The Nature of Sacred Time

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

Summer 2021

Department

Department of Humanities

Abstract

In his essay, I examine the nature of sacred time, focusing primarily though not exclusively on two aspects of sacred time: that it is “set aside” from use and that in this time human beings can be in union and communion with and in God. I argue that chronological, “clock” time and Heideggerian “datable” (in-order-to) time are incapable of being directly consecrated as sacred time. In order to understand sacred time, I investigate the Fall and how this results in an essentially instrumentalist understanding of the world and time, which has its ultimate motive in the drive for human self-sufficiency. Only against this backdrop can one properly understand the nature (physis) of human temporality and historicity with respect to sacred time as set apart from use and as that time we spend and thus share with Christ, thereby coming into union and communion with God.

Publication Title

American Catholic Philosophical Quarterly

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