This to me is the best theological framework. It absolutely solves the problem of evil, it is compatible with modern science, it helps us to understand why there are so many different religious traditions and Christian denominations. God does not work coercively, he works persuasively, patiently, lovingly. When I was struggling with this theology, I initially refused it because I could not reconcile it with the miracles in the Bible, but I eventually realized that this framework makes the *most* sense with miracles. Under traditional theology, we are left to wonder why God does not more often act in miraculous ways like he did in the Bible. If he had the power to cure your loved one, why didn’t he? We can only appeal to some divine mystery. But under process theology, God and creation sometimes cooperate so efficiently that something amazing happens. Miracles are something that sometimes can happen but sometimes can’t, depending on creaturely conditions and cooperation.
Great video. Thanks for uploading. Perhaps it is my misinterpretation, but the story about Tom, at the end of the presentation to me, painted a picture of God's loving lure, taking protective interest, trying compassionately to persuade energy event Tom away from danger. This certainly is a very comforting view. The problem of maleficence is approached by saying God doesn't want the bad things to happen. God is compassion and love, but it is not in the nature of the energy event God to have interventive power over energy events. This speaker says he is able to reconcile the horrendous impacts of natural disasters through this admission of God's impotence because energy events, being affected by all past energy events, have the freedom to ignore the divine will which is Good. In nature it is fairly obvious that many complex beings go on surviving through the decimation of other beings. Take the classic example of the Cheetah and the Gazelle, who are, after all, not so far behind us in the phylogenetic tree. The predator-prey symbiosis is so ancient and archetypal it's hard to fathom that it contradicts or repudiates God's divine lure. If God takes a 'protective interest' in the gazelle, who in turn heeds the lure to safety, the cheetah wouldn't eat. If God takes an interest in the cheetah's survival, and offers up the possibility to the cheetah, that gets her into just the right position to strike and the cheetah chooses right, the gazelle is savaged. This makes me wonder if God's Lure really takes a protective interest in Tom, and not the other animals, or some of the animals, some of the time and ultimately where the 'Good' would lie in any of this. If God's Will persuades us towards survival, health, justice et cetera which can seem to US so inherently good, it can hardly be 'granted' to all sentient beings let alone incarnated by multiple energy events because of all the emergent possibilities, the one that, when actualised is a horrendous disaster for A, will be incredible fortune for B. Anyway, perhaps it's unfair to compare Tom to a Gazelle...... My confusion might be in thinking that whitehead is saying that from the emergent possibilities, God is willing us, persuasively towards the one that is in some sense 'greater'? because..... I thought God didn't know the future. And is it an implication of this view that A highly complex energy event that can align itself to this Divine Will would essentially fast-track evolution?
This to me is the best theological framework. It absolutely solves the problem of evil, it is compatible with modern science, it helps us to understand why there are so many different religious traditions and Christian denominations. God does not work coercively, he works persuasively, patiently, lovingly.
When I was struggling with this theology, I initially refused it because I could not reconcile it with the miracles in the Bible, but I eventually realized that this framework makes the *most* sense with miracles. Under traditional theology, we are left to wonder why God does not more often act in miraculous ways like he did in the Bible. If he had the power to cure your loved one, why didn’t he? We can only appeal to some divine mystery.
But under process theology, God and creation sometimes cooperate so efficiently that something amazing happens. Miracles are something that sometimes can happen but sometimes can’t, depending on creaturely conditions and cooperation.
Great video. Thanks for uploading.
Perhaps it is my misinterpretation, but the story about Tom, at the end of the presentation to me, painted a picture of God's loving lure, taking protective interest, trying compassionately to persuade energy event Tom away from danger. This certainly is a very comforting view.
The problem of maleficence is approached by saying God doesn't want the bad things to happen. God is compassion and love, but it is not in the nature of the energy event God to have interventive power over energy events. This speaker says he is able to reconcile the horrendous impacts of natural disasters through this admission of God's impotence because energy events, being affected by all past energy events, have the freedom to ignore the divine will which is Good.
In nature it is fairly obvious that many complex beings go on surviving through the decimation of other beings. Take the classic example of the Cheetah and the Gazelle, who are, after all, not so far behind us in the phylogenetic tree. The predator-prey symbiosis is so ancient and archetypal it's hard to fathom that it contradicts or repudiates God's divine lure. If God takes a 'protective interest' in the gazelle, who in turn heeds the lure to safety, the cheetah wouldn't eat. If God takes an interest in the cheetah's survival, and offers up the possibility to the cheetah, that gets her into just the right position to strike and the cheetah chooses right, the gazelle is savaged.
This makes me wonder if God's Lure really takes a protective interest in Tom, and not the other animals, or some of the animals, some of the time and ultimately where the 'Good' would lie in any of this. If God's Will persuades us towards survival, health, justice et cetera which can seem to US so inherently good, it can hardly be 'granted' to all sentient beings let alone incarnated by multiple energy events because of all the emergent possibilities, the one that, when actualised is a horrendous disaster for A, will be incredible fortune for B.
Anyway, perhaps it's unfair to compare Tom to a Gazelle......
My confusion might be in thinking that whitehead is saying that from the emergent possibilities, God is willing us, persuasively towards the one that is in some sense 'greater'? because..... I thought God didn't know the future. And is it an implication of this view that A highly complex energy event that can align itself to this Divine Will would essentially fast-track evolution?
I enjoyed listening.
Take God out of the picture and we are talking about thoughts much closer to Buddhism.
There are some similarities to eastern orthodoxy too
The point of this is that they are putting God in the picture…