Very well-written! I’ll be linking this to a piece I have coming out on New Year’s re: Christian futures (from a bit more of a statistical perspective). Scattered thoughts in reply:
—Good to hear you’re a universalist. For what it’s worth: you’re pretty definitely not wrong! There just isn’t another answer that provides a fully satisfying and coherent read of the scriptural narrative / the God-world relationship / of the divine economy of redemption / of the theological value of our own reason and moral intuition.
—Re: the present state of sectarianism: while I think Rome is moving slower than the Protestant world on “radical ecumenism,” the one thing I will say for Peter’s barque is that once it gets fully turned around, it sails with great vim. The institutions of Catholicism, once they’ve fully embraced some of the ideas you list here (and I would say the Church is on its way that direction), will ultimately be more effective on the ecumenical front than some of the current grassroots activities. Or, they will be able to give new energy to those. However you prefer.
—Re: political philosophy: as I wrote recently, Christians have a bad track record here. But I think the world is currently facing a test that will force an answer from the church about how it wants to proceed in matters of politics. Liberalism isn’t perfect, and even has some really serious flaws. But is the proper response to that an evolution of something better from liberalism—liberalism as the floor—or some kind of nostalgic embrace of strong-man politics? The church has a prophetic opportunity. Here again, a shout-out to Rome: Synodality is a politics, which is why it is an ecclesiology.
—Re: enchantment/divine council things: I think accepting the notion of a cosmos that is alive and full of mind, and that might be full of all kinds of beings far beyond our ken and only dimly reflected in our traditional religions and spiritualities, is a step one. It’s basically just a corollary of the classical vision of who and what “God” is. The next step is to go not out but inward: I have to realize that all those things are in me, too, and to learn how to manage them there, like Adam in the Garden. Lewis, I think, had a grasp of this with his concept of the planetary gods: the real point is that there is a Joviality, a Martiality, a Saturninity, etc. which we all experience within, and so which can be symbolized by the external cosmos, etc.
So much to chew on here, and I'm sure we'll do so for some time. As a work of invitation, this piece was wholly successful for me. I feel my imagination churning.
Most of my thoughts at the moment are related to your "fourth way" diagram for the Church. A part of me wonders if it's possible to think of it as more than a corrective to Protestantism, much as Protestantism was a corrective to the Roman Catholicism of its time. If a fourth way is primarily a Protestant corrective, it feels doomed to me—inasmuch as all these church revolutions fall short eventually. I wouldn't necessarily put much hope in a fourth way that is a new choice among other options; rather, I'd prefer to imagine a way that encompasses all options and goes beyond them.
Was it Chesterton who said the Church in every age is in need of revolution? Looking at the state of the Church today, this naturally brings to mind something like a fourth way. But maybe the radical ecumenism you touch on is itself the revolution we need most in our age. For me that feels more hopeful, more unlikely, and more beautiful than a fourth way among other ways.
At a more philosophical (and personal) level, this conversation also brings up a longstanding question for me concerning ideal forms and the broken form of the world. In speaking of the future, it's easy to drift into a space of Platonic forms. We can imagine an ideal type (of government, of church, of kingdom, etc.) and forecast a day when it will come to earth. In the meantime, I am often at a loss for how it will interface with the world as it is today.
It is the role of the mystic, the artist, the prophet, to glimpse truer forms and tell of them. In a way, these forms are more real than reality, and they are constantly pushing in upon the present age, which is passing away. But to be a person who tells of ideal forms can also be an embarrassment; maybe all mystics are also holy fools. I've been reading Simone Weil's letters to her priest friend in "Waiting for God," and I'm struck by how quickly I move between admiration and embarrassment. Flannery O'Connor sums up my feelings on Weil in a letter to a friend:
"The life of this remarkable woman still intrigues me while much of what she writes, naturally, is ridiculous to me. Her life is almost a perfect blending of the Comic and the Terrible, which two things may be opposite sides of the same coin... By saying Simone Weil’s life was both comic and terrible, I am not trying to reduce it, but mean to be paying her the highest tribute I can, short of calling her a saint, which I don’t believe she was. Possibly I have a higher opinion of the comic and terrible than you do. To my way of thinking it includes her great courage..."
In reading Weil, and in reading your post, I do feel a blush of ridiculousness. I feel this in my own writing as well. To speak of coming realities is to expose our most fragile hopes, a comic and terrible thing. It makes us live strange lives.
I'm not sure I'm making sense, but I'll be thinking about this more. Thanks for writing!
Very well-written! I’ll be linking this to a piece I have coming out on New Year’s re: Christian futures (from a bit more of a statistical perspective). Scattered thoughts in reply:
—Good to hear you’re a universalist. For what it’s worth: you’re pretty definitely not wrong! There just isn’t another answer that provides a fully satisfying and coherent read of the scriptural narrative / the God-world relationship / of the divine economy of redemption / of the theological value of our own reason and moral intuition.
—Re: the present state of sectarianism: while I think Rome is moving slower than the Protestant world on “radical ecumenism,” the one thing I will say for Peter’s barque is that once it gets fully turned around, it sails with great vim. The institutions of Catholicism, once they’ve fully embraced some of the ideas you list here (and I would say the Church is on its way that direction), will ultimately be more effective on the ecumenical front than some of the current grassroots activities. Or, they will be able to give new energy to those. However you prefer.
—Re: political philosophy: as I wrote recently, Christians have a bad track record here. But I think the world is currently facing a test that will force an answer from the church about how it wants to proceed in matters of politics. Liberalism isn’t perfect, and even has some really serious flaws. But is the proper response to that an evolution of something better from liberalism—liberalism as the floor—or some kind of nostalgic embrace of strong-man politics? The church has a prophetic opportunity. Here again, a shout-out to Rome: Synodality is a politics, which is why it is an ecclesiology.
—Re: enchantment/divine council things: I think accepting the notion of a cosmos that is alive and full of mind, and that might be full of all kinds of beings far beyond our ken and only dimly reflected in our traditional religions and spiritualities, is a step one. It’s basically just a corollary of the classical vision of who and what “God” is. The next step is to go not out but inward: I have to realize that all those things are in me, too, and to learn how to manage them there, like Adam in the Garden. Lewis, I think, had a grasp of this with his concept of the planetary gods: the real point is that there is a Joviality, a Martiality, a Saturninity, etc. which we all experience within, and so which can be symbolized by the external cosmos, etc.
Ooh, brother, preach! You're lighting me up here! This! This is what I have felt in my heart, too. I am with you all the way, Ant-Man!
So much to chew on here, and I'm sure we'll do so for some time. As a work of invitation, this piece was wholly successful for me. I feel my imagination churning.
Most of my thoughts at the moment are related to your "fourth way" diagram for the Church. A part of me wonders if it's possible to think of it as more than a corrective to Protestantism, much as Protestantism was a corrective to the Roman Catholicism of its time. If a fourth way is primarily a Protestant corrective, it feels doomed to me—inasmuch as all these church revolutions fall short eventually. I wouldn't necessarily put much hope in a fourth way that is a new choice among other options; rather, I'd prefer to imagine a way that encompasses all options and goes beyond them.
Was it Chesterton who said the Church in every age is in need of revolution? Looking at the state of the Church today, this naturally brings to mind something like a fourth way. But maybe the radical ecumenism you touch on is itself the revolution we need most in our age. For me that feels more hopeful, more unlikely, and more beautiful than a fourth way among other ways.
At a more philosophical (and personal) level, this conversation also brings up a longstanding question for me concerning ideal forms and the broken form of the world. In speaking of the future, it's easy to drift into a space of Platonic forms. We can imagine an ideal type (of government, of church, of kingdom, etc.) and forecast a day when it will come to earth. In the meantime, I am often at a loss for how it will interface with the world as it is today.
It is the role of the mystic, the artist, the prophet, to glimpse truer forms and tell of them. In a way, these forms are more real than reality, and they are constantly pushing in upon the present age, which is passing away. But to be a person who tells of ideal forms can also be an embarrassment; maybe all mystics are also holy fools. I've been reading Simone Weil's letters to her priest friend in "Waiting for God," and I'm struck by how quickly I move between admiration and embarrassment. Flannery O'Connor sums up my feelings on Weil in a letter to a friend:
"The life of this remarkable woman still intrigues me while much of what she writes, naturally, is ridiculous to me. Her life is almost a perfect blending of the Comic and the Terrible, which two things may be opposite sides of the same coin... By saying Simone Weil’s life was both comic and terrible, I am not trying to reduce it, but mean to be paying her the highest tribute I can, short of calling her a saint, which I don’t believe she was. Possibly I have a higher opinion of the comic and terrible than you do. To my way of thinking it includes her great courage..."
In reading Weil, and in reading your post, I do feel a blush of ridiculousness. I feel this in my own writing as well. To speak of coming realities is to expose our most fragile hopes, a comic and terrible thing. It makes us live strange lives.
I'm not sure I'm making sense, but I'll be thinking about this more. Thanks for writing!