This special number of The Way honours Hans Urs von Balthasar’s centenary, and focuses chiefly on one theme in his work: what Gerald O’Collins refers to as the beauty of Christ. One can only be selective with Von Balthasar. His achievement is massive, and it is only now, as we go to press, that English translations of the final volumes of his major three-part work are being announced. Probably no one is yet in a position fully to appreciate how his work as a whole holds together. His legacy appears at present as a set of fascinating, controversial fragments, often pointing in different directions. In focusing on the themes of tradition and beauty, this collection in no way summarises von Balthasar’s achievement as a whole, nor resolves the questions it raises. The apprehension of divine beauty is only the beginning of the Balthasarian process, one that continues through the drama of God’s engagement and culminates in a reflection on divine logic. Christian tradition inevitably expands our sense of the beautiful, until it includes, like the creative love of God, the whole cosmos:
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