundamentally constituted by meaning’ (p. 204), and progress towards solving the modern problem of the supernatural ‘requires hermeneutical techniques of interpretation’ (p. 206, all emphases original). Because of its brevity, the concluding part of the book feels somewhat like an epilogue that completes Heaps's constructive proposal by gesturing towards (rather than painstakingly developing) his methodological insight. This proposal focuses on how theological hermeneutics of culture(s) can achieve its irreducibly diachronic—that is, both ongoing and contextual—task in a methodical way that can be validated (just as in separated philosophies) ‘by reflecting on its own unfolding procedure’ (p. 209). Heaps's methodological contribution is a heuristic technique for the ongoing search for the modern solution to the modern problem of the supernatural. This heuristic anticipates the ‘known unknowns’ of the inherently pluralistic and dynamic answer by considering three axes along which hermeneutical and diachronic inquiry proceeds: transcendence, context, and history (pp. 219-224). This methodological ‘objective’ counterpart to the ‘subjective’ determinations of the modern problem (as explored in part four) highlights that finding an adequate solution hinges on a well-balanced coordination between all three axes. Overall, I find Heaps's argument persuasive, instructive, and clear. His use of Lonergan is creative, accessible, and illuminating, even though I wondered why the mature works of Lonergan, where his concern with the historical-mindedness of theology becomes fully explicit, are engaged relatively little. While considering that the later Lonergan moved away from the language of metaphysical faculty psychology or emphasised the relative priority of love over understanding in religious matters would not invalidate Heaps's argument, it could potentially expand the modern horizon for understanding the relationship between rationality, meaning, and human freedom. Despite this potential area for further development, Heaps's book is a remarkable scholarly achievement that efficiently illuminates the modern controversy surrounding the relationship between the natural and the supernatural. It is a must-read for any graduate student or theologian seriously interested in the problem of the supernatural.