Transferring Self to Other: Radicalizing Human Being

This article begins by indicating recent developments in philosophical anthropology that provide background for understanding some key elements in the view of what it is to be human that underlie Chiara Lubich’s text “Look at all the Flowers.” The author begins by looking at self-transcendence and notes the shift from previous instances of spirituality that comes about as a result of Chiara Lubich’s context of mutuality, of her reciprocal transfer of self to the other. He then looks at the metaphysical structure that supports this way of being, and explores three core categories: transcendence, relationality, and corporeality. These underpin relationships according to the pattern of the Trinity that take people in relationship beyond themselves individually, and, at the same time, beyond their mutual relatedness. This is a different way of being human that also opens up the possibility of a different way of knowing