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The chart above shows the evolutionary development of religion. As a process theologian I can say that even my own Christian religion for myself, and for my time and space, continues to redefine itself from its past in significantly more helpful ways than did my traditional teachings of classic Christianity had done.
That even in this small regard, the evolution of the Christian religion continues apace with all world religions as each examines their own origins, past teachings and beliefs, and adjust all centralized tenets to better comport with today's metamodern worlds of contemporary thought-and-living.
It is why I felt Whiteheadian process philosophy could help not only my own beliefs but my observations to the world and sciences around me. Which is also why great pains have been taken to share my journey here from traditional Christianity towards a Process form of Christianity which I have written down at length.
That God is love. That Love is central to the cosmology of God and the universe we live within. That love must become central to all our relationships with each other and nature about us. That Process Theology can take the Christ event of redemption and apply it meaningfully in the direction of love and healing, as it was meant to be by the God of Love. And how that love, as shown through the person of Christ Jesus, is also the path we must take in a processual world of relationality of all things to all things.
Process, for myself and for others, is the more meaningful way forward from traditional Christianity's dipolar God of love and wrath. It doesn't deny sin, or consequences of sin and evil, but it also says the God who loves always, is never a part of sin and evil. Does not perpetrate or cause it. And does not extend or continue it in forms of wrathful judgement and hell. Traditional Christianity has idolatrized God with our own human natures. But God is not us though we are to become like God in love, outreach, helps, works of kindness, and so forth. Not as forms of salvation but as forms of growing our inner beings deriving purpose, identity, satisfaction, care, healing, and mission.
A Process God is a God who is processual Savior, Re-Creator, Redeemer, Healer of our souls; the world's soul;, nature's soul. A process God is generative and good and meaningfully present every moment of our lives. And that the future is open - wishing, yearning, longing to fulfill itself in the direction of divine love and beauty, fellowship and enjoyment amongst its members.
This is the process theologian's vision of today's new post-evangelical, post-Christian religion and what it may become with Jesus and divine Love at the center of its bones when shunning Hellenism, Platonism, Rationalized Enlightenment, and all creedal church statement describing God as other than God is.
Here, today, I found the presentation below to helpfully extend the meaningfulness of myth and mythos traditions in terms of redemptive storylines. The bible shares a historicity with past events but its oral traditions also extended religious man's ideation of God... some good, some not so good. Rather than to look to Karen and Brian's commentary as a definite judgment upon religious beliefs I thought it may be helpful to examine the storyline of religion through their minds and hearts. Who are asking and observing the many commonalities much of the world is asking itself of religion... if there is any good which may be found in belief.
For myself, I say yes, if redirected more healthily towards the belief in a God who is Love and who had Loving shared God's Self with us through God's incarnation and resurrection.
Lastly, I would observe that neither Karen nor Brian speak to the newest development in salvific Christianity - that of Process Christianity based upon Whitehead and expanded by John Cobb over their lifetimes of examination asking questions of life, death, despair, myth, religion, and ecology.
Blessings,
R.E. Slater
November 20, 2022
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| World Science Festival |
Questions of Life, Death, Despair,
Myth, Religion, and Ecology
Sacred Nature with Karen Armstrong
Premiered Nov 10, 2022
Bestselling author and religious historian Karen Armstrong joined Brian Greene for a conversation exploring humankind’s evolving relationship with the Earth, life, and the cosmos. To save ourselves and the planet, do we need to reestablish our sense that nature is sacred? This program is part of the Big Ideas series, supported by the John Templeton Foundation. Co-Presented with, and filmed at, the New-York Historical Society.Official Site: https://www.worldsciencefestival.com/Twitter: https://twitter.com/WorldSciFestFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/worldscience...
AUTHOR
Karen Armstrong is the author of numerous books on religious affairs, including The Case for God, A History of God, The Battle for God, Holy War, Islam, Buddha, and The Great Transformation, as well as a memoir, The Spiral Staircase. Her work has been translated into forty-five languages. In 2008 she was awarded the TED Prize and began working with TED on the Charter for Compassion, created online by the general public, and crafted by leading thinkers in Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Confucianism. The charter was launched globally in the fall of 2009. She is currently an ambassador for the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations. She lives in London.
PHYSICIST, AUTHOR
Brian Greene is a professor of physics and mathematics at Columbia University, where he also serves as the director of Columbia’s Center for Theoretical Physics. Greene is recognized for a number of groundbreaking discoveries in his field of superstring theory, including the co-discovery of mirror symmetry and the discovery of spatial topology change. His books—The Elegant Universe, The Fabric of the Cosmos, The Hidden Reality, and Until the End of Time: Mind, Matter, and Our Search for Meaning in an Evolving Universe—have collectively spent over 67 weeks on The New York Times bestseller list, and were the basis of two award-winning NOVA mini-series, which he hosted. In 2008, Greene co-founded the World Science Festival, where he serves as Chairman of the Board. His latest book, Until the End of Time: Mind, Matter, and Our Search for Meaning in an Evolving Universe, was released in 2020.
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