Gospel of Karin

What you know first stays with you, my Papa says.
But just in case I forget
I will take a twig of the cottonwood tree
I will take a little bag of prairie dirt
I cannot take the sky.
And I’ll try hard to remember the songs,
And the sound of the rooster at dawn,
And how soft the cow’s ears are
When you touch them,
So the baby will know
What he knew first.
And so I can remember too.

—From What You Know First, by Patricia MacLachlan and Barry Mosher

Finding the Way Back with Animals
This morning, I heard the sound of barking through an open window. It was a moment of happy recognition; I knew the octave, the pattern, the cadence. Every bark is a little different, you know. This one came from my dog, Henry (Henry James to be precise). Henry is a baritone barker, except on those occasions when his bark suddenly breaks high, like the warbling voice of a teenage boy.

Diesel, my other dog, is a naggy contralto. He is strident and imperious, especially at mealtimes. By the look of him, you might expect him to bark like James Earl Jones or Barry White (if they were dogs). But this morning, it was Henry who I heard barking in the backyard, the sound thrusting forward and dissipating wide and fast across the sky. It wrapped around the house, drifted through the window, and met me where I stood. It emerged from back to fore and I received it joyfully, this comforting, familiar sound.

Years earlier, I held a four pound puppy in my hand. Henry was not yet Henry. He was “Blue,” a reference to the little blue string of yarn tied loosely around his neck to distinguish him from his siblings. A few weeks later, my ex-husband and I took him home. We became coo-ers; “Blue” was so cute. “Blue” was so happy. Also, “Blue” peed everywhere. Cute as he was, I was determined to maintain some house rules. Rule 1: he will never sleep on the bed. Rule 2: he will never get up on the furniture. I liked this little pup alright, but it was not my idea to get a dog. Everything would be ok as long as the rules were followed. But Blue grew into Henry, Henry Fenry, Hank, Cutie Wootie, Baby, Bubba, Bub, and Bubble. He learned to answer to all of these weird endearments and more. Five months later, he was sleeping on the bed. Several months after that, we adopted Diesel. Another dog. What on earth was I thinking? Read the rest of this entry »

Check out this New York Times op-ed, “Taking Science on Faith,” by scientist and sometime theologian Paul Davies.

Davies is one of the writers who contributed to the book on panentheism I’ve been reviewing, In Whom We Live and Move and Have Our Being. See Panentheism: World as God’s Body, Part II.

I sent a letter to the editor about his op-ed, which I’ll post in a couple of days.

In the last couple of posts, I began presenting interrelational views on panentheism, as presented in the book In Whom We Live and Move and Have Our Being. The present post focuses on the perspective of theologian Ruth Page.

Interrelational Perpectives on God, Part III
In an earlier essay, I introduced the concept of emergent monism in theology. As a reminder, emergent monism is inspired by the evolutionary concept of emergence in which natural systems and organisms spontaneously give rise to higher levels of complexity and novel properties. Theologically speaking, emergence refers to the belief that God is not a static substance but a creative, dynamic presence inextricably intertwined with nature and continually advancing it toward higher states of being.

Page argues that emergent monism as a way of understanding God-world relations is problematic for a couple of reasons. First, she suggests that the argument that evolution reveals a pattern of divine purpose is contrary to the evidence. The overwhelming number of occurrences of “natural evil,” such as mass extinctions, tell against divine providence (224, 227). Likewise, she argues that the Process philosophy notion that God lures creatures toward the good is hard to reconcile with natural relationships such as predator and prey.

Second, she objects to ontological hierarchies which grade the intrinsic value of creatures based on what biologist Charles Birch refers to as “richness of experience.” This view, she argues, is rooted in the mistaken belief that complexity and consciousness are simple goods. (Page quoting Birch, 225).1 On the contrary, says Page. Greater complexity and higher levels of consciousness are at best ambiguous with respect to the inherent value of living beings.

Instead, she emphasizes relational over essentialized ontologies in which God values creatures as they are, embedded in their particular situation without reference to humanity. In Page’s words: “the whole of creation is companioned [my italics] by God, not on the basis of hierarchy, but according to what is proper and necessary to the creature in its circumstances” (229).

Rather than panentheism (all in God) as a way of thinking about God’s relationship with living beings, Page proposes the concept of pansyntheism, or all “with” God (231). This idea, she believes, preserves the separate identities required for participants to actually be in relationship, rather than one party overwhelming the other. It also may help us to appreciate that nonhuman creatures have ways of responding to God that are distinct from humans. Their means of relating to God is appropriate for their own kind. As such, it makes no sense to measure their intrinsic value against the value of human beings.

Works cited
Page, Ruth. Panentheism and Pansyntheism: God in Relation,” in In Whom We Live and Move and Have Our Being: Panentheistic Reflections on God’s Presence in a Scientific World (222-32).

Photo: “Predator and Prey” by Carl Purcell, copyright Carl Purcell, image courtesy of www.art.com

Due to a minor accident, I’ve been out of commission for awhile. Now, I continue my ongoing series on panentheistic views as presented in the book In Whom We Live and Move and Have Our Being.

Interrelational Perspectives on God, Part II
In the last post, Interrelational Perspectives on God, Part I, I began presenting interrelational views on panentheism. The present post focuses on the perspective of theologian Keith Ward as conveyed in his essay “The World as the Body of God: A Panentheistic Metaphor.”

Keith Ward argues that the world as God’s body metaphor as proposed by Process theologians (such as David Griffin) is problematic for Christians who maintain that God is perfect and independent of the world. Key objections include:

• God does not emerge from matter, nor does the world contribute to God’s perfection.
• God transcends good and evil. God’s perfection is unimpaired by the struggling, suffering, and competition of the world.(1)
• Evil may happen, it may even be necessary as part of expressing God’s will, but God must have ultimate causal priority, which Process theology does not allow (69-70).

Ward suggests a “communion of persons” model in which Christ serves as the metaphor for God’s body. As Ward explains, God creates free, distinct persons, who through loving, personal relationships help to realize God’s divine perfection. God changes “by relation to persons,” but God’s perfection is unaffected by evil.

The church as body of Christ must carry the divine love into the world through their free, creative actions, with the hope that one day, all will be united in an “integrated and organic communion” with God (an “eschatological panentheism” [71-72]).

Notes
1. In fairness to David Griffin, he understands evil as being part of God’s experience but as having no effect on God’s essence. God has no evil intentions and always “aims for the greatest good.” See David Ray Griffin, “Panentheism: A Postmodern Revelation” in In Whom We Live and Move and Have Our Being (46).

Works cited:
In Whom We Live and Move and Have Our Being: Panentheistic Reflections on God’s Presence in a Scientific World. Philip Clayton and Arthur Peacocke, eds. William B. Eerdsman Publishing Company (Grand Rapids: 2004).

Painting: “When Healing Comes” by Pamela Yates, copyright Pamela Yates, www.pamelayates.com

In the prior two essays, I discussed the views of several theologians as to what it means for the world to be the body of God. These theologians tended to interpret God-world relations through the lens of physics and biology. The theologians in the next three essays understand God-world relations by way of interrelational concepts, such as the Trinity, community, society, ecology, and intersubjective relationships.

In this essay, I present a very brief description of the panentheistic view of Joseph A. Bracken as conveyed in his essay, “Panentheism: A Field Oriented Approach” (see Works cited below).

Interrelational Perspectives on God-Part I
Philip Clayton critiques Process philosophy (viewed as the strongest form of panentheism) as not giving enough attention to the dialectical nature of the antecedent (immutable and primordial) and consequent (changeable and responsive) natures of God (Clayton 83). Trinitarian process theologian, Bracken, attempts to do just this using a conception inspired by Alfred North Whitehead’s concept of “society.” A society is a group of actual entities (the smallest units of experience) that form an enduring level of order. A human being, for example, is a very high-level society (Hosinski 131-32).

The three persons of the Trinity, he explains, “co-constitute an all-inclusive divine field of activity” (212), which stands as the enduring yet dynamic basis from which all levels of creation emerge and become. All fields of creation, which are formed through mutual prehension, also continually prehend the persons of the Trinity, who together co-create the divine unity (212, 217).

Bracken’s approach is an alternative to the organismic view of God-world relations in which God is to world as soul is to body. Bracken believes that this model does not sufficiently preserve the ontological independence of either God or creation. The field metaphor does reflect this independence because lower-level fields are governed by their own laws and help to form higher level fields. Higher level fields in turn, regulate lower levels. Each level maintains an enduring identity while simultaneously being modified through these interrelationships (Bracken 212).

Works cited
In Whom We Live and Move and Have Our Being: Panentheistic Reflections on God’s Presence in a Scientific World. Philip Clayton and Arthur Peacocke, eds. William B. Eerdsman Publishing Company (Grand Rapids: 2004).

Hosinski, Thomas E. Stubborn Fact and Creative Advance: An Introduction to the Metaphysics of Alfred North Whitehead. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc. (Lanham: 1993).

This essay is a continuation of three prior posts on the subject of panentheism as discussed by several essayists in the book In Whom We Live and Move and Have Our Being.

The Revival
God in the World
World as God’s Body-Part I

As mentioned in the prior essay, “World as God’s Body-Part I,” both Arthur Peacock and Philip Clayton believe that human personhood represents a special place in the “ontological relation of, and the interactions between, God and the world” (although God is also present to other levels of reality [Peacocke, 148, 150]).

This view of humans as being closest to God in the natural hierarchy is also held by two other essayists, Paul Davies and Harold J. Morowitz. Davies views God as having set natural laws in place, and bestowed on nature the role of co-creator effected through the capacity of self-organization. Nature appears to have a predetermined direction (“teleology without teleology”), but is free to spontaneously self organize. In other words, God makes the laws that “guarantee a trend toward greater richness, diversity, and complexity,” but the “final outcome…is open and left to chance” (106).

The “crowning achievement,” according to Davies, are intellectual endeavors (math and science) that “capture the very laws upon which this magnificent edifice is constructed,” thereby linking “mind back to the lowest level of complexity,” namely, “particles and fields of matter” (106). Morowitz views emergence in nature as beginning with the “Ground of order” (God), and terminating with the human mind. As he see it, “Transcendence is the divine in us” (136). This special role comes with very high ethical responsibilities to be good, merciful, and humble, but the story of God’s transcendence ends with humans.

Works Cited
In Whom We Live and Move and Have Our Being: Panentheistic Reflections on God’s Presence in a Scientific World. Philip Clayton and Arthur Peacocke, eds. William B. Eerdsman Publishing Company (Grand Rapids: 2004).

Painting: “Hands that Hold Us,” Pamela Yates, copyright Pamela Yates (www.pamelayates.com)