Political Eschatology, by Sean J. McGrath

Abstract

In Political Eschatology, Sean McGrath embarks upon a demanding intellectual journey and, as its title suggests, breaks through the narrow confines of academic disciplines in order to think freely. The title itself may pose a challenge to the uninitiated reader: what is “political eschatology”? The eschaton refers to the end of all things and, in the Christian tradition in which it is most prevalent, to the end times—during which the final act of God’s revelation will play out. But what does it mean to think eschatology in conjunction with politics? It is here that McGrath follows in the footsteps of some of the great political thinkers of the twentieth century: Eric Voegelin, Ernst Bloch, Jacob Taubes, and Günter Anders all used the theological concept of the eschaton to think the political moment in which they lived. McGrath elaborates his own compelling theological ideas about the eschaton and then proceeds to think through the crises of the twenty-first century using the eschatology he has developed. The preface and first long chapter, entitled “Endtime,” sets the stage by exploring eschatology and its intellectual history. Thereafter, essays on consumerist culture, the environmental crisis, the pandemic, and hospitality follow. While a part of the author’s strategy is to denounce the injustices of today and link them to a historical and philosophical lack of imagination, the tone is ultimately prophetic. McGrath is leading us through a difficult exercise in thinking the future without determining it in advance, something that requires a major paradigm shift. This change in attitude, this conversion or metanoia, is what the book’s multifaceted strategy aims to effect.