Ismael Quiles S. J.: interreligious and intercultural dialogue as an aesthetic experience

Abstract

The following study aims to delineate the way interreligious dialogue can occur as an aesthetic experience. By affirming the essential divine ineffability, following the line of negative theology in Eastern Orthodox Christianity, we will see how the very act of dialogue demands its transcendence for God in his ultimate essence is unthinkable, but “feelable”, “experienceable”. Under the guidance of two episodes of Scripture, the ideas of the Cappadocian father St. Gregory of Nyssa and various recent specialized papers, we will try to re-signify the place of the aesthetic in the interreligious experience with the final idea of demonstrating how interreligious dialogue can promote the common feeling of that Presence, beyond doctrinal differences, but without leaving them aside. After highlighting the way in which father Ismael Quiles S. J. conceptualized beauty as a fundamental category in the encounter between religions and cultures, we will move on to a general conclusion that presents aesthetics as an essential modality for the encounter between the different religions of the world in the 21st century.