Freedom and Gratefulness

The movement of love in the thought of Klaus Hemmerle

Abstract

Self-giving and thanks-giving could represent the two-way movement of the dynamic of love in Klaus Hemmerle’s thought, offering new suggestions on philosophical, theological and aesthetical level. The two terms are deeply interrelated, and build together the “circle of a permanent Easter”, whose inner logic shows the dynamic of freedom in self-giving and the dynamic of gratefulness in receiving. Gratefulness as awareness and free answer in receiving the gift is no long a merely mood, but becomes the hermeneutic key which can highlight on the ontological level the lines of Trinitarian Ontology, on the theoretical level the perspective of verdankendes Denken as gratefulness in the way of thinking, on anthropological level the mutual relationships and selfgiving as main basis for personal identity, on the aesthetical level the perspective of gratefulness for Art, artistic talent and beauty conceived as gifts.