The Eucharistic Cosmology of Teilhard de Chardin

Abstract

A creative renewal of metaphysical conceptions of eucharistic consecration in the face of dominant models based on ecclesial community has the potential to make a valuable contribution to mission and spirituality by relating the Eucharist to the active lives of lay people within the Church and outside it. This is a possibility for many churches and not just those with a Catholic liturgical tradition. The Jesuit theologian and palaeontologist Pierre Teilhard de Chardin develops a suggestive eucharistic theology as part of a cosmological vision in which the whole of creation is ultimately dependent on the transforming power of the Eucharist. The antecedents of this theology are to be found in the philosophy of Gottfried Leibniz and Maurice Blondel, and it has clear affinities with Gregory of Nyssa's eucharistic imagery. Fundamental to it are the notions of sacred space, incarnation and transfiguration.