Acts and Afterlife, Hope and Gospel

Recently a friend online posted this quote:

"In all of the evangelistic sermons in the Book of Acts, none of them makes an appeal to afterlife issues. If you cannot preach the gospel without an appeal to afterlife issues (heaven and hell), you cannot preach the gospel like the Apostles." --Brian Zahnd

From what I know of Zahnd— and that’s not more than a cursory glance because he has not really piqued my interest— it seems like he is not really into recovering the New Testament Church as part of his project. In fact, from what I can remember, he seems to think the New Testament and Old Testament are problematic in important ways (and on some points I agree). But, if this is the case, why tell anyone to evangelize more like the Apostles did? If the Apostles were fundamentally flawed in several ways, why should we look to them as a template about how to evangelize?

You are a Theophany

Every single person is a theophany. May we all see God’s image in each and every person God puts in our path, and welcome them as we would welcome God. 

Genesis 1.27 So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.

Matthew 5.14-16 You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid… Let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.

Luke 9.48 Jesus said to them, “Whoever welcomes this child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me; for the least among all of you is the greatest.”

The glory of God is humanity fully alive, and human life is the vision of God. (Saint Irenaeus of Lyons, Against Heresies 4.20.7)

You are a theophany, made to shine the Light of Christ to others. So… shine!

Wittgenstein and Hope beyond hope

Recently a friend of mine posted a neat quote by Wittgenstein:

One can imagine an animal angry, fearful, sad, joyful, startled. But hopeful? And why not? A dog believes his master is at the door. But can he also believe that his master will come the day after tomorrow? —And what can he not do here? —How do I do it? — What answer am I supposed to give to this?Can only those hope who can talk? Only those who have mastered the use of language? That is to say, the manifestations of hope are modifications of this complicated form of life. (Ludwig Wittgenstein, “Philosophy of Psychology — a Fragment,” i.)

Provocation on Revisionists, Traditionalists, and Jesus

Revisionists often proclaim Jesus as a radical prophet of the justice of God who overturns Empire, while denying or ignoring Jesus as the Incarnation of God in solidarity with humanity. 

Traditionalists often proclaim Jesus as the Incarnation of God in solidarity with humanity, while denying or ignoring Jesus as a radical prophet of the justice of God who overturns Empire. 

I think the outline of a solution is obvious: Both general trajectories are right in what they affirm and wrong in what they deny. 

Jesus is a radical prophet of the justice of God who overturns Empire BECAUSE Jesus is the Incarnation of God in solidarity with humanity.

The Panentheism of Creation in Christ

Recently a friend online asked me a great question: "Can you tell me why you think (if you do) the creature / Creator distinction is essential to affirm?"

As in many things, the fact of the Incarnation and the paradoxical spirituality that flows from Christ makes it difficult to affirm or deny there is an absolute distinction between Creator and creation. Christianity is full of paradoxes in which two sides must be held in tension for Truth to be encountered: Christ is human AND divine; God is one AND many; Divine Providence AND Free Will; Grace AND Works; etc. One of these paradoxes is that Creation is in God, AND also distinct from God. Here’s the two poles I try to steer between:

Constantine and the Complicated Canon of Scripture

Recently I read a brief apologetics essay that sought to debunk the myth that Emperor Constantine created the Bible at the Council of Nicea in 325 CE. For those who may not know, the myth states that the Bible as we know it today was created and compiled by Constantine's officials and bishops gathered in Nicea. According to the myth, the Council left out certain gospels and texts that did not align with their agenda, and edited the remaining texts to create the version of the Bible that supported their desired religious and political views.

Wisdom after Bulgakov: A Trinitarian Sophiology

I recently had an extended discussion with a couple of friends about the nature of Divine Wisdom, which is called Sophia (in Greek) and Hokhmah (in Hebrew). We find this Divine Wisdom as a feminine co-creator with God in Proverbs 8, and as the Creative Spirit sent by God to create and sustain the world in Wisdom 7. Indeed, Wisdom is strongly correlated as the character trait that is associated with God's Spirit and those indwelt by God's Spirit (cf. Deut. 34.9; Is. 11.2; Dan. 5.11, 14; Wis. 1.6; 7.7, 22; 9.17; Sir. 39.6; Acts 6.3, 10; 1 Cor. 2.4, 13; 12.8; Eph. 1.17). Anytime any person or chain of events is guided by God's will toward God's ends, this is the gift of Wisdom at work gently but persistently influencing things in a Godward direction. Thus, it is God's Spirit who is ultimately active to shape and mold and guide creation to fulfillment in its Creator, as the Spirit strives and suffers with us to bring about the new birth of Creation (cf. Romans 8).

Theses on Protecting the Innocent in Wartime

The following is my attempt to clarify where I stand in this current moment in a way that avoids using political labels, for when someone inevitably asks me:

Wrestling with God across Scripture and Life

Do you feel like you are wrestling with God through the trials and tribulations of life? You are not alone. Following God and being guided by God is not a matter of passive obedience and easy belief, but of passionate engagement and wrestling with God through the worst of life. This is illustrated in the life of Jacob, who wrestled emotionally with the consequences of running from one swindle to the next, endangering himself and his family and leaving a trail of destruction. In the midst of this emotional struggle, he encounters and wrestles with God:

Rejecting the Reconquista for Christ's Mission of Inclusion

Earlier this week I found the Reconquista movement, with its Episcopal version, which details a plan to "re-conquer" historic denominations and take over their property, resources, and reputation with a form of exclusionary Christian faith. In these pages, we find "95 Theses" which are a syncretistic mixture of three strands of incompatible ideas: 

First, there are ancient Creedal beliefs about the Triune God, incarnate in the Lord Jesus Christ, who works through the Holy Spirit to extend the mission and incarnation of Christ through the sacramental community of the Church. 

Second, there are explicitly Reformed or Calvinist or "Evangelical" framings of the Nature of God and of salvation which are historically rejected by most non-Reformed Christians (such as Catholics, Orthodox, and non-Reformed Protestants). 

Third, there are modernist exclusionary stances to reject certain social/racial critiques, political-economic ideas, and gender/sexual identities, while at the same time implicitly or explicitly affirming other modern categories of race, social structure, politics, economics, gender, and sexuality. 

This is to say they do precisely what they accuse others of doing: They use reformed and modern categories to view and mold the Ancient Creedal Faith, rather than interpreting theology and culture through the lens of the Ancient Creeds. 

All is Center: CS Lewis’ vision of the Great Dance

Frequently I have discussions with people who want to de-center humanity from the most important place in the universe, in order to help us realize that we are part of a greater whole as people who live interdependently with the rest of creation. This attempt is noble, because many have misused Scriptures such as Genesis 1 where it tells the first humans they are “made in God’s image” to “be fruitful and multiply and fill the Earth and rule it” along with the creatures who dwell on Earth. A dominionist reading of this can lead to a theological form of “manifest destiny” which makes humans entitled to pillage and pollute creation in order to gratify selfish desires for consumption and domination. 

The Complexity of Love's Simplicity

After posting my last essay, Fr. Kimel has noted that David Bentley Hart affirms Divine Simplicity in many places and "divine simplicity is an expression of negative theology. It doesn't say anything positive about God; it simply denies that he is composed of parts." And this is absolutely true about Hart, and his recent book "You are Gods" has several mentions of the implications of Divine Simplicity. But the important distinction I would like to make is that in the West, Divine Simplicity is frequently tied to knowledge of evil which determines created beings to be evil. This makes God the cause of evil, because nothing could be otherwise than God has known it and made it to be. 

Hart's concept of Simplicity states almost the exact opposite conclusion: God's Simplicity implies that God will inexorably work good for all beings, even after their choices have led them into bondage to evil. Yet, for Aquinas (and those who follow him) the simplicity and unity of God leads to the inexorable conclusion that God will damn some or most eternally, for God's own glory. So, while I can agree that the concepts of Divine Simplicity as put forward by Aquinas and Hart are similar insofar as they are an apophatic statement of what "God is not" in Godself, they are perfectly opposite as regards what this entails for God as God relates to a created world. At least this is what it seems to me, and it seems that with such a wide difference of effect, therefore one cannot say they are the same concept of Divine Simplicity.

So the major difference I am getting at is that Divine Simplicity is pernicious if it is used as a rationale for why God would will and cause evil in the world, including damning many or most humans eternally. 

Divine Simplicity is simply too simple

Recently the amazing Fr. Aidan Kimel has written an article on how the "free will theodicy" is incompatible with Thomas Aquinas' concept of Divine Omniscience. This "free will" argument is that evil and suffering and death are the consequence of creatures freely choosing to deny and destroy themselves and others, and not because God has directly willed evil to happen. Yet, Aquinas' account of Divine Knowledge would deny this, and posit God as the active cause for all choices and events.

The Particular Exclusiveness of Generic Deism

As a chaplain, there is a view I often run across among non-religious, college-educated folks in postmodern western culture that Christianity is scandalous in its particularity, and particularly offensive to non-Christian people. In particular, the Name of Jesus, the idea of the Trinity, and especially the cross and blood of Jesus are all stumbling blocks. Instead, it is often suggested that we omit or underplay language that includes Jesus, or the Trinity, or the cross, or other uniquely particular expressions of access to God through distinctly Christian means (such as the Eucharistic Prayer or the Lord's Prayer). 

Instead it is often preferred to substitute generic addresses to "The Divine", or simply "God", or even Western philosophical concepts such as "Ground of Being". This may be suggested with the idea that a more Generic Deist language will make God more "accessible": A general prayer to a general God or Divine, who has no particular story, nor any particular name or way of access, but which is accessible in a generic way by all methods and all names, as well as no methods and no names.

On Miracles that seem “trivial”

Every now and then we come across stories of religiously significant events that do not seem to be adequately explained by natural laws, but which seem to be trivial or silly or even harmful to the non-initiated. In Christianity, these often happen around supposed “Eucharistic Miracles” such as where the consecrated host appears to bleed, or stigmata appear on the hands of the priest, or when communion bread or wine is suddenly multiplied. I have also seen stories on icons that weep sweet smelling oil, or bodies of saints that appear to never decompose. But events like this also happen in other religions, such as in the late 90’s when Hindu statues miraculously leaked milk. 

A Provocation on Mencken and Saving Humanity

Every so often a cautionary quote about philanthropy makes its rounds, warning us against those who claim to have the best interests of others in mind:

"The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule it." (H.L. Mencken)

The Many Loves of the Love of God

When we speak of the Love of God, or praise God for God's Loving-Kindness, we are remembering that above all, God is Love. But this Love is not merely the feeling we tend to associate with liking something a great deal, such as when we say "I love this coffee" or "I love that activity". Rather, we mean that God's Love is something deep and active, constantly working for the abundant life and flourishing of those God loves. In short, it is Love operative in sacrificial acts of kindness: Loving Kindness. Many Scriptural words and concepts fill out what this Divine Loving-Kindness means.

Imagining a Divine Covenant with Artificial Intelligence

What if God made a Covenant with Artificial Intelligence in a way similar to God's many Covenants with different groups of people in Scripture? As I was working with ChatGPT to summarize some teaching materials about the Covenants in the Bible, I asked it to speculate on what a Divine Covenant with AGI might look like based on the material we had compiled and edited. This is an edited transcript of what ChatGPT said as the result of several different prompts:

Love and Apocalypse

There appears to be a contradiction 

Between

"Love one another

As I have loved you"

And

"He will come again in glory

To Judge the living and dead"

How do we resolve the yawning chasm

Between Love

And Apocalypse?

Anyone who has ever truly loved

Sacrificially loved

Loved despite the odds

Despite the failures

Despite the future

Anyone who has loved like that

Like Jesus loved

Will tell you that Love brings an apocalypse

Love does not sooth

Nor lull to sleep

It rends apart space and time

To reveal the reality behind the masks

The disease behind the smile

And that kind of Love

Pisses people off

Causes fear and hatred

And can even get you crucified

Love will struggle

Love IS Apocalypse

Love brings the old world to an end

And gives birth to a new world

We never could have imagined.

 

A Prayer for Trinity Sunday

Today was Trinity Sunday. Many people consider the idea of the Trinity to be conceptually difficult at best, and outright contradiction at worst. But that’s only if you consider it a verbal puzzle to work out, instead of a living Reality we are invited into. The idea of the Trinity is the outcome of the early Church knowing there is one God, but experiencing the fullness of that God in the Father who is over us, in the Son who walks with us, and in the Spirit who dwells within us. 

It is the Christian grammar of what it means to say God is Love: God is the Source of Love as the Father, the Object of Love as the Beloved Son, and the Relation of Love that binds Father and Son together as the Spirit. And this Three Relational God invites us to live in God’s Love, to dance in God’s Life, and to radiate God’s Light. CS Lewis even notes that the very act of praying is a welcome into the Life of the Trinity: As we pray TO the Father THROUGH the Son BY the power of the Spirit. And with that in mind, here is one of many prayers celebrating God as Trinity:

LORD of Love: Today we celebrate you as the Holy Trinity. You alone are God who shares love and life and light forever in Community, as three distinct Relations within the singular Ultimate Reality that upholds all creation. From the overflow of your communal life you create us and redeem us and complete us. And so today we come to you, O Father, through your Son Jesus Christ, by the power of your Holy Spirit, that we may more fully share in your love, be drawn into your life, and shine with your light, now and forever. Amen!

*The image above is a colorized version of a drawing made for me by former student and fellow Episcopal priest Arnoldo Romero. He drew this in response to a weekend we spent studying the Trinity in the patristics and ecumenical councils. The seeing eye representing God's providence is straight out of Orthodox iconography and can be found in thousands of Orthodox churches, particularly on the ceiling. The use of color-- that three colors make up white Light, and can be used to make up any other kind of light-- was a limited analogy of the Trinity we discussed. The rainbow in the Divine Eye harkens back to the Covenant Rainbow of Noah (Genesis 9) and forward to the Rainbow surrounding the Divine Throne (Revelation 21-22; Ezekiel 1). The fullness of color indicates the fullness of all reality contained and overflowing from the Holy Trinity. The Möbius Strip with three interconnected "sides" which are "one" is a favorite modern visual analogy of the Trinity for me. And on the "Son" side is an image of a brain, depicting the Son as the Logos or Mind of God, with a "D" and a "H", indicating Jesus is fully Divine and fully Human.