'...tot rituel gelouterd' De sacramentele theologie van Schillebeeckx ontwikkelen

This doctoral project consists of two main parts. In the former, the developments in the sacramental thinking of Edward Schillebeeckx are charted. This begins with the work from his own doctoral dissertation published in 1952 as De sacramentele heilseconomie, and in the most widely known and briefer form, Christ the Sacrament of the Encounter with God. It charts the development of his thought into the central period of his career, and the traces of a sacramental theology to be found among his christological and ecclesiological works, before joining Schillebeeckx in his return to sacramental theology in his incomplete project to write a new book on sacramental theology at the end of his life. The first part of this project concludes by examining the archived papers from this project, alongside some of his final published works, especially the one essay explicitly from this project, 'Naar een herontdekking van de christelijke sacramenten' (2000). The second part begins with the key threads that emerged in Schillebeeckx's work, specifically around his turn to ritual studies and the performance and performativity of the sacraments that introduces to his work, alongside his continued use of the epistemic tool of the negative experience of contrast. Rather than attempting to complete Schillebeeckx's project for him, instead I begin with these threads to propose a sacramental theology for today. Using the work of Judith Butler and Richard Schechner, I examine ritual at the convergence of performativity and performance, and the creation of an 'as-if' world at this juncture. While the narrow sense of liminality proposed by Victor Turner is found insufficient in theorizing this, the wider concept of a ritual subjunctive emerges. Schillebeeckx's attention to the negative experience of contrast provides a content with which to fill out this subjunctive theologically. Nonetheless, his approach has been rightly critiqued and I draw on some womanist, post- and decolonial critiques to develop a vision of this ritual subjunctive that is attentive to all those whom Fanon called the 'wretched of the earth.' Using this sacramental subjunctive, questions raised by Schillebeeckx about the connection of sacramental theology to creation and of 'new sacraments' are examined.