FredP

I appreciate your satisfaction, Flow. But of course you know I'm being quite serious, and genuinely hope that conservative and traditional brothers and sisters will take my reply for its content, and not as a cranky personal attack. If anybody can sympathize with the elegance of traditionalist view from the inside, believe me, I can. But I do genuinely disagree with the observation that a constructive modern approach to faith and spirituality need be elitist or relativist. On the contrary, I think the people who are making the biggest strides in modern spirituality are doing so precisely because they're integrating the most universal and critical insights from the deep core of their traditions. The quacks who just kick all tradition onto the scrap heap and invent crazy theories and practices from scratch can't possibly compete with the enduring wisdom, truth, and beauty of the great religions. Anyone seeking this ultimate wisdom, truth, and beauty would be a fool to ignore the treasures found there. But to suppose that the final word has been handed down once and for all in one particular tradition -- and the authority to interpret it given to a political body conspicuously similar in form and structure to a Roman imperial council, and alone vouchsafed and protected from error for all time by the Holy Spirit? Wow, that takes a powerful lot of faith. And I'm not just beating up on Catholics here -- any Christian who looks to the early councils and creeds for theological finality has got a whole lot of human foible and face-saving to contend with. I wonder, how many ordinary folks do you suppose considered Augustine and Aquinas "elitist" for couching their theologies in terms of the ancient Greek philosophical systems of Plato and Aristotle? Maybe the only people who could actually read didn't mind. The playing field is a whole lot different now, when far more people than ever before are taking an active role in the formation of their spiritual lives. I appreciate that this characterization may seem "elitist" to those of a more traditional bent. But it seems hard to deny that, over the last few centuries, people have been seeking to make their own what for most of human history has been merely mediated to them (for your safety and protection!) via a "divinely ordained" authority structure. If that's a bad thing, then we really do live in different worlds.

Yeah, it gets really annoying to keep recrafting sentences over and over again, just to not have to use a pronoun! I considered, in the same vein as G-d, using -e for he/she and h- for him/her/his/hers, but it would have to be awfully clear from the context, and well, it just looks a little dumb. I suppose if I used it enough, it might become clear. I don't think there's a great answer without inventing a new word.

Unfortunately, the thread took a (hopefully) temporary turn south last week. I apologize to DavidD for oversimplifying your perspective in some of my posts, and to anyone else who took my words divisively. There is a theological sense in which all our words about God ultimately do fall short, and so silence is the only precisely accurate response. But we can and must make statements that have some degree of practical or analogical value, and criticize statements that are misleading. All that to say: no, I don't think this discussion is futile. I read your original post as suggestive, for the purposes of stimulating discussion, and not as some sort of definitive claim that was meant to close the book on the nature of God.

The Creator/creation model does have positive metaphorical value for expressing the meaningfulness and purposefulness of the universe in relation to God. But philosophically I steer clear of it, because it suggests an image of God as a kind of craftsman or artifacer. This image tends to suggest that God fashions the world out of some sort of raw material, rather than out of the divine being itself, and that therefore God is not ultimate reality. Furthermore, on this model, God is not the source of our being, just our form. For all practical purposes though, it's probably still one of the best models we've got.

That's just it, from the conservative/traditional Catholic perspective, the Catholic Church is not man-made, but definitively initiated by Jesus Christ, and perfectly guided into its present form by the Holy Spirit. This is not incidental to the disagreement: it is the disagreement. Without understanding this, any discussion concerning personal preferences about spirituality, what "works" and what doesn't for whom, etc., is ultimately beside the point. Having said that, I believe that this claim to unique initiation and guidance status for Catholic Christianity in particular is notoriously circular, and falls quite short of James' desire to maintain a notion of Truth, and of "the ability of humans to know and to some degree prove it." The Catholic Church's ecclesiology of apostolic succession, for example, is based primarily on an idiosyncratic reading of a word-play in the gospels -- "You are Petros, and on this petra I will build my church..." -- a very convenient interpretation which (any Catholic will admit) no other church in the world recognizes. In fact, the New Testament, ounce for ounce, seems to paint St. Paul in the clear position of leadership, both doctrinally and pastorally. Of course, Rome can always haul out its arsenal of proof texts, as it always does; but it remains highly curious to me how its own claims to unique authority in the spiritual landscape are based on interpretations of texts and traditions that even other Christian churches don't share. We're far from the realm of clear and demonstrable Truth here, even if we're taking the Bible literally and/or seriously. Incidentally, I was received into the Catholic Church as an adult too, in 1999, when I was not much older than James. I know all the arguments for the primacy of Peter, the role of Mary, and everything else. But I just couldn't continue to hold onto such a vicious circularity as the Catholic defense of its own authority structure. It has nothing to do with a modern criticism of Truth or Authority per se, but with these particular, idiosyncratic, and circular claims to them. Who gets to say that the integration of the gospel with Greek philosophy was God's will, but the integration of it with eastern philosophy is syncretistic? Only whichever Pope or council authorized the synthesis, apparently. As for the spirituality movement being "dangerous to humanity because it recasts us in the role of the playthings of the gods from pagan times," well, I've already conceded elsewhere that there's enough New Age quackery out there to constitute a spiritual danger to humanity. When Sylvia Browne is on the same shelf as Ken Wilber, "metaphysics" and "spirituality" cease to have much substantial public meaning in the marketplace. But I'm being just as critical of the "mass-membership mentality" of New Ageism as that of conventional religion. Spirituality doesn't necessarily mean leaving religion behind, and this is where my initial comment about pinning the terms down with finality comes back around. Religion does give people some of the best spiritual resources you can find, if only most people would bother to drop the power and authority fixation and actually look for them.

Community vs. autonomy is a false dichotomy. Even you, James, were welcomed into the Catholic Church because you chose to be. Your embrace of specifically Catholic modes of worship, doctrine, practice, etc. is just as much an exercise of your spiritual autonomy as the embrace of more syncretistic modes by others here. In your case, I wouldn't necessarily call your acceptance a "mass-membership mentality." As for believing in Truth, and in the existence of ways to know and demonstrate Truth to some degree, I stand right with you. However, the fact that many here do not share the specificities of your beliefs, does not constitute a rejection of Truth itself. Surely you did enough homework before being received into the Roman Catholic Church to realize that the formation of Christian doctrine was quite a syncretistic process in its own right. To claim Holy Spirit-guided inspiration for that process alone would be very myopic.

We took a trip up to western Michigan to visit my sister and brother-in-law, and their new son Ethan, who was born last Sunday (11/20). So it was the first time the cousins met face-to-face -- even though John has met Ethan face-to-belly. My mom has been with them for the last two weeks to help my sister with labor and adjusting to motherhood, so she was with us as well. The weekend went way too fast. We crashed in-laws' Thanksgiving celebrations on both Thursday and Friday, so much turkey and stuffing was had by all. It's nice to be back in our own home again, though. A blessed first Sunday of Advent to everyone.

Excellent topic! I've actually had trouble finding that Watts book in stores. It's one of the few I don't have. But I have read Behold the Spirit, twice within six months actually, and I had the same feeling. He just gets Christianity so deeply and profoundly. I suppose he just didn't find that level of understanding in 97% of what passes for Christianity in the West, and felt he had to look for it elsewhere. It's too bad -- 20th century Christian spirituality could really have used more books by him! You're right, advent is a great time of year to consider this topic. I was just thinking about that on the way into work this morning! I'm coming to the end of a three-year process of reunderstanding the Christmas story as an allegory of the descent of the One. Ken Wilber's books are also great modern sources for PP, especially The Eye of Spirit.

Hey, I was just thinking about watching that movie! Comfortably Numb Fruitcake? Never saw that one. In truth, it is much easier to make a bad fruitcake than a good one. Anything that can be pasted together with mortar to form a wall is not strictly eligible for eating.

Don't tempt me!

You are a troublemaker. But you bring up a good point, of course, that the definitions of the words require taking the statement in context. It seems to me Sister Joan's observation is that a genuine encounter with God can begin when the canned mass-membership mentality of conventional religion ends. True enough. Not all spirituality is "a geniune encounter with God," and not all religion is a "canned mass-membership mentality," of course. But one doesn't have to pin down the words in any sort of final way to appreciate the observation she's trying to make. She's not writing philosophy, after all.

Welcome! South Korea, eh? Do they say all y'all over there?

I find it rather unnecessary to wrap all my ideas about God in the disclaimer, "I believe, but am not certain, that God might be like ___." Isn't that implied in the fact that I'm saying something, that it's my opinion? If I'm making a suggestion, it seems clear enough to everyone else that I'm offering my opinion, not trying to shove it down their throat. At the same time, I'm going to defend my opinion, because, well, it's my opinion. If I didn't believe it was correct, it wouldn't be my opinion, now would it? Moreover, I haven't tried to tell anyone that I know God better than they do. Even my philosophical ideas about God are just ideas. Even if they're right, it doesn't mean that I know God at all. In fact, truth be told, I'd give up all the ideas I might think I have for one tiny taste of that blessed union with the All in All.

I think the strain is due to the fact that two different fundamental views of reality are being presumed in all these discussions. To make matters worse, there's enough New Age quackery out there for any naturalist to rightfully cringe at the mere suggestion of anything "metaphysical." It's difficult to defend a metaphysical or platonic view today without being accused of rash oversimplifications, even though there's nothing simple or reductionistic about it. It's important to keep in mind that a metaphysical system is not a scientific theory. The platonic belief that the universe is patterned after universal forms and structures of thought isn't an "alternate explanation" for electrical charge or sexual reproduction. It's not a flight from reality; it's a committment to face reality head on, with the confidence that whatever we find will ultimately be rationally intelligible. It seems to me that this confidence is what drives people to become scientists in the first place. As far as God being "more involved in the universe," I'm beginning to lose track of the number of times I've said that this conception is incoherent. If I've sounded like I'm pushing for an interventionist God, then I've really badly failed at explaining myself. God isn't in the universe: the universe is in God. I know that feels emotionally distant, but as I said the other day, emotional distance is a human response to power that we project onto God. As the mystics have universally experienced, God is nearer to you than you are to your own self, because your own self is not other than God. But here we are getting off again into very different conceptions of God, so I'm not sure how much this is helping anyone anymore.

Personally, I'm just not sure how one can be "devoted to God, whoever and whatever God is," without having any idea -- or any conceivable way of finding out -- whoever and whatever God is. If you view the philosophical exploration of God as no better than astrology, then I guess "something greater than me" is probably the best you can hope for. If it works for you, then nobody's "insisting" that you change. On the other hand, just because I'm human, and the philosophers who have influenced me are human, doesn't mean that all ideas about God are worthless. Sorry if that sounds harsh, but I am a philosopher, and I have to defend my turf a little.

No, "substance" doesn't mean "material." I was just distinguishing between looking at something as a "thing" or as a "process," and saying that theses, antitheses, and syntheses are types of "things," while differentiations, integrations, and oppositions are types of "processes." Of course there is a polarity going on here too, because you can view a process as a thing, and a thing as a process -- but that was my whole point in saying that the two triads map directly onto each other. Remember brain droppings?

I think it is known as Physics Physics isn't more powerful than God: physics is God, crammed into mathematical form.

It is interesting, as I remarked when we bumped this thread, to see how my ideas have and have not changed. I see some subtle differences, but then I also read some posts that sound like I just wrote them yesterday. Others were crucial in the formation of some ideas that I now hold in a more developed fashion. (Like the one where I discovered Anti-being!) I was mulling again tonight (I have a 45 minute drive to/from work now), and it seemed to me that the notion of procession needs to be expanded upon, so that there is an explicit reference to both differentiation (downward) and integration (upward), as these seem to be quite distinct processes. This actually produces another triad -- differentiation, integration, opposition -- which, apart from just so happening to take the shape of a cross, also holds an interesting relationship to Hegel's triad. Hegel's triad -- thesis, antithesis, synthesis -- maps stations or substances, where my triad maps procedures or processes. Interestingly, my triad represents the relationships that hold between Hegel's stations, and Hegel's triad represents the poles that crystallize out of the various processes of mine. I thought it had a certain wave-particle duality about it that was rather satisfying. I also noted that these fundamental metaphysical symbols of triad and cross are quite uniquely important to Christianity.

I could start a topic for that!

If God isn't all powerful, then there is some other Being, or Force, or Reality, or Whatever Have You, that has some power God doesn't have, and is therefore more powerful than God. So then why isn't this other Being, Reality, etc. called God? At some point you have to employ a workable definition of Godness, or else God is just somebody's name, so why not call him Bill or Steve or Ethel?

The two aren't at odds. Of course one finds these patterns expressed in the physical universe, because (in Platonic terms) the particular is an expression of the universal. Creation begins with universal forms, and proceeds downward to matter. That's not a "beginning" in chronological time, however, but an expression of ontological dependence. In chronological time, the situation is reversed: elementary matter evolves through higher and higher forms to embody universal principles. I don't think so. Light and darkness are opposites; procession and opposition are orthogonal. (That's the $64,000 word for "at right angles," or independent from a structural standpoint. But they're not opposites.) Darkness is the mirror image of light -- its photographic negative, an analogy which works especially well in this case. So, if light is procession, then darkness isn't opposition, but the opposing procession. Does that distinction make sense? That may be what you meant. Yes, for every form, there is an equal and opposite anti-form. Greece and Rome in harmonic opposition? I don't think Rome really gave us anything, intellectually speaking, that didn't come from Greece. (Of course, I had an ex-coworker who would say everything worthwhile from Greece actually came from Turkey. The fact that he was Turkish probably didn't cloud his judgment on this particular claim at all...) Christianity, Gnosticism, and Neoplatonism all relied heavily on classical Greek thought for their metaphysical structure. Which is why they were so right on just about everything.

Yes, Marcion taught that the wrathful God of the O. T. was a different (and inferior) God than the God of Christ. This became the basis of some of the harsher dualistic forms of Gnosticism, who unilaterally equated the O. T. God with the Demiurgos. However, not all Gnostic groups wanted to be this controversial. I'm not sure if Manicheanism made that identification explicitly or not, but it was there implicitly at least. There is a lot going on in the O. T. -- thinking about creation and fall, the flood, and the tower of Babel, especially -- that really raises my eyebrows. As I don't believe these stories are historical, my concern isn't over who was the god in these stories, really? It's just the fact that there is this conception of god buried deep in our cultural and religious subconscious, who seems intent on keeping us in our place at any cost, including thwarting, and destroying if necessary, all our efforts at reaching him. It's tempting to chuckle in our modern smugness, and say, "Oh, look at those primitive folk and their silly tribal conceptions of God! How unenlightened they all were!" But upon closer inspection, the god they projected into these myths turns out to be a frighteningly accurate representation of our personal, social, and cosmic situation -- so much so that I'd go as far as to use the unfashionable word "inspiration" to describe them. Maybe our flowery, modern conceptions of God are the ones that are really unenlightened. All the same, I don't buy into the two Gods theory of Marcion and the Gnostics. A polarity of cosmic "principles," yes; gods -- small "g" -- in a much more limited sense, if you want to call them that, sure. It's back to the primal duality of manifestation into which G-d enters in the self-creation of the cosmos. But the "two gods" are no more two than the two ends of a magnet. If you cut them in half, you don't separate the poles, you get two polarities instead of one. If you keep cutting them in half, you get an endless procession of polarities, you get... well, the universe. I was mulling this over the other night, and it occured to me that these two fundamental concepts in metaphysics -- procession and opposition -- together are sufficient to explain the universe in its totality. Procession, which has been explored by Western thought, deals with the structural nature of forms, that they differentiate and integrate along the "chain" of Being. Opposition, which has been explored by Eastern thought, deals with the polar nature of forms, that a form logically includes and implies its opposite. It occured to me that these two views are in fact at perfect right angles to each other. Cool, huh!

Right. I wouldn't get it for the Christian spirituality section alone. My wife just happens to be into the holistic health and cooking scene, so between the two of us, we can come up with 10 books to buy.

We got a mailing last week from a book club called One Spirit (http://www.onespirit.com). They're having a pretty nice sign-up offer: 5 books for $2 (plus S&H of course, so it's more like $15, but still), with 4 more books to buy in the next 2 years. Pretty decent selection.

Of course, there is some salesmanship going on here. The Bible didn't fall out of the sky containing all the truth there is; but to say the whole thing is unlaterally a "WILLFUL" distortion of the truth isn't quite fair either. Do you really think that the Bible and the Qur'an are "works of political propaganda created by Taliban-like fundamentalists to justify religious violence"? If that were true, then the texts would have no value even to their esoteric and gnostic interpreters, among whom Freke and Gandy count themselves. But of course, you're smart enough to pick through the commercialism and get to the good stuff. Actually, I recently picked up all three of the popular new Freke and Gandy books myself (book club enrollment), and sometime in between work and being a dad I'll get around to reading them. (So, sometime in 2031, maybe?) The Laughing Jesus is billed as dealing with the subject of literalism in western religious texts, which is a good topic these days. Like you, and many others here no doubt, biblical "inerrancy" in some form or other, was the first thread that I started pulling on in my exploration of my fundamentalist roots. And before long the whole sweater was one big mess of fabric lying in a tangled ball on the floor. It is scary, and liberating, and worthwhile. Just keep your head on straight!