This essay examines the relationship between Jean-Luc Marion's argument of ‘conceptual idolatry’ and John Duns Scotus’ doctrine of the univocity of being. I argue that Scotus does fall under Marion's criticisms, which radically undermine the use of ‘being’ in theology, but that univocity, in its barest Scotist form, also seems impossible to avoid. After arguing that attempts to move past this ontological conundrum fail, I conclude the relationship stands at an impasse. While this conclusion is critical, I make it for the sake of a constructive argument: post-metaphysical theology should reckon with the inevitability of being, appreciating this impasse between the apparent hegemony of being and the priority of God's self-revelation. Making the impasse clear at least points the way towards a renewed theological consideration of being.

Jean-Luc Marion is often interpreted as a thinker of the purely invisible and apophatic, in tension with the rich forms of mediation found in Christian practice. I will challenge these assumptions through a close reading of one of Marion's rare concrete examples, the “icon”— not his philosophical use of the term, but the holy image that initially inspired it. Marion defines the sacred image by its “transparency,” “self-effacement,” or “kenosis.” This seems to indicate that the icon must cancel itself out to make room for God, an iconoclastic attitude with troubling consequences for the believer who prays to the icon and for the rest of the finite world. By rigorously developing Marion's understanding of this word “kenosis,” I argue that, counter to initial impressions, this account of the sacred image is deeply faithful to the essential aspects of the Byzantine icon understood as a “window into heaven.”

Theologians have recently shown interest in the work of Irish metaphysician William Desmond. A prevailing antimetaphysical sentiment may, however, discourage others from engaging his work. To allay concerns, this article brings Desmond into conversation with Jean-Luc Marion on the topic of divine revelation. The purpose is twofold. First, for those wary of metaphysics, this essay demonstrates that Desmond's metaxology evades Marion's critique and, more importantly, shows how the two thinkers share a “familial intimacy.” Despite the opposition between metaphysics and phenomenology, this intimacy renders them companion thinkers. Second, this companionship is theologically beneficial to Desmond. With Marion as guide, we consider how the concept of divine charity can be added into Desmond's metaphysics in what I call the passio caritatis, or “passion of charity.” The article concludes by suggesting how undergoing the passio caritatis effects a theological expansion of Desmond's metaphysics and puts it at the service of theological reflection.

Jean-Luc Marion’s phenomenology reveals two attitudes regarding the classification of phenomena. On the one hand, they are classified by type. On the other, the “banality of saturation” reduces these types to possible interpretations, in which case saturation isn’t a qualitative rupture anymore, but a possible hermeneutic attitude to any phenomenon. Hence, there is, in Marion’s phenomenology, a tension between a metaphysical attitude that maintains categorial discontinuities, and a hermeneutic temptation driven by the recovery of quantitative continuities between all phenomena. Yet, Marion does not push this quantitative temptation to its limits; he steps back in front of a specifically saturated phenomenon: the icon.

This article uses the work of Jean-Luc Marion, emphasizing his shift from Being to Love as an analogue for God, to make a parallel shift from Person to Love in Trinitarian theology, thereby addressing some of the issues raised by the social trinitarians. The article then focuses on the work of Catherine Mowry LaCugna as particularly congruent with the shift suggested by Marion, but adds to LaCugna's work a conception of the immanent Trinity that is grounded in Marion's phenomenological shift. Conceiving of God as the unoriginate source of Love that is revealed in Word and enacted in Spirit allows one to understand personhood and community, not in and through the relationships between the Trinitarian Persons, but in and through Love incarnate in the human person of Jesus Christ, and Love enacted in the Spirit present in the community, forming it into the Body of Christ.