End of the Modern World
* Book: The End of the Modern World. By Romano Guardini. ISI, 1998
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See also:
- the prequel: Romano Guardini, Letters from Lake Como: Explorations in Technology and the Human Race, (Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1994).
- the sequel: Power and Responsibility: A Course of Action for the New Age.
Description
"Two monumental works on the nature of the modern age by Romano Guardini, one of the most important Catholic figures of the 20th century.
This expanded edition of The End of the Modern World: A Search for Orientation includes its sequel, Power and Responsibility: A Course of Action for the New Age. In both, Guardini analyzes modern man's conception of himself in the world, and examines the nature and use of power. It is the principle of individual responsibility that weaves both works into a seamless, comprehensive, and compelling moral statement. Guardini tirelessly argues that human beings are responsible moral agents, possessed of free will, and answerable to God and their fellow man.
On The End of the Modern World: "This book will cauterize the spirit of any man who reads it; it will burn away that sentimentality with which so many today view the advent of the new order, imagining – as they do – that a fully technologized universe can retain every significant cultural and traditional value sustained by the past." – Frederick D. Wilhelmsen, founding editor of Triumph magazine and professor at the University of Dallas
On Power and Responsibility: "If the characteristic of Hellenic civilization is to be summed up in the word logos, the characteristic of our own is more exactly summed up in the word power. The fact itself is a challenge to the wisdom of man. One is grateful that Romano Guardini has taken up the challenge... I highly recommend the book to all who are wise enough to know today's need to wisdom. That is, I recommend the book to every thoughtful mind." – John Courtney Murray, S.J., architect of the Vatican II "Declaration on Religious Liberty" and author of We Hold These Truths"
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Discussion
Emery de Gaál:
"The End of Modernity had been penned by Guardini during his time teaching at Tübingen University (1945-47). It was succeeded by Die Macht in 1951 (a treatise on Power, heretofore not translated into English). However, these texts are not without an important preceding text. When travelling to his native Italy, Guardini had spent time at Lake Como, north of Milan, at the feet of the Alps. Experiencing palpably how technology creeps gradually into the regular, dreamy lifestyle of the local population, the simple folk, he authored the now famous Letters from Lake Como between 1923 and 1925. These people were living through their architecture and craftsmanship noninvasively and respectfully as part of nature. The homes, vineyards and fields blended into the beautiful landscape. But he foresees this bucolic world fading as people lose control over technology. This is manifest seemingly without any apparent reason in the homes built in the 1920’s. They now want to take control of nature. The motor boats no longer peacefully ply the waters of the idyllic lake, but cut through with no regard for the winds and waves, doing thereby violence unto the natural constitution of the lake. He attempts to uncover the causes for these variegated phenomena.
He sees all factors subcutaneously interconnected:
1. The causes for the decline in culture,
2. The destruction of nature,
3. “seelische Ortlosigkeit” (the lack of a spiritual home) and
4. The vainglory of modernity.
This latter phenomenon he describes as the “hubris of autonomy,” reflecting humankind succumbing to “the machine” and power. Yet, one would do Guardini great injustice were one to equate his analysis with Oswald Spengler’s (1880-1936) then much discussed, as almost contemporary and hugely successful book The Decline of the West (1918-22).17 Nothing like cultural pessimism befalls Guardini. His is the joy of Easter. By no means does he advocate a return to a preindustrial age, or a rejection of modernity or succumbing to sorrow, let alone a return to a pre-Enlightenment naïveté. Nor does he reject technology per se. He apprehends “something greater gaining contours.” Especially in the ninth and tenth Letters from Lake Como something amazing occurs: he prophesizes the birth of something altogether novel arising precisely from the unharnessed and chaotic forces technology unleashes. He asserts that the novel age of technology is at present destructive merely because the commensurate or congenial human being has yet to be born. Ever again and anew, human beings are called to position themselves in the reality of an ongoing creation. The process need be transformed by human beings. In and of themselves neither technology nor the sciences are contrary to Christianity or let alone human dignity in general. Guardini struggles to develop an essential relationship between Christianity and categories for mastering the world on a higher plane. It must be a spiritual relationship of heightened, personal awareness. This will find its expression in a new dimension of human freedom and “A religious process of incalculable importance has begun – the Church is coming to life in the souls of men.” And, this notwithstanding, he concedes the tragic facticity of human existence will perdure. Only a human being who lives out as “a redeemed soul” in a conscious and grateful immediacy with God will be a good master of the thus reconfigured world; a world of harmony between humankind, nature and techné, as the people will have rejected the temptation of being a homo faber. He need acknowledge afresh his dignity as a creation reborn through the mysteries of Good Friday and Easter morning. People may not fall prey to “the demonic powers of the number, machine and will to rule ...” Human beings are called to form “the new chaos” from within a deeper spirituality (Geistigkeit), freedom and interiority.” He advocates not less but more technology. More to the point, he calls for more considered and more humane technology. “The soul touches us from something grander that will approach [us], although we sense the questionableness [of the novel] and the deliciousness of the old luminously shines forth.” The danger lies in severing modernity from the divine reality which sustains creation. As technology and the natural sciences do not generate on their own values, invariably human personhood will be imperiled. Thus three postures are required – as already mentioned – truthfulness, courage and trust as correctives to a collective distancing from any appreciation for timeless values. Only in a deliberate vis-àvis to God can human beings survive as persons. Thus, the danger of absolute impersonal control by faceless, technological exigencies contains also the chance for fuller human maturity. One recognizes how Guardini clairvoyantly sees the threats technology poses. It is the mystery of the incarnation that keeps him from subscribing to antiquarianism or larmoiement. He teaches us to pose questions lucidly and to countenance honestly also a future monstrosity, i.e. to accept in sobriety the challenges a particular age offers. If our gaze is set firmly on the sources and wellsprings of humanitas, on what constitute the essentials of being human, then the possible threats technology poses are not greater than predicaments in previous ages."
The Use of Guardini in Laudato Si
Emery de Gaál:
"In 1950 Guardini had written a precious book titled “The End of the Modern World.” There he presciently describes the human roots of the present ecological crisis. If the sciences and technology only attempt to harness the environment for the sake of the principles of utility and security he argues, then progress becomes blind and destructive. This will invariably lead to a compulsive consumerism, of a need for completely unnecessary items he apodictically observes. Such an unhealthy disposition invariably leads to a general lack of measure for people of all walks of life. The attendant complete lack of proper balance, in turn, will lead to the supposedly autonomous human subject controlling nature to the detriment of both nature and humankind. Already in 1923-25 Guardini had made similar observations in his celebrated “Letters from Lake Como,”9 where he describes a gradual decline of culture. Guardini does not oppose technology per se. However, it must be used in such a manner that no harm is done to creation and to the God-given dignity of humankind. This can be achieved if human beings acquire virtuous postures: truthfulness, courage and trust.
...
"As Pope Francis cites Guardini’s book The End of the Modern World six times in his encyclical Laudato Si! In every reference the critical issue is the radical change human existence undergoes by virtue of the relentless and breathtakingly accelerated insertion of technology into our world. Without encountering a checking, countervailing power, it inexorably imposes itself upon nature and on the ways human beings live and interact. Guardini receives particular attention in chapter three “The human Roots of the Ecological Crisis” and in the final chapter six “Ecological Education and Spirituality.” Pope Francis reminds the reader of his encyclical that also the acquisition of technical power, be it nuclear power, bio technology or knowledge of the human DNA, served totalitarian powers of different persuasions in the 20th century to justify mass murder. In a nuanced manner, the author does add that such power holds the promise of vitality and greater appreciation for values.
...
Paraphrasing Guardini, Pope Francis sees a general lack of education and human formation to deal with such power leading to a naïve freedom without norms. Thus, technical progress lacks direction and self-control. Along with Guardini, Francis stresses that by virtue of its indwelling logic such instrumental or reified reason – created so to speak outside the human mind by the inexorable self-dynamics of technical progress – begins to take control of human society. Rather than developing along the lines of the common good and benefit for humankind, it automatically asserts itself over nature and human beings."
The Three Spiritual Ages According to Roman Guardini
"In The End of the Modern World, Guardini divides the history of the world into three ages:
(1)the medieval world
(2)the modern world and
(3)the coming age after the modern world
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More information
George A.Pinichas writes:
‘Admittedly, Guardini is now a neglected religious thinker.
The Henry Regenery Company of Chicago:
- The Lord, in 1954,
- Power and Responsibility, in 1961,
- and The Virtues, in 1967,’
- George A. Pinichas, ‘The Essential Guardini, ’Modern Age: A Quarterly Review (Spring 2005):pp.171–172.
The most recent works on Romano Guardini published in English include:
- Robert A. Krieg, C.S.C. Romano Guardini: A Precursor of Vatican II (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame, 1997) and
- Robert A. Krieg, C.S.C.,(ed.), Proclaiming the Sacred in the Modern World (Chicago: Liturgical Training Press, 1995).
In 2010, Ignatius Press published ,
- Romano Guardini: Reform from the Source (San 8ROLANDMILLAREFranciscoIgnatiusPress,2010).