{"id":4115,"date":"2018-02-20T16:29:05","date_gmt":"2018-02-20T16:29:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ccmj.org\/wp\/?p=4115"},"modified":"2019-12-08T16:33:51","modified_gmt":"2019-12-08T16:33:51","slug":"a-lens-updated-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ccmj.org.uk\/wp\/archives\/4115","title":{"rendered":"A LENS UPDATED"},"content":{"rendered":"

AS A BOLD RESPONSE <\/strong>TO \u201c ECSTASY\u201d \u2013 a perspective from outside ourselves.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Dear CCMJ Associates,
\nIf we are inclusive in understanding our faith \u00a0\u2013 \u00a0as \u201cincarnation\u201d implies \u2013 \u00a0and if democracy involves everyone and their common good, wherein all have room to play their constructive part, then this summing up of one of the key studies behind our \u2018doing of theology\u2019 for today, \u00a0is significant in informing our attempts to interpret Kingdom of God language in terms of public policy today.
\nFirst then, the final paragraph of a short article is given below; in the hope that even in our busy lives we can be encouraged to take time to consider and apply the five paragraphs that preceded it. A full reading will then provide a setting in which we weigh up the Principled\u2013Pragmatism that ICUK (Independent Constitutionalists UK) is trying to spell out for public policy in and for the British Isles.
\nMy suggestion to CCMJ associates is to read this article and, with that cosmic lens in use, to examine www.icuk.life<\/a> in its present stage of evolution. Evolution, that is, in interpreting the concept of the kingdom of God in the workable terms of our contribution to global housekeeping together today in the UK.<\/p>\n

That last paragraph: <\/strong>\u201cWe need a new theology of the cosmos, one that is grounded in the best science of our day. It will be a theology in which God is very present, precisely in all the dynamisms and patterns of the created order, in which God is not rendered absent by the self-organizing activities of the natural world, but in which God is actual as the one who makes and the one who is incarnate in what is made by these very self-making activities.\u201d [1]<\/p>\n

[1] Beatrice Bruteau,\u00a0God\u2019s Ecstasy: The Creation of a Self-Creating World,\u00a0<\/em>(The Crossroad Publishing Company: 2016, \u00a9 1997), 9-10, 13.<\/strong><\/p>\n

And now the full 6 paragraphs:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Reframing Our Cosmology <\/strong>Tuesday, February 20, 2018<\/p>\n

If you wear glasses, perhaps you\u2019ve experienced receiving a new prescription and suddenly you see the world in a new way. We often get used to \u201cseeing the world\u201d with an inadequate or outdated prescription. It is only when we go in for a check up that we realize we need a lens update, and what a difference it makes!<\/p>\n

Cosmology\u2014our understanding of the origins of our world and how our world works\u2014is just like that. How we understand the universe comprises a \u201clens\u201d through which we tend to understand\u00a0everything else in life.\u00a0<\/em>Many of us who grew up in the church don\u2019t realize that we\u2019ve inherited a pretty blurry cosmology: a usually male God, separate from our world, who stands back and judgmentally observes the goings on of our universe and humanity\u2019s faults and failings. This\u00a0just does not work<\/em>, and I do not apologize for saying it.<\/p>\n

This view has gone a long way in perpetuating the idea that we are isolated from each other and from God and that there is something inherently wrong with us and the world. Christianity\u2019s adherence to Greek philosophical ideas that matter and spirit are separate has perpetuated a split between theology (or \u201cGod-talk\u201d) and science.<\/p>\n

Beatrice Bruteau (1930-2014), who brings such profound spiritual intelligence to our necessary conversation, can help us update our cosmology to a lens that is more compatible with science and the world around us.\u00a0<\/em>Rather than a God that is removed from us, she explains how the Trinity reveals God as actively moving in and through our world:<\/p>\n

What we now call\u00a0complexity<\/em>, and recognize as doing its creative work on the very edge of chaos, is at the heart of this miraculous picture. There may not be an external Designer and a micro-managing Providence from the outside, but neither is the world devoid of divinity. The divinity is so intimately present in the world that the world can be regarded as an incarnate expression of the Trinity, as creative, as expansive, as conscious, as self-realizing and self-sharing.<\/p>\n

I have called this creative act God\u2019s ecstasy. Ecstasy means standing outside oneself. It is kin to the\u00a0kenosis\u00a0<\/em>of Philippians 2:6\u2014being God is not a thing to be clung to, so God empties Godself, taking the form of limitation in finitude, and is born as a universe. It is the defining divine act: self-giving, being-bestowing. Ecstasy has the connotations of extreme love and supreme joy. That is right for the creation of the universe.<\/p>\n

And so that last paragraph again: <\/strong><\/p>\n

. . . We need a new theology of the cosmos, one that is grounded in the best science of our day. It will be a theology in which God is very present, precisely in all the dynamisms and patterns of the created order, in which God is not rendered absent by the self-organizing activities of the natural world, but in which God is actual as the one who makes and the one who is incarnate in what is made by these very self-making activities. [1]<\/p>\n

[1] Beatrice Bruteau,\u00a0God\u2019s Ecstasy: The Creation of a Self-Creating World,\u00a0<\/em>(The Crossroad Publishing Company: 2016, \u00a9 1997), 9-10, 13.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

AS A BOLD RESPONSE TO \u201c ECSTASY\u201d \u2013 a perspective from outside ourselves.\u00a0 Dear CCMJ Associates, If we are inclusive in understanding our faith \u00a0\u2013 \u00a0as \u201cincarnation\u201d implies \u2013 \u00a0and if democracy involves everyone and their common good, wherein all … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4115","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-agenda"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ccmj.org.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4115"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ccmj.org.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ccmj.org.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ccmj.org.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ccmj.org.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4115"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/ccmj.org.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4115\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5044,"href":"https:\/\/ccmj.org.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4115\/revisions\/5044"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ccmj.org.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ccmj.org.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ccmj.org.uk\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}