Volume 26, Issue 1, January 2009
Jack Mulder, Jr.
Pages 42-63
KIERKEGAARD AND NATURAL REASON
A CATHOLIC ENCOUNTER
In this paper I consider Kierkegaard’s pseudonymous attack on natural theology with respect to how it lines up with Catholic thought on that topic. I argue that Kierkegaard’s recently shown similarities to accounts of basic beliefs raise an interesting question when a Catholic hybrid of basic beliefs and natural theology, which I develop in the paper, is considered. Kierkegaard does not attack what we might call natural reason, or a natural awareness of God’s existence, only natural theology’s demonstrative capabilities, and his reasons for doing the latter, in our current epistemological climate, are shown to be mistaken.