John Saward
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Father John Saward is a fellow of Greyfriars and associate lecturer of Blackfriars at the University of Oxford, having held the posts of Professor of Dogmatic Theology in the International Theological Institute, Gaming, Austria and Visiting Professor in Systematic Theology and Christology in the same Institute.
Father Saward completed a BA (Philosophy and Psychology) and Postgraduate Diploma in Theology at the University of Oxford in 1969. In 1973 he completed an MA and M.Litt. also at Oxford. Ordained an Anglican priest in 1972, he was received into the Catholic Church in 1979. He lectured in Dogmatic Theology at St Cuthbert's College, Durham, and was Professor of Systematic Theology at St Charles Borromeo Seminary in Pennsylvania, prior to his appointment as Professor of Dogmatic Theology in the International Theological Institute, Gaming, Austria.
His published works include: The mysteries of March: Hans Urs von Balthasar on the Incarnation and Easter (1990), Redeemer in the Womb: Jesus Living in Mary (1993), Christ is the Answer: The Christ-centred teaching of Pope John Paul II (1995), The Beauty of Holiness (1996), The Way of the Lamb: The Spirit of Childhood and the End of Age (1999), Cradle of Redeeming Love: The Theology of the Christmas Mystery (2002) and Sweet and Blessed Country: The Christian Hope for Heaven (2005). He has been responsible for the English translations of works by Hans Urs von Balthasar, Pope Benedict XVI and Christoph Cardinal Schonborn.
He has been described by Father Aidan Nichols as "the Balthasar of the English-speaking world." However, in recent years Saward appears to have come to share the growing unease among orthodox Catholics about the nature and origin of Balthasar’s theology. In his 2005 work The Sweet and Blessed Country he describes Balthasar’s theory of universal hope as “a kind of blasphemy.” Alyssa Pitstick, one of the Swiss theologian's most telling and insightful critics, studied under Saward at the International Theological Institute.
Saward’s work has been evolving not only in content but also in method and style towards a form which combines ‘ressourcement’ with the rigour of scholasticism. Sacred art also plays a prominent role in this method.
