Zoom Info: Click on the session links below to access. (You must be enrolled in the course.)
Course Summary
While “process philosophy” is wider than the work of Alfred North Whitehead, the depth and dynamism of his thought principally inspire its modern expression. This five-part course introduces students and life-long learners to the central themes, contours, and ideas of Whitehead’s “philosophy of organism.”
Course Description
Whitehead’s “philosophy of organism” is one of the most significant attempts in all of philosophy to think through what reality must be like because you are apart of it. His philosophical vision is at once vast, various, and prismatic. His wife Evelyn once used the wonderful metaphor of a prism to describe his thinking, saying: “It must be seen not from one side alone but from all sides, then from underneath and overhead. So seen, as one moves around it, the prism is full of changing lights and colours. To have seen it from one side only is to not have seen it.” The five sessions of this course aim to reveal the various sides, lights, and colors belonging to Whitehead’s process philosophy from the microscopic to the macroscopic, and in direct relation to your experience as an expression of the universe.
Session one surveys the basic thematic and historical dimensions of “process philosophy” as a current of philosophical thinking with both ancient antecedents and creative modern expressions. Session two dives into Whitehead’s analysis of human experience, clarifies the fundamentals of his “philosophy of organism,” and considers some of the challenges, problems or questions that often emerge from his theory. Session three clarifies the fundamental place of possibility, novelty and value in Whitehead’s philosophy, particularly in relation to human experience as an expression of both biological and cosmological evolution. Session four explores Whitehead’s understanding of the philosophical function of God, including the roles of the “primordial” and “consequent” natures, as well as other important philosophical principles. Session five concludes the course by considering Whitehead’s critiques of the theological tradition and the relevance and/or religious availability of “process panentheism” as a fruitful means of modeling the God-world relationship.
Process & Faith (a program of the Center for Process Studies at Claremont School of Theology)
is a multi-faith network for relational spirituality and the common good, and my friends there have announced some pretty zesty offerings that I thought you’d want to know about.
First, there’s an online class that begins Tuesday, Sept. 13 at 7:30 EDT called “The Biblical Narrative and Universal God Identity: Integral Theology and Process Approaches.” In this six-session course, Doug King (founder of Presence International) and Sheri Kling (director of Process & Faith and the John Cobb Legacy Fund) will guide students through an exploration of integral consciousness and spiral dynamics using integral and process theologies to reveal the message of universal God identity in the Judeo-Christian biblical narrative.
Could it be that Jesus and Paul both promoted a world-centric identity? If so, the implications may dramatically affect the future of long-held Christian views of identity and might actually point to something beyond exclusionary models and separation thinking.
“The convergence of quantum physics, evolutionary biology and ecology are pointing to an underlying field of unity. If God is all in all, how would the Biblical Narrative align with these scientific findings?” Doug King.
All sessions will be recorded and available through the learning platform. Learn more here.
If you’re still hungry for more, then take a look at the 3-hour online seminar P&F is offering on Sept. 30 at 8pm EDT called “*Process Thinking and Human Living*.” This one features Patricia Adams Farmer (“Beauty in Troubled Times”), Andrew Davis (“Ideas in Process: Five Whiteheadian Transitions”), Bruce Epperly (“Healing Politics: Process and Political Theology”), and Sheri Kling (“Wholeness and Transformation: A Process Spirituality”). Co-convened along with the Network of Spiritual Progressives (Australia) and the Centre for Interfaith Understanding (Singapore), and co-sponsored by the Cobb Institute, this event is meant to spark reflection on the way we think about the workings of our cosmos and the impact of those beliefs on the way we live. Our unquestioned assumptions can negatively affect our world, and so these four speakers will offer some zesty alternatives!
Process thought often has more in common with ways of thinking that are found in the East – such as in the traditions of Buddhism, Daoism, and Confucianism – than it does with the dominant worldview in the West. How might we apply these resources in both East and West to address the division and suffering we see in our world today?
Six Sessions Exploring Universal God Identity In the Biblical Narrative Through the Lenses of Integral Consciousness and Process Theology
WHO: Doug King and Sheri D. Kling
WHAT: Six Online Sessions
WHEN: Tuesdays @ 4:30 - 6:00 PM PST
Begins September 13th
WHERE: Online via Zoom
In this six-session course, Doug King (founder of Presence International) and Sheri Kling (director of Process & Faith) will guide students through an exploration of integral consciousness and spiral dynamics using integral and process theologies to reveal the message of universal God identity in the Judeo-Christian biblical narrative.
"The convergence of quantum physics, evolutionary biology and ecology are pointing to an underlying field of unity. If God is all in all, how would the Biblical Narrative align with these scientific findings?" -Doug King
Course Description
Both process thought and integral consciousness provide a developmental approach to the evolution of human consciousness. Process philosophy and theology have been used as life-giving tools in interpretation of the biblical narrative and this course will investigate the use of integral consciousness models as complementary to biblical interpretation as well. Our primary question will be whether the biblical narrative has always been evolving toward and into universal God identity. The implications of the possible answers to that question can dramatically affect the future of long held Christian views of identity. This is especially true if the biblical narrative points to something beyond separation thinking with regard to identity.
In this course, we will use models like Spiral Dynamics to trace biblical history, finding meaning both in its original setting and as a process story of the evolution of spiritual consciousness with regard to God identity. Spiral Dynamics uses a two-tier framework, and we’ll begin by seeing how it is applied to various fields of study. Next, we’ll apply this approach to the biblical narrative, examining each first-tier level or stage and comparing it to biblical history. Then we’ll look at Tier 2 and the development of integral consciousness as a unitive step. As we go, we’ll build on the principles behind the process to see how each level or stage of development produces necessary values that become part of a “transcend and include” understanding of identity. Finally, we’ll explore the implications of process or developmental models for religion itself, particularly the religion of Christianity and its future. The possibilities are literally world changing.
Course Outline
Session 1: Introduction: Spiral Dynamics and the Biblical Narrative Session 2: Archaic, Tribal, Identity & Separation Session 3: Warrior, Traditional, and the Seeds of Integral Session 4: Modern, Postmodern, and Second Tier Session 5: Christology and Eschatology, Form and Transform Session 6: Universal God Identity
“There is a unity in the universe, enjoying value and (by its immanence) sharing value. When we survey nature and think however flitting and superficial has been the animal enjoyment of its wonders, and when we realize how incapable the separate cells and pulsations of each flower are of enjoying the total effect – then our sense of the value of the details for the totality dawns upon our consciousness. This is the intuition of holiness, the intuition of the sacred, which is at the foundation of all religion.” - Alfred North Whitehead
About the Instructors
Doug King is CEO of Presence International, a growing network that engages emergent, integral, and interspiritual organizations and idea leaders to facilitate a “global conversation for a new earth.” Doug is steeped in biblical scholarship and worked alongside his father Max King to develop Presence to offer events, a podcast, and other teaching resources.
Sheri D. Kling, Ph.D., is the director of Process and Faith with the Center for Process Studies of the Claremont School of Theology and director of the John Cobb Legacy Fund. In her teaching and writing, Sheri draws from wisdom and mystical traditions, relational worldviews, depth psychology, and the intersection of spirituality and science to help people transform their lives. She is a faculty member of the Haden Institute, the author of A Process Spirituality: Christian and Transreligious Resources for Transformation, and can be found online at www.sherikling.com.
If you’d like to join the P&F community, you can also sign up for a free membership and join one or more of the 19 Paths (from Harvard’s Pluralism Project) if you’d like to connect with others interested in relational spirituality and the common good.
Both process thought and integral consciousness provide a developmental approach to the evolution of human consciousness. Process philosophy and theology have been used as life-giving tools in interpretation of the biblical narrative and this course will investigate the use of integral consciousness models as complementary to biblical interpretation as well. Our primary question will be whether the biblical narrative has always been evolving toward and into universal God identity. The implications of the possible answers to that question can dramatically affect the future of long held Christian views of identity. This is especially true if the biblical narrative points to something beyond separation thinking with regard to identity.
In this course, we will use models like Spiral Dynamics to trace biblical history, finding meaning both in its original setting and as a process story of the evolution of spiritual consciousness with regard to God identity. Spiral Dynamics uses a two-tier framework, and we’ll begin by seeing how it is applied to various fields of study. Next, we’ll apply this approach to the biblical narrative, examining each first-tier level or stage and comparing it to biblical history. Then we’ll look at Tier 2 and the development of integral consciousness as a unitive step. As we go, we’ll build on the principles behind the process to see how each level or stage of development produces necessary values that become part of a “transcend and include” understanding of identity. Finally, we’ll explore the implications of process or developmental models for religion itself, particularly the religion of Christianity and its future. The possibilities are literally world changing.
