The icon of the Trinity is one of my favorites. I first laid eyes upon a copy of it as I was decorating the Religion Department lobby. What ultimately struck me first about this icon was that I was unable to determine the gender of these three persons. They have masculine features, and yet at the same time a grace of feminism. Though some fear creating idols, I feel that in this picture one experiences the complexity of God. This picture represents God. God, the Creator, God the Word, God the Spirit. Look at their faces…all the same. Now in this language of Trinity, we may get wrapped up in the legalism of ousia’s, but what the Trinity should express to us, or what we should experience when we talk about the Trinity is that God is relationship. So our language and understanding should begin to stretch that when we talk about God, or use the word God, that picture is what we are talking about.
I think we have fallen into a bad habit of slopping language when talking about God. Well all language is sloppy when talking about God. Maybe its that we are unaware of our language barrier when we talk about God and begin to create a cage, bar by bar that defines God.
Now you are probably wondering when am I going to talk about God’s agency. I’m getting there, but first I think it is important to think of God as relationship in order to move into reflecting further. Remember the “relationship” part of God is relationship, is essentially unlike any relationships we have experienced, relationship is a metaphor. So the question becomes how does God, who is relationship, act in this world.
By now you may have noticed that I have yet to use the word will. To be honest most times when I hear people talk about God’s Will it makes me want to vomit. When we talk about God’s Will it is usually in selfish ways, let me explain. “God’s Will” is so uncontrolable and yet we like to think we have it figured out. We deny relationships with people because we don’t feel it’s God’s Will, we go to war because we feel it’s God’s Will, we protect ourselves from suffering stating it is God’s Will. We bend and manipulate those words so much to our own desires that we have become calloused to it.
I had to look up some notes on God’s Agency. I think these are very helpful in reflecting more:
“God’s activity and ours are unlike each other, If God is reacting to a situation, we have to suppose God failed to provide for in advance. Is God the cosmic Santa Claus?”
“If God’s purposes are those of responding to problems on earth, what does that say about God’s creative and redemptive plan? Is God a cosmic bandaid?”
“To say that God is God is to say that God is not conditioned by environment. God’s Freedom. God has a radical freedom to be unconditioned – covenants made out of love and not obligations. Asking God to fix something makes God a thing.”
The most powerful thing in my notes that I’ve read tonight is: “What God does…is who God is. When we talk about who God is we talk about what God does.”
These reflections from my notes show that God’s activity is not in competition with ours. If it were, God would be like a cosmic santa, or bandaid, a thing.
So how is God acting? Go outside, experience life, relationships, creation…that is God acting. It is always a God thing. From the most minute detail to the moving of the planets. God.
Now you may be frustrated saying, “yeah, yeah, that is all good and wonderful, but still….”. So here we change the question from “How does God act, or What is God’s will” to “How does God’s agency work in people, or How do we interact with God’s agency.” Fair enough.
This is where a continuation of my theological upheaval picks up. I was thinking about this. This is a side track. Are you familiar with Lacan or Derrida? (If not I highly recommend exploring them more). Both seemingly describe something that is not, meaningless, separating. Lacan giving us the word Lack, and Derrida’s differance (to differ and to defer). In both cases the person experiences a separation, wether it is in relating to someone, or in communicating to some one. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Lacan) Anyway what really got me thinking about our agency interacting with God’s was Lacan’s perception of the Real (look it up in that address). Similarly I wonder if the Real helps with thinking about God.
We all have idolized God. Our concept of God is always an idol, our language always falls short. If it didn’t than that would not be God. We as humans are subjective and objective beings (though i would describe objective subjectively :P) We have tried so long to separate the two claiming one to be more true or more important than the other. Though as humans beings we are all subjective, and our experiences in the subjective influence the objective reality around us. (So in that case subjective is more important, philosophy more important than science). Our concept of God exists in the subjective. Though God may not exist in the objective nor subjective (because God is not a thing), we still experience God as true in the subjective. We experience God in the subjective. We get glimpses of God, the Real, and that is traumatizing, it changes our concept of God and thus changes how we interact in the world. We read about others’ glimpses of God and how that changed their concept of God, and thus changed their community.
A glimpse of God is transforming.
Thus our agency and God’s agency interact within the hermeneutical cycle. We come with an idea of God, this impacts our actions, we read, get a glimpse of God, which in turn transforms us, changes the way we view and experience everything, we then enter the world with new eyes, experience life and others, where we get another glimpse of God which changes how we read, which changes how we think, which changes how we act, which changes how we relate, which changes how we read…..and so on nonexclusively.
In essence this hermeneutical cycle should raise questions if we ever have free will since all our actions are based off of experiences and ideologies. An interesting idea I read in the book, The Dispossessed by Ursula K Le Guin was from a character who said something like physical free will exists, but not psychological.
God is acting in the world. It is all a God thing. We experience God’s agency relationally within the hermeneutical cycle taking place within Community. God acts to us through us.
I didn’t really touch on the incarnation of Christ and I can later if people desire, but I think it would fit in experiencing the traumatic Real of God. An encounter with Christ is a transforming one.
I would love to hear feed back from you, maybe present some things you would like me to reflect on, or questions you have for me, or clarifications you want me to make. Thanks.
May we experience the sustaining, creating, and unrelenting love of God, and see, and touch, and feel, and hear, and enjoy that love in the creation around and in us. May we feel the transforming glimpse of God and move us into loving relationships with others. Amen.
Namaste.
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