Immanently Soft Theism
What Would Whitney Think?
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The Problem of Robust Theisms and Robust Atheisms |
Immanently Soft Theism
What Would Whitney Think?
My former student, Whitney Bauman, has written a powerful book called Religion and Ecology: Developing a Planetary Ethic (Columbia University Press, 2014) which I want to recommend. There is so much that I appreciate his book: his invitation that we humans walk in ways that are generous, imaginative, and sensitive to "place" without making gods of places; his celebration of queer spirituality; his recognition that we can respect others only if we relinquish our own pretenses to certainty; his sense that we live in an evolving, multitudinous world of inter-becoming, with an open future his emphasis on context and bodies; his rejection of master narratives such as capitalism and globalism; and his prioritization of love as a virtue. Influenced by ideas in Hinduism and Jainism as well as ideas in the Abrahamic paths, he rejects two kinds of conceptual foundationalism: robust atheism and robust theism, both of which claim to know more than we can know. He advocates in its stead a way of living and thinking that he calls viable agnosticism that "navigates between theism and atheism."
the cloud of uknowing
As I read Whitney's book, I wonder if I might be a viable agnostic, too. Along with him, I don't believe in certainty concerning God or most anything. Whitney writes: ""The only certainty is that when certainty is imposed on the world love is impossible and violence is inevitable." I agree. Sometimes it is hard to explain to others why "certainty" gets in the way of love. Whitney does a much better job than I.
He adds, with a surprising twist, that in some sense he believes in a god of the gaps: "Hence at the very center of the emergence of planetary identities is an embrace of the god of the gaps, the cloud of unknowing that is the course for the continuation of the becoming planetary community." Please understand, by "god of the gaps" he does not mean a heavenly agent to whom we might appeal in the absence of scientific knowledge about how the world works. He is opposed to this. He is referring, more metaphorically, to an open space of fresh possibilities for imagining and living in the world that is with us moment by moment, in our daily lives, and not yet filled with form. It is "left open" for the coming of novelty. (172) I believe in this open space, too, and feel suffocated by ways of thinking -- theistic and atheistic -- which seem insensitive to it. If it is the center of reality, or at least a center within our own hearts, then I'm for leaving the center open for others, for ourselves, and for fresh possibilities.
is there a deep listening in the cloud of unknowing?
For my part, I believe that this open space is one place among many where we meet something deep within the universe, beyond humanity, but not (as I will emphasize shortly) beyond our experience. I will call it God the Friend or the Deep Listening. Perhaps it is Whitney's God of the Gaps -- except with a bit more content than he is disposed to recognize.
Deep Listening is my own metaphor for what I believe to be a womb-like Consciousness in whose life the universe unfolds. You might think of it as the embodied mind of the universe, whose very body is the universe itself.
I am not certain that the universe as a whole is an embodied mind, but it seems reasonable to think this say -- no less reasonable than to think that the universe is mindless. Whitehead would speak of this embodied mind, often named God, as the concrescence of the universe.
We are never outside this Consciousness; we are always already inside it, feeling its presence through myriad experiences: wonder, awe, and a sense that all living beings are somehow cared for, if not by us, then by the universe as a whole. God is the universe as a whole not as a separate plane of existence, but as love. We may feel this love so deeply that we reach out with metaphors of our own and say "Abba" or "Amma" or "You." And when we do, so I believe, someone or something is listening.
Immanently Soft Theism
Is this someone or something transcendent? Yes, insofar as the Deep Listening transcends any given particularity and includes all within its embrace. But here "transcendence" is simultaneously "immanent." The philosopher Emmanuel Levinas speaks of the Face of the Other as transcending the one who beholds the face. When we gaze into the eyes of another person, we know that they are more than us. The theologian Mara Rivera speaks of this as feeling, this knowing, as a "touch of transcendence." And so, I believe, we are touched by the Deep Listening, who is other than us but also present to us, just as we are other to it and present to it. God transcends us and we transcend God: friend to friend.
Whitney avoids this kind of language, and the very sensibility may be alien to him or offputting to him. He does indeed believe that we need to listen to other people, to hills and rivers, to trees and stars, and that they -- or at least some of them -- may well listen back. By listening I mean "feeling the presence of" or, in Whitehead's words, "prehending." But he does not seem to believe that the universe as a whole listens.
What would Whitney think?
As I read Whitney's book I am wondering if I and other process theologians are examples of what he finds problematic: a robust theism that seeks foundations for experience and claims to know too much, all under the rubric of a system. Truth be told, I think that some in the process family are part of the problem. Many process theologians claim to know too much about God. We are "theists" in the worst sense. We are soft theists. When we hear Whitney speak of a robust theism that feigns certainty and wants to impose itself on others, we really don't hear ourselves. We are immanentists in Whitney's sense of the word:
the cloud of uknowing
As I read Whitney's book, I wonder if I might be a viable agnostic, too. Along with him, I don't believe in certainty concerning God or most anything. Whitney writes: ""The only certainty is that when certainty is imposed on the world love is impossible and violence is inevitable." I agree. Sometimes it is hard to explain to others why "certainty" gets in the way of love. Whitney does a much better job than I.
He adds, with a surprising twist, that in some sense he believes in a god of the gaps: "Hence at the very center of the emergence of planetary identities is an embrace of the god of the gaps, the cloud of unknowing that is the course for the continuation of the becoming planetary community." Please understand, by "god of the gaps" he does not mean a heavenly agent to whom we might appeal in the absence of scientific knowledge about how the world works. He is opposed to this. He is referring, more metaphorically, to an open space of fresh possibilities for imagining and living in the world that is with us moment by moment, in our daily lives, and not yet filled with form. It is "left open" for the coming of novelty. (172) I believe in this open space, too, and feel suffocated by ways of thinking -- theistic and atheistic -- which seem insensitive to it. If it is the center of reality, or at least a center within our own hearts, then I'm for leaving the center open for others, for ourselves, and for fresh possibilities.
is there a deep listening in the cloud of unknowing?
For my part, I believe that this open space is one place among many where we meet something deep within the universe, beyond humanity, but not (as I will emphasize shortly) beyond our experience. I will call it God the Friend or the Deep Listening. Perhaps it is Whitney's God of the Gaps -- except with a bit more content than he is disposed to recognize.
Deep Listening is my own metaphor for what I believe to be a womb-like Consciousness in whose life the universe unfolds. You might think of it as the embodied mind of the universe, whose very body is the universe itself.
I am not certain that the universe as a whole is an embodied mind, but it seems reasonable to think this say -- no less reasonable than to think that the universe is mindless. Whitehead would speak of this embodied mind, often named God, as the concrescence of the universe.
We are never outside this Consciousness; we are always already inside it, feeling its presence through myriad experiences: wonder, awe, and a sense that all living beings are somehow cared for, if not by us, then by the universe as a whole. God is the universe as a whole not as a separate plane of existence, but as love. We may feel this love so deeply that we reach out with metaphors of our own and say "Abba" or "Amma" or "You." And when we do, so I believe, someone or something is listening.
Immanently Soft Theism
Is this someone or something transcendent? Yes, insofar as the Deep Listening transcends any given particularity and includes all within its embrace. But here "transcendence" is simultaneously "immanent." The philosopher Emmanuel Levinas speaks of the Face of the Other as transcending the one who beholds the face. When we gaze into the eyes of another person, we know that they are more than us. The theologian Mara Rivera speaks of this as feeling, this knowing, as a "touch of transcendence." And so, I believe, we are touched by the Deep Listening, who is other than us but also present to us, just as we are other to it and present to it. God transcends us and we transcend God: friend to friend.
Whitney avoids this kind of language, and the very sensibility may be alien to him or offputting to him. He does indeed believe that we need to listen to other people, to hills and rivers, to trees and stars, and that they -- or at least some of them -- may well listen back. By listening I mean "feeling the presence of" or, in Whitehead's words, "prehending." But he does not seem to believe that the universe as a whole listens.
What would Whitney think?
As I read Whitney's book I am wondering if I and other process theologians are examples of what he finds problematic: a robust theism that seeks foundations for experience and claims to know too much, all under the rubric of a system. Truth be told, I think that some in the process family are part of the problem. Many process theologians claim to know too much about God. We are "theists" in the worst sense. We are soft theists. When we hear Whitney speak of a robust theism that feigns certainty and wants to impose itself on others, we really don't hear ourselves. We are immanentists in Whitney's sense of the word:
An immanent understanding of the world argues that whatever consciousness, spirituality, or divinity might be, they must exist in the same realm as the everyday world of material existence. In other words, there is not a transcendent space known as heaven or salvation that is in direct dualistic opposition with the material world, nor is the mind or the soul something that is in a different space from that of the brain or the body. Speculative realism, secular theologies, radical materialism, and event-based ontology are just a few names [of] contemporary methods that work with immanent understandings of reality. (205)
On Hearing the word Atheism for the first time
I can remember the first time I heard the word "atheism." I must have been about six years old. My parents told me the story of some friends of theirs whose son had invited a classmate over for dinner. Their friends were about to say a prayer before dinner, and the son's classmate asked "What are you doing?" They said that they were praying and he (the son's classmate) said something to the effect: "We don't do that at my house. We are atheists."
When my parents told me the story, they were confused and sad, but not condemning. They didn't know anyone who identified himself as "atheist" and I didn't either. I think they were also a little hurt by the word, as was I. I'm not sure whether we were hurt for ourselves or for God. Maybe both.
The God in whom we believed was not a cosmic moralist or a distant clock-maker, but more like an invisible but present friend who was on the side of life and love. It seemed and still seems a little ungrateful not to acknowledge this cosmic friend. It would be like having a loving mother and denying her existence and her love. It might hurt her feelings.
Nevertheless, my family did not believe that this cosmic friend was a punishing sort of spirit, or even that the cosmic friend was especially preoccupied with being acknowledged or receiving gratitude. The friend was more like a cosmic Bodhisattva in Buddhism: an encircling and loving presence whose very essence is love. Love does not need to be worshiped, but it can be more effective (so I believe) if we acknowledge it and try to cooperate with it.
The Space and Faith of Agnosticism
Truth be told, atheism doesn't really make sense to me. It claims too much certainty. It seems to know, almost indubitably, that the cosmic friend is non-existent. I am doubtful about this kind of certainty, and I'm also doubtful of certainty on the other side. I believe and feel that there is truly a cosmic Friend at work in the world, but I am not certain. I might be wrong.
What makes more sense is agnosticism. In Religion and Ecology: Developing a Planetary Ethic. Of agnosticism, he writes:
I can remember the first time I heard the word "atheism." I must have been about six years old. My parents told me the story of some friends of theirs whose son had invited a classmate over for dinner. Their friends were about to say a prayer before dinner, and the son's classmate asked "What are you doing?" They said that they were praying and he (the son's classmate) said something to the effect: "We don't do that at my house. We are atheists."
When my parents told me the story, they were confused and sad, but not condemning. They didn't know anyone who identified himself as "atheist" and I didn't either. I think they were also a little hurt by the word, as was I. I'm not sure whether we were hurt for ourselves or for God. Maybe both.
The God in whom we believed was not a cosmic moralist or a distant clock-maker, but more like an invisible but present friend who was on the side of life and love. It seemed and still seems a little ungrateful not to acknowledge this cosmic friend. It would be like having a loving mother and denying her existence and her love. It might hurt her feelings.
Nevertheless, my family did not believe that this cosmic friend was a punishing sort of spirit, or even that the cosmic friend was especially preoccupied with being acknowledged or receiving gratitude. The friend was more like a cosmic Bodhisattva in Buddhism: an encircling and loving presence whose very essence is love. Love does not need to be worshiped, but it can be more effective (so I believe) if we acknowledge it and try to cooperate with it.
The Space and Faith of Agnosticism
Truth be told, atheism doesn't really make sense to me. It claims too much certainty. It seems to know, almost indubitably, that the cosmic friend is non-existent. I am doubtful about this kind of certainty, and I'm also doubtful of certainty on the other side. I believe and feel that there is truly a cosmic Friend at work in the world, but I am not certain. I might be wrong.
What makes more sense is agnosticism. In Religion and Ecology: Developing a Planetary Ethic. Of agnosticism, he writes:
"Agnosticism is a valid position in many philosophies and epistemologies that suggests we can never get beyond our human perspective to know reality in full. Historically, in theological terms, it has been a term that navigates between theism and atheism."
Let agnosticism name a place in the heart and mind that is free from certainty and that can, in Whitney's words, reach out in love to others: to people, animals, and the earth.
Some agnostics believe in the cosmic Friend and some do not. Many are somewhere in between. One of these in-between places might be called generous non-theism. It believes in something like a force for goodness or for love at work in the universe, but does not believe that this force takes the form of an agent with consciousness and will. What makes this agnosticism spacious is that it reaches out in love to people, animals and the earth, respecting their integrity and seeking to share in the journey. Always it reaches out from a particular historical situation, a particular embodiment in the moment at hand, that is perspectival. It cannot speak for all places and time, but for its place and time.
All agnostics know, with Whitney, that their perspective is limited, and that this force may not exist at all, except in their imaginations. Still, they feel it and try to live by it. And they realize, as does Whitney, that just because we "never get beyond" our human perspective doesn't mean that things are given to our experience that our beyond the human: hills, rivers, plants, animals, trees, stars, and maybe also the living presence of a divine Love. Whitney's point is that when we think about these realities, we inevitably bring our human perspectives into the thinking.
Back to Generation Z. The atheists among them are far ahead of where I was when a teenager. I was much more interested in being accepted and finding my niche among peers than thinking about whether or not God is real. Believe in God was a default option for me, not a deliberated option. I respect those for whom it is a deliberated option.
Let agnosticism name a place in the heart and mind that is free from certainty and that can, in Whitney's words, reach out in love to others: to people, animals, and the earth.
Some agnostics believe in the cosmic Friend and some do not. Many are somewhere in between. One of these in-between places might be called generous non-theism. It believes in something like a force for goodness or for love at work in the universe, but does not believe that this force takes the form of an agent with consciousness and will. What makes this agnosticism spacious is that it reaches out in love to people, animals and the earth, respecting their integrity and seeking to share in the journey. Always it reaches out from a particular historical situation, a particular embodiment in the moment at hand, that is perspectival. It cannot speak for all places and time, but for its place and time.
All agnostics know, with Whitney, that their perspective is limited, and that this force may not exist at all, except in their imaginations. Still, they feel it and try to live by it. And they realize, as does Whitney, that just because we "never get beyond" our human perspective doesn't mean that things are given to our experience that our beyond the human: hills, rivers, plants, animals, trees, stars, and maybe also the living presence of a divine Love. Whitney's point is that when we think about these realities, we inevitably bring our human perspectives into the thinking.
Back to Generation Z. The atheists among them are far ahead of where I was when a teenager. I was much more interested in being accepted and finding my niche among peers than thinking about whether or not God is real. Believe in God was a default option for me, not a deliberated option. I respect those for whom it is a deliberated option.