I stumbled on to Wikipedia the other day. Wikipedia is an online open source encyclopedia. Anyone, absolutely, anyone can go in and edit. I decided to check out the Christianity articles and found myself in the Religious Philosophy page.

First of, someone made a good distinction between Religious Philosophy and Philosophy of Religion. Religious Philosophy is philosophical thinking guided by religious assumptions or premises. Pretty much the entire Summa of Catholic philosophy falls into this category. Philosophy of Religion is more about the the phenomenon of religion and its philosophical aspects.

The Religious Philosophy entry was not quite as good as one would like, but so be it. So I added a few things. For instance in listing important Christian philosophers, they list Augustine (good), Aquinas (good), then they list Francis Bacon. Francis Bacon, if I am correct is the English philosopher of the Modern philosophy. I think the person had Roger Bacon, the 12th century Franciscan and experimentalist, in mind. Now, Roger Bacon is a very significant figure in Medeival learning and in the history of science, but no one would list him as a signigicant Christian philosopher. So I removed his name, but I was able to give him an honorable mention. I noted that St Albert the Great, was Thomas Aquinas' mentor. Albert, like Roger Bacon of Oxford, was an amazing experimentalist for his time. BTW, I understand that Roger Bacon was probably the first person in the west to explode gun powder, which he must have received from the Arabs.

Next I dutifully added the most brilliant Catholic thinker of all time, Blessed John Duns Scotus. Also added Anselm to the list. Anselm is the father of the scholastic movement in terms of content, though Peter Lombard's Sentences provided the impetus for the scholastic format. I also added William Ockham, the Franciscan, to the list. Scotus and Ockham are crucial transitory figures in the move to modern philosophy. Their logical distinction were very important. Although, I don't know that Ockham liked Scotus much. BTW, Scotus, is the guy who came up with the Immaculate Conception theological defense.

An interesting bit here. Scotus was from . . . Scotland and the British aisle ahd a very strong Marian tradition going back a few centuries to Anselm. And so when you read St Anslem's work, his Mariology is quite high. I note this because Scotus is more my type of theologian, the one who knows what he believes and finds a theological way to make it work. His theology was in response to his devotion as opposed to the Aristotle worship of Aquinas.

Going on with this Wikipedia thing, there was a list of modern Christian Philosophers which included names like Kiekegard (fine), Karl Barth (what the heck?), G. K. Chesterton (You're kidding right?), C. S. Lewis (I can live with that), Wyotila (fine), Platinga (fine) . . . Kind of an odd ball list. I added John Henry Newman, whose monumental work An Essay in the Aid of a Grammar of Assent is an amazing description of the human journey to certitude. BTW, karl Barth doesn't quite belong there, from what I understand, he was more of a pure theologian. Bultmann, the other German guy, can be list for his contribution to hermeneutics. But again, here is where the differences between Catholicism and Protestantism show up. In the Catholic tradition, the distinction between theology and philosophy has been worked out in pretty extensive detail, while Protestant thought hasn't quite done that.

Anyway, that section is going to need a lot of work it seems. It would seem like a worthy goal bring that section up to speed. I just don't have the time.