Although many contemporary theologians and philosophers of religion distinguish between ‘idolatry’ in a general sense and ‘conceptual idolatry’ as a distinct error, close attention to theorists of idolatry shows that ‘conceptual idolatry’ should not be considered distinct from idolatry proper. After discussing the relation between concepts and idolatry in key thinkers from the phenomenological and grammatical traditions, this article discusses analytic attempts to understand idolatry, showing how each falls short.

Ultimately, attention to the category of ‘conceptual idolatry’ shows the deficiencies present in contemporary framings of idolatry simpliciter. This article concludes with a proposal for a new framework by which to understand the dispute about idolatry: turning away from the question of whether we are worshipping the right God, towards the question of how God might (and might not) become apt to human thought and speech.

This article discusses and critically evaluates the dispute between Herbert McCabe and his pseudonymous interlocutor G. Egner with respect to the doctrine of transubstantiation. The aim is to treat their views of that doctrine as exemplary of the difference made by what might be called a ‘Grammatical Thomist’ approach to our view of the nature of the sacrament of the Eucharist, of sacraments in general, and of theology's propensity to violate the rules of sense that are constitutive of ordinary language and of philosophical systems alike, in order properly to establish and maintain a believer's relation to God. Particular attention is paid to the way McCabe's account at once taps into unacknowledged aspects of Wittgenstein's vision of what it is to be human and violates what are usually regarded as the enabling conditions of that vision's articulation.

This paper defends Herbert McCabe OP against anti-realist charges, particularly Francesca Murphy's extended criticisms of McCabe as a ‘Story Thomist’. McCabe stands accused of reading Thomas Aquinas, in part through Wittgenstein, such that concern for method and language displaces concern for God. Rather, McCabe's story is one of God raising up human beings so that their language and activities develop as they grow in divine life. Beginning with his account of religious obedience, I argue that McCabe is a realist sensitive to the journey of finite creatures towards the mystery of God. Developing in divine life is not primarily informational, but is an entering into the mystery of God so as to share in God's own self-knowledge, a knowledge that humans cannot claim to possess on their own terms. McCabe's Wittgensteinian-inflected Thomism embraces the real gift of divine self-knowledge and the ongoing development of human language and activities in receiving this gift.

Herbert McCabe was, by widespread acclaim, one of the greatest Catholic thinkers in the English speaking world during the final quarter of the last century. He was also deeply committed to radical left‐wing politics. What is the relationship between these two facts? I lay out what I take to be the key themes in McCabe's politics before arguing that, in contrast to significant strands in present day political theology, he had a keen sense of the respective roles of faith and reason in guiding political action. This allowed him to commit himself to a politics which was more radical than much of what has followed him, whilst having a clear sense of how Christian faith ought to be allowed to condition political engagement. The article concludes by drawing out lessons from McCabe for thinking about faith and politics. Not least of these is that we ought to avoid the lure, often articulated in terms of the ‘unifying’ role of the Church, to eschew conflict.