Bogoslovska smotra, Vol. 72 No. 2-3, 2002.
Preliminary communication
Ministry as a Meeting Point for Church and Social Services
Ante Vučković
orcid.org/0000-0002-5049-2934
; Catholic Faculty of Theology, University of Split, Split, Croatia
Abstract
While ministry and its understanding within Church frameworks is a self-comprehended notion, in social relations it has a negative and archaic connotation. While the intra-church understanding of the notion of ministry developed in line with equalising ministry with individualism, the social notion of serving developed in exactly the opposite direction. No later than the beginning of the Modern the notion of serving on a wide social level gained a negative connotation and all the more clearly the ministry was divided from individuality. What is more, the modern notion of freedom is developing on the conscious and clear division of ministry from individuality.
The development of the understanding of ministry with regard tο the Church is monitored through the development of the understanding of the priestly. In social relationships we see the clearer and more powerful division for the ministry from individuality up until the modern understanding of the subject that is faced with the demand of self-creativity - and aesthetic of life. When Kant explains what enlightenment is and how we can build a space for the free use of reasons he uses the example of priest, his ministry which obligates him to obedience on the one hand and his freedom in public space on the other.
Nietsche presented a sharp criticism of disguising the desire for power with the notion of ministry.
Despite the disappearance of the concept of ministry in terminology relating to social relationships it can still be found within the field area of industrial production where it serves to mean to service manufacturing machines - while in the past two decades it is used more as a feature of modern society that is marked with an increasing service industry.
Keywords
ministry; clergy; freedom; subject; individuality
Hrčak ID:
28973
URI
Publication date:
12.2.2003.
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