Dr. T. Alexander Giltner

Bio

T. Alex Giltner, Ph.D., is an assistant professor of Theology and Director of the Assisi Program for Discipleship and Leadership at the University of Saint Francis. He works on Historical (including Biblical) Theology, the relationship of Faith and Reason, and Trinitarian Metaphysics. He has published mostly in the area of Historical Theology, particularly on the thought of Saint Bonaventure. He is currently working on his first monograph, The Lightness of Being, a critique of the modern epistemological crisis, focused on reorienting the relationship of epistemology to ontology. He and his wife Mary Beth have a criminally adorable son named Jack.

Areas of Interest

• Trinity
• Christology
• Personalism
• Patristic and Medieval Theology
• Epistemology
• Scripture and Theology of Revelation
• Philosophical Theology
• Ressourcement and Nouvelle Théologie
• Faith and Reason
• Vatican I and II

Selected Publications

Refereed Journal Articles

“One Way or Another: The Augustinian-Dionysian Dialectic in the Thought of Saint Bonaventure,” Cithara 61.1 (2021), 51-66.

“The Power unto Glory: A Bonaventurean Critique of Foucault’s Critique of Power,” Scottish Journal of Theology 72.1 (2019), 46-63.

“Intimae theologiae: The Christocentric Cosmology of John Scottus Eriugena in the Homilia super “In principio erat Verbum,” Archives d’histoire doctrinale et littéraire du moyen âge 83 (2017), 7-32.

“Palamas among the Scholastics: A Review Essay,” with J. Isaac Goff and Christaan W. Kappes, Logos: A Journal of Eastern Christian Studies 55 (2014), 175-220.

Chapters in Edited Volumes

“All’s Alight with the Fire of God: Four Theses for Reinterpreting Illumination in the Thought of Saint Bonaventure,” in Conference Proceedings from Frater, Magister, Minister et Episcopus: The Works and Worlds of Saint Bonaventure, edited by Timothy Johnson and Katherine Wrisley Shelby (New York: Franciscan Institute Publications, 2021).

“The Center Holds: Echoes of Eriugena in the Christo-cosmic Exemplarism of Bonaventure,” in The Spirit and the Church: Peter Damian Fehlner’s Franciscan Development of Vatican II on the Themes of the Holy Spirit, Mary and the Church: Festschrift, edited by J. Isaac Goff (Eugene: Wipf and Stock, 2018).

“Healing unto Glory: Sacraments in the Cosmic Narrative of the Breviloquium,” with J. A. Wayne Hellmann OFM Conv., in Companion to the Breviloquium, edited by Dominic Monti OFM and Katherine Wrisley Shelby (New York: Franciscan Institute Publications, 2017).

Selected Presentations

• “Recapitulating History: Interpreting Vatican II through the Christology and Eschatology of Hans Urs von Balthasar and Henri de Lubac,” Catholicity as Gift and Task: the 50^th Anniversary of Communio, St. Bernard’s School of Theology and Ministry, October 2022
• “Unique Dignity and Common Causes: Martin Luther King Jr.’s Theology of Integration in Today’s Political Climate,” Critical Conversations Diversity Speaker Series, University of Saint Francis, January 2019
• “Equality, Proportionality, Hierarchy: Correlating Dionysian and Augustinian Conceptions of Beauty in the Trinitarian Thought of Saint Bonaventure,” Patristics, Medieval, and Renaissance Conference, Villanova University, 2018
• “One Way or Another: Exploring the Dialectic of Augustinian and Dionysian Authority in St. Bonaventure’s De triplici via,” Symposium of Medieval and Renaissance Studies, Saint Louis University, 2018
• “Sexual Violence and God-Talk: A Theological Conversation on Silence, Complicity, and Social Responsibility,” Saint Louis University, October 2018
• “The Lightness of Being: The Scope of Illumination in the Thought of St. Bonaventure,” presented at Frater, Magister, Minister et Episcopus: The Works and Worlds of Saint Bonaventure, Saint Bonaventure University, 2017
• “The Power unto Glory: Sacraments as the Power of Re-Creation in the Cosmic Narrative of Bonaventure’s Breviloquium,” College Theology Society Annual Convention, Rockhurst University, 2016
• “Bonaventure, Philosopher or Theologian? Some Comments on the Origins of a Modern Debate,” Symposium of Medieval and Renaissance Studies, Saint Louis University, 2016
• “On Anselm and Angels: A Background Survey of the ‘Perfect Number’ Argument of Anselm’s Cur Deus Homo,” Symposium of Medieval and Renaissance Studies, Saint Louis University, 2015
• “Divine Infinity and Divine Ignorance: God’s Knowledge in the Theology of John Scottus Eriugena,” Symposium of Medieval and Renaissance Studies, Saint Louis University, 2014