Religious Intolerance & Persecution - Doing What's Right

Universal Rights Group

Religious Intolerance & Persecution

Doing What's Right

I'm told Alexa is the writer and inspiration behind this book and that her dad was the helper behind her heartfelt project. As transgenderism is the topic of the day it should also be explored by those trans-- writers who have something to say about themselves and their Faith.

Older generations may continue in their misunderstandings of the LGBTQ+ society as might conservative churches - but a God who loves neither shuns, belittles, or looks at others without checking the planks in their own bible verse interpretations and beliefs.

I, for one, believe it is right and necessary for all individuals to have civil rights under America's Constitution. And, as Christians, to acknowledge that the salvation of Christ extends to all recipients regardless of who we think should be in or out of the Christian faith.

There are Christian transgenders who need and want fellowship. We may not be the ones to help but we must all be able to see one another in Christ. If not, the sin lies not in the other but in our own eyes and hearts.

Perhaps, to see Christ better, Alexa's book should be read to help reduce the self-righteous spirits which grips the heart of all religionists and churchly faithful.

Thank you for picking up a copy and reading!

R.E. Slater

April 28, 2023

Amazon link

This book fundamentally changes the game for the Church of the Nazarene.

A growing number of people are calling for fresh conversations about sexuality and gender. And many want fundamental change. This book gives voice to those people.

There are strong reasons the Church of the Nazarene should become fully LGBTQ+ affirming. The writers of these essays – whether queer or straight – lay out those reasons, share their experiences, and explain why change is needed.

Love rests at the heart of the denomination’s view of God. And yet its statement about human sexuality does not support the ways of love.

At least in America, the Church of the Nazarene is rapidly shrinking. Many people are leaving the denomination because of its views on LGBTQ+ matters. According to research, in fact, the holiness movement is the worst at keeping young people.

This book offers hope. Hearing the voices of queer people, allies, and scholars is a crucial step toward transformation.

For love to win in the Church of the Nazarene, change is needed.

ABOUT THE EDITORS

Thomas Jay Oord is a theologian, philosopher, and scholar of multi-disciplinary studies. Oord has been an ordained elder in the Church of the Nazarene for more than 30 years, taught at two Nazarene institutions of higher education, and published many books through the denomination’s publishing house. A best-selling author, Oord currently directs doctoral students at Northwind Theological Seminary. Website: thomasjayoord.com

Alexa MacKenzie Oord is a graduate of Harvard University and Simmons University. Oord currently serves as an Administrative Assistant in Undergraduate Student Life at Columbia University in New York. She also works as Senior Editor at SacraSage Press. Website: sacrasagepress.com

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R.E. Slater - Divine Sovereignty - What Is It?

Divine Sovereignty - What Is It?

Is It Near or Far? Controlling or Uncontrolling? Fully Knowledgeable

or Processually Affected in It's Divine Knowledge, Power, and Presence?

by R.E. Slater

December 16, 2022

A Fresh Perspective of Divine Omnipotence

When thinking of a Divine God with Divine Power it perhaps is better think in terms of Divine Love....

Shocking?

Perhaps.

But certainly much more in line with a "biblical" God than if casting Divinity in terms of non-Loving power and control. (aka, church-like dominionism with its legalisms, rites, and beliefs).

For a process theologian when speaking of God we prefer to speak of a God who is loving at all times rather than some times... or maybe not at all.

Too, if divine Sovereignty were cast in terms of a divinely Loving God at all times than the traditional terms of power and control must also be altered to better reflect a loving God.

As example, for the traditional language of omnipotence let's recast it in terms of "amnipotence" - that is, LOVING power (see Oord's articles below).

Let's also do the same with the very unhealthy word "control" which Christians love to sing about and speak to when praising God's omniscient determination of our own affairs and the world's.

A process theologian will do away with words like "divine control" altogether when speaking to a divinely-loving sovereignty within processual categories of divine processual indeterminancy. By which we mean, that creation, if it were to follow it's inherently- divine "Imago Dei" of God birthed within it (and yes, even today does this divine birth continue - as versus just one time "in Adam" ala Paul's voluminous characterization of Adam's sin in the book of Romans).

And further, because divine Love created creation in God's Image (Imago Dei) it also was created by Love (and not by divine fiat) with intermittant freewill.

That is, creational freewill agency - just like our own freewill agency - is fraught between generative, or valuative, good and sin and evil, which are not generatively good or valuative of someone or something outside itself.

A Processual Divinity Takes on a

New Divine Character and Attributes...

Hence, process theology generally teaches of a loving and uncontrolling (or noncontrolling) divine Sovereignty which, though genuinely powerful is genuinely loving and noncontrolling per the processual metaphysics found throughout the universe's "cosmic being".

Which cosmic being may also give rise to someone or something that isn't just "IS," in itself, but also "BECOMING" more than itself in itself.

So when when describing God as a processual God a process metaphysician (or metatheologian?) will say that God is not only complete in himself but also has the capacity in God's Godness of transcendence to be 100% present and immanent to creation's "processual" being. Which is to say that God in God's relationship with creation will "grow" and "become" with creation as it becomes.

When saying this a process theology is stating that neither party is static but continually evolving in relationship to itself and with creation as a whole. And that an IMMANENT God - in God's timeful existence - processually evolves with our own existence. An existence which, unlike God's divine Self, may also devolve in it's processually timeful existence.

Take note: "God qua God is complete." God is infinitely Becomed or Evolved. But in God's processual relationship with an evolving or devolving freewill and indeterminant creation, God is continually processing - or urging - that creation to become what it inherently is in itself re its Divine Imago; than to lean into the dark side of its unloving, devolving freewill which is as "uncontrollable" as its upside potential is.

Processual divine Sovereignty then speaks to an evolving/devolving creation which is and may become more than it is or may become less than it is.... And further, it is by God's redemptive power imbued into creation (as depicted by God's atoning redemption) that a freewilled, indeterminant creation may be released from its devolvement towards a processually good and generatively valuative part of the creational whole when partnering with salvific God of creation.

Thus and thus, the classical church teachings re divine omnipotence, omniscience, even omnipresence, when recast processually completely change the nuances of a truly divine loving sovereignty. And when done, show us a divine God who is much more who God is than our own images of God cast into our own religious images however "Christian" or "biblical" they claim to be. Let's read below Thomas Oord's thoughts on a few of these Christianized aspects of God....

Blessings & Merry Christmas!

R.E. Slater

December 16, 2022

https://open.spotify.com/episode/55JiRaUOL47X3mmgqZggOu

Part 1

The Death of Omnipotence

(and Birth of Amnipotence)

https://thomasjayoord.com/index.php/blog/archives/the-death-of-omnipotence

by Thomas Jay Oord

November 16th, 2022

I’m writing a new book. My tentative title is “The Death of Omnipotence… and Birth of Amipotence.”

As the title suggests, I’ll argue that God is not omnipotent. But instead of simply saying, “God can’t do…,” I’m also proposing a view of divine power I think is more biblically supported, philosophically coherent, and experientially justified. I call it “amipotence.” (Here’s a 3-minute ORTShort describing the word.)

Here’s how I plan to start the book…

THERE’S NOTHING THAT HE CANNOT DO?

“My God is so big, so strong, and so mighty there’s nothing that He cannot do.”[1] These lines from a children’s song give voice to what many people believe: God can do anything.

Other song lyrics proclaim the glory of an all-powerful God. In his Messiah concerto, George Frideric Handel’s oft-repeated lines ring out:

For the Lord God omnipotent reigneth,

Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah![2]

Contemporary worship choruses promote omnipotence, declaring a sovereign God cannot be thwarted nor the divine will be frustrated. It’s common for believers, enraptured in praise, to lift their voices to the One they call “almighty” and proclaim, “our God reigns!”

OMNIPOTENCE

“Omnipotence” expresses in formal language the “God can do anything” view. A God with all (omni) power (potent) apparently can do anything we imagine and more. Augustine made this connection, saying the omnipotent God is “He who can do all things.”[3]

In some theologies, God actually exerts all power and is the cause of everything; call this “theological determinism” or “monergism.” In others, God could do everything but chooses not to. God so conceived controls from time to time but generally opts to allow creatures to exert power; call this view “voluntary divine self-limitation.”[4]

Among the attributes theists ascribe to God, omnipotence is likely best known. For many, it’s a placeholder for God – “the Omnipotent.” Although distinctions can be made, the term is often thought synonymous with other words and phrases describing divine power: “sovereign,” “all-powerful,” and “almighty.”[5] These describe what many think necessary of a being worthy of worship: unlimited power.

Christian creeds refer to God’s almightiness. “I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth…” begins the Apostle’s Creed. The Nicene Creed starts similarly: “We believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth…” The Westminster Confession speaks of a God who, in “sovereign” or “almighty” activity, saw fit to “ordain whatsoever comes to pass.”

THREE MEANINGS

Theists espouse various meanings of omnipotent, almighty, or all-powerful. In this book, I address three common among scholars and laity. To say God is omnipotent typically means at least one of the following:

1. God exerts all power.

2. God can do absolutely anything.

3. God can control others or circumstances.[6]

Amazon

Some theists affirm one or two meanings but not all. Some reject the idea God exerts all power, for instance, but believe God can control others. Others say God can do anything but also say God doesn’t always control creatures. Many claim God can singlehandedly determine outcomes but cannot do what is illogical or self-contradictory. And it’s common for believers to say God is omnipotent but appeal to mystery when vexing questions arise.

CONCLUSION

I’d love to hear your questions, suggestions, and thoughts. Now that you know the general aim of the book, what issues should I be sure to address?

(I explain amipotence a bit in my book, Pluriform Love. Also, see this essay from Jay McDaniel.)

[1] Ruth Harms Calkin, “My God is so Big” (Permission to quote granted from Nuggets of Truth Publishing).

[2] Handel seems to be drawing from Revelation 19:6, which in Latin and in the King James Version of scripture is translated “omnipotent” but in most contemporary biblical translations is rendered “almighty.”

[3] Augustine, De Trinitate, IV 20, 27 (CChr.SL), 50, 197: “Quis est autem omnipotens, nisi qui omnia potest.” Despite this claim, Augustine also notes a number of things God cannot do.

[4] Theologians have explored the distinction between God’s potential power and the actual expression of divine power. See, for instance, Ian Robert Richardson, “Meister Eckhart’s Parisian Question of ‘Whether the omnipotence of God should be considered as potentia ordinata or potentia absoluta?” Doctoral Dissertation (King’s College London, 2002), 17.

[5] In previous writings, I’ve said we could rightly call God almighty in the senses. God is 1) the mightiest, 2) exerts might upon all, and 3) the source of might for all. Gijsbert Van Den Brink argues for “almightiness” over omnipotence in Almighty God: A Study of the Doctrine of Divine Omnipotence (Netherlands: Kok Pharos, 1993).

[6] By “control,” I mean acting as the sufficient cause of some creature, circumstance, or event. To describe such control, I use phrases like “singlehandedly decide outcomes,” “unilaterally determine,” or others that depict God as the sole cause. I will argue that God never has controlled and, in fact, cannot control others.

* * * * * * * *

Part 2

Omnipotence Not in Scripture

https://thomasjayoord.com/index.php/blog/archives/omnipotence-not-in-scripture

by Thomas Jay Oord

November 27th, 2022

I’m currently writing a book that rejects the doctrine of divine omnipotence. I’ll suggest a replacement I call divine amipotence – the power of love. I introduced the writing project in this previous blog essay.

One chapter in my book addresses God’s power described in what Christians call the Old and New Testaments. I’ll argue that omnipotence — even the Hebrew and Greek words often translated “almighty” or “all-powerful” — are not in the biblical texts.

God’s Power in Scripture

Authors of sacred writ describe a God who does amazing things, including creating the heavens and the earth, enacting miracles, providing salvation, and promising ultimate victory over evil. While English translators typically avoid “omnipotence” when translating Hebrew and Greek texts, they do use “almighty.” Many people believe biblical writers portray God as all-powerful.

Given this reading of scripture, Arthur Pink puts the significance of omnipotence this way: “If God were stunted in might and had a limit to His strength, we might well despair. But seeing that He is clothed with omnipotence, no prayer is too hard for Him to answer, no need too great for Him to supply, no passion too strong for Him to subdue, no temptation too powerful for Him to deliver from, no misery too deep for him to relieve.”[1]

According to many, only an omnipotent God can save.

The Hopelessness of Omnipotence

Omnipotence does not inspire hope in everyone, however. It leads many to despair and unbelief. To those who suffer, a God who can singlehandedly liberate seems asleep. Or this God doesn’t care enough to rescue the hurting from horrors and holocausts. Fervent prayers for healing go unanswered; cries for help from the sexually abused elicit few godly rescues.

Consequently, many people have no desire to live forever with a deity who allows evil now. An almighty God isn’t trustworthy.

I will argue that Christian scripture does not support omnipotence, at least as understood in the three ways I’ve identified. God doesn’t have all power, there are many things God cannot do, and God can’t control others.

Biblical authors talk about divine action, and they consider God’s power immense. But the Hebrew and Greek words translated “almighty,” “sovereign,” and the like support neither classic nor popular understandings of God as all-powerful.

Amazon

In fact, writers of scripture acknowledge limits to divine power. And they point to the role creatures play in bringing about outcomes.

Omnipotence isn’t born of scripture.

Issues to Address?

As you see it, what words, passages, or issues should I address when talking about God’s power described in Scripture?

[1] Arthur Pink, 67.

Theologian Keith Ward's "God of Love"

 

Pictured L to R: Peter Enns, Tripp Fuller, Adam Clark, Thomas Oord

Keith Ward and a God of Love

article link

by Thomas J. Oord

October 16th, 2022

I recently wrote a chapter for a book celebrating the work of Keith Ward. My argument is that Ward offers a metaphysics that supports both a conceptual basis for love and a basis to view God as loving.

God is Love

Keith Ward believes an adequate account of love requires an equally adequate account of God. He believes God is the chief exemplar of love and the ultimate Mind making creaturely love possible.

Keith believes a Christian description of God is “guided by the key teaching that ‘God is love.’”[1] But just about every Christian believes God loves.

The way many professional theologians conceive of God, however, does not align with love as I have defined it, as we experience it, or as described in much of sacred scripture. Keith Ward’s concept of God is different; it aligns with love so understood.

God Must Love

Unlike the voluntarist God of some theologies, Keith believes God must love. God cannot freely choose evil.[2] In fact, divine freedom is “necessarily conditioned” by love.[3] To put this in my own terms, Keith believes love comes logically prior in the divine nature to will.

We should reject theologies aligned with ancient Greek philosophical notions of a static God, says Keith. Such theologies consider God a timeless substance rather than a dynamic person. They present God as simple, immutable, and impassible too, which fails to align with the dominant biblical portrayal of God or with the personal piety of believers.[4]

Keith agrees with the majority portrayal of God in the Christian scripture, which portrays God as “a dynamic, creative, and relational reality.”[5] This dynamic God changes but is not in all ways immutable. “A general biblical account of God,” says Keith, “is more sympathetic to the view that God changes in some respects than to the view that God is completely changeless.”[6] A changing God “capable of new creative actions is more supreme than are beings that cannot be other than it is.”[7]

Open and Relational God

Keith Ward is what I call an “open and relational theologian,” because he believes God essentially experiences time analogous to how creatures experience it. God’s experience is temporal, but the divine nature does not change. Keith rejects the classic view of divine simplicity because it undermines the personal and relational aspects of God. God does not have a preordained plan that is worked out in a predetermined and precise way.[8]

A relational God suffers with and knows creatures experientially. God’s “concern for the well-being of creatures implies knowledge of their condition,” Keith says. And it implies “pity if it involves suffering, revulsion if it involves the willful causing of suffering, and action to relieve that suffering where it is possible.”

A God who simply contemplates suffering “is not truly love,” says Keith. “The one who truly loves will do something to help.”[9] God is passible, because “affected by the beauties and sufferings of the created world.”[10]

God’s Creative Love

Love compelled God to create the universe. “One who believes in the existence of God,” argues Keith, “will believe that there is an actual case of supreme goodness that has created the world for the sake of good.”[11] And God had a particular aim in creating: “that autonomous persons can come into existence,” says Keith. These creaturely persons would be able to “shape their own lives freely and creatively, and can find their fulfillment in being united to the divine in love.”[12]

In a certain sense, says Keith, God needs creation. “If God’s love is agape love, love of the other and the imperfect, then that love could not exist without a creation containing possibly imperfect creatures.” This does not mean that the universe created God, however. “Creation in no way brings God into being,” Keith says, “and it depends wholly upon God in order to exist.”[13]

Trinity?

A good number of Christian theologians affirm divine love as necessary among members of the social trinity. But Keith thinks “the idea of God as a sort of society is a bad idea.”[14] Christians should not think God is comprised of three persons, each with distinct centers of consciousness, distinct freedoms, distinct responsibilities, distinct wills, and distinct relations between one another.

This formulation of the Trinity is more tritheistic than monotheistic. Keith believes God is one; God has one mind and will. I’ve reviewed Keith’s book on the Trinity here.

The loving Creator experientially loves and relates with the created world.[15] God’s love is ad extra. “If God is a relational being characterized by love,” Keith reasons, “that relation must be to non-divine persons, and not a sort of secret self-love.”[16] 

We can talk about divine love as in some sense trinitarian, Keith says, if we identify a “threefold form of divine love – as creating finite persons, relating in love to them, and uniting them to the divine life.” This activity “is the manifestation of the supreme goodness of God as creative, self-giving, and universally inclusive love.”[17] “If God is agape love,” says Keith, “this is love of what is truly other than God, not just love of the divine beauty and self.”[18]

God and the Future

God’s “plan” for creation is not a detailed blueprint of all that will occur. God does not entirely determine or even foreknow what the future of the universe will be. But “God wills that creatures cooperate in the work to create new expressions of love and goodness,” says Keith, “and that plan can take many forms.”[19] The love plan Keith says God entertains is neither unilaterally determining nor willy nilly.

Creaturely love is derived from divine love. We “must learn to love,” says Keith, “by learning to share in the divine love.”[20] This learning provides creaturely persons with their purpose. “The highest business of life is to live well in a just and compassionate society,” Keith says, “and to see that living well consists in seeking the true, the good, and beautiful for its own sake.” It involves “realizing as fully as possible our positive human potentialities, and then working for a society and a world in which that is a real possibility for all without exception.”[21]

Love after Death

Loving creatures hope to experience even greater love after death. “For those who believe themselves to experience something of a God of love,” says Keith, “the hope of paradise is the hope of closer knowledge and love of God.”[22] But this closer knowledge and love does not come through divine fiat. God wills that persons “attain their end by their own efforts, in cooperation with the divine…” And “if finite persons are to love and realize themselves in God, there must be more to finite consciousness than the often painful and always inadequate sense of union with the divine that is apparent in ordinary lives.”[23]

This “more” is what many theists call “heaven.” Even “the hope of heaven,” says Keith, “is entailed by belief in a God of love.”[24]

Keith Ward’s theistic metaphysics provides a far more adequate account of love, creaturely and divine, than alternatives. Rather than a materialist metaphysics that denies essential elements of love, such as value, freedom, experience, agency, morality, and more, Keith’s idealistic metaphysics not only accounts for these elements but emphasizes them. Rather than a theistic metaphysics that claims God is impassible, timeless, simple, and in all ways immutable, Keith’s theistic metaphysics portrays dynamic love as the activity of a dynamic God in giving-and-receiving relations with creatures.

Keith Ward’s philosophical vision aligns with a robust account of love.

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[1] Keith Ward, Christ and Cosmos, 86.

[2] Ibid., 167.

[3] Ibid., 165.

[4] Keith expresses this throughout his book Sharing in the Divine Nature.

[5] Ibid., 72.

[6] Ibid., 61.

[7] Ibid., 73.

[8] Ward, Sharing in the Divine Nature, 77-78.

[9] Ibid., 47.

[10] Ibid., 49.

[11] Ward, Morality, Autonomy, and God, 208.

[12] Ward, Christ and Cosmos, 231.

[13] Ward, Sharing in the Divine Nature, 74.

[14] Ward, Christ and Cosmos, x.

[15] Ibid., 72.

[16] Ibid., 182.

[17] Christ and Cosmos, 62.

[18] Ward, Sharing in the Divine Nature, 77.

[19] Ibid., 77-78.

[20] Ward, Morality, Autonomy, and God, 202.

[21] Ibid., 215.

[22] Ibid., 207.

[23] Ibid., 192.

[24] Ibid., 207.