LaCugna appreciates Rahner’s axiom as a needed corrective, but she thinks the way it is framed and received either threatens divine freedom or keeps Trinity locked in an abstract “immanent” realm; she therefore wants to move beyond the economic/immanent scheme altogether.[1][2][3][4][5][6]
### 1. What she affirms in Rahner’s axiom
– She praises Rahner’s rule (“the economic Trinity is the immanent Trinity and the immanent Trinity is the economic Trinity”) for re‑connecting Trinity and salvation, banishing a “hidden God” behind the God revealed in Christ and the Spirit.[2][5][1]
– She says his theology of self‑communication “revitalized” Catholic trinitarian theology by insisting that in Jesus and the Spirit we meet the real God, not a lesser manifestation.[1]
### 2. Her main worries about the axiom
– She explicitly “questions the second clause” of the axiom (“the ‘immanent’ Trinity is the ‘economic’ Trinity”) insofar as it “implies an unwarranted identification of ‘the free mystery of the economy and the necessary mystery of the Tri‑unity of God’.”[1]
– Like Zizioulas and others, she worries that if the axiom is taken as describing an ontological state of affairs, it can jeopardize God’s ontological freedom by making God’s saving actions ad extra look like necessities of the divine nature.[5][1]
### 3. The dilemma she sees in the usual paradigm
She thinks the economic/immanent paradigm forces a bad choice:
– Either we stress identity (economic = immanent) and risk collapsing God’s free acts into a necessity of God’s being.[5][1]
– Or we stress distinction (economic ≠ immanent) and “attenuate and diminish our expression of the depth of the mystery of Incarnation and grace” that Rahner rightly highlighted.[1]
She also argues that the paradigm itself “inhibits” trinitarian theology because it keeps the discussion focused on coordinating two “Trinities” rather than on worship and participation.[1]
### 4. Her constructive move beyond the axiom
– LaCugna famously writes: “**There is neither an economic nor an immanent Trinity; there is only the oikonomia that is the concrete realization of the mystery of theologia in time.**”[3][4][7]
– Instead of speaking of two Trinities (or two aspects of one Trinity), she wants to speak of the one mystery of God’s life‑with‑us, where God’s eternal triune being is known only in and as this oikonomia.[6][8][2]
### 5. Her “corollary” and practical focus
– She adds a corollary to Rahner’s rule: “**Theology is inseparable from soteriology, and vice versa**,” shifting emphasis from metaphysical coordination of immanent/economic to lived participation in God‑for‑us.[9][2]
– Her critique of the axiom is thus not a rejection of its intent but a re‑framing: rather than treating the rule as a statement about two levels of deity, she wants to dissolve that distinction into a single, practical mystery of the triune God whose life is always already a life for and with creatures.[8][2][6]
Sources
[1] [PDF] CATHERINE MOWRY LaCUGNA’S CONTRIBUTION TO … https://theologicalstudies.
[2] The Dimensions of God’s Life – Religion Online https://www.religion-online.
[3] [PDF] An assessment of some recent Trinitarian thought – Durham E-Theses http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/4394/
[4] [PDF] The Language of Father and the God of Israel https://research-repository.
[5] [PDF] 5. TRINITAS RAHNER _Janggat_ https://media.neliti.com/
[6] [PDF] A Study of the Trinitarian Theology of Catherine Mowry LaCugna … https://repository.divinity.
[7] [PDF] THE TRINITARIAN SOTERIOLOGY OF THOMAS F. TORRANCE A … https://pure.manchester.ac.uk/
[8] [PDF] God For Us – -ORCA – Cardiff University https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/
[9] [PDF] Navigating the Trinity’s Practical Symphony with LaCugna and … https://digitalcommons.csbsju.
[10] [PDF] The Economic Trinity is the Immanent Trinity and Vice Versa https://www.midamerica.edu/
[11] [PDF] Immanent and Economic Trinity https://www.saet.ac.uk/
[12] The image of the immanent Trinity: Implications of Rahner’s Rule for … https://search.proquest.com/
[13] (PDF) Does Karl Rahner Derive His Axiom, “The Economic Trinity is … https://www.academia.edu/
[14] [PDF] Rahner’s Rule: An Emperor without Clothes? – Randal Rauser https://randalrauser.com/wp-
[15] The Image of the Immanent Trinity https://fredfredfred.com/book/
