You Are the Now of God: Christus Vivit and the Need for a Theological Anthropology of Youth

Abstract

Adolescents and young adults are generally missing from Catholic theological reflection on what it means to be a human person. However, Pope Francis's 2019 Apostolic Exhortation, Christus Vivit, reveals an operative theological anthropology of young people as inherently good and of adolescence and young adulthood as a life stage that is good in its own right. This, then, can serve as a foundation for a more robust theological consideration of adolescents and young adults in Catholic theological anthropology, in general, and in our understandings of the doctrines of the imago Dei, sin, and grace, in particular.