A Theology of the Cross

[angellous_evangellous]

Bump for recent interest

 

[angellous_evangellous]

Recent interest

 

[Just_me_Mike]

Process theology is a theory that God made mistakes and learned in the story of God in the Hebrew bible and New Testament. God created humans imperfect - with the ability to sin - and introduced them in an environment that made sin and evil on earth possible.

Now we have a long history of human and divine evil.

Humans have the right to be angry with God because God refuses or is unable to stop the evil that plauges our world. In this we judge God for being Divine, "You refuse to stop the evil that you created!"

God has the right to be angry with humans, "You're still responsible for your actions!"

In Christianity, God has become incarnate in Jesus Christ. He pronounces himself guilty as charged and dies as a human being for the sins of all humanity.

Please share with me where you are at on this theology.

I suspect it goes deeper than just a discussion for you. (If I am wrong forgive me)

I think there is possibly something valuable in what you are saying.

I think by the terms you are using you scared off potential people from understanding because it sounds so foreign.

 

[Just_me_Mike]

Process theology is a theory that God made mistakes and learned in the story of God in the Hebrew bible and New Testament. God created humans imperfect - with the ability to sin - and introduced them in an environment that made sin and evil on earth possible.

An interesting note to me, is that you have phrased this as a mistake on God's part. However, our definition of mistake is inadequate for God.

Instead I like the whole OP, but as a deliberate and rightful creation that God is entitled to do as God. So he "broke it" in our eyes, but to him it was all just part of his plan.

Another poster pointed out the other day that it could be like heart surgery (I think Henei posted it) and that if you snap shotted the knife opening the chest you could see murder or a mistake or error or sin, but to see the whole procedure you see life saved.

Does that make sense to you?

 

[angellous_evangellous]

Hey itwillend - I appreciate your questions, but I must answer them later.

I realize that my last post on this thread was a year ago, but it does I think capture my thoughts so far.

 

[Mr Cheese]

What if the view expressed in the OP is not in opposition with other christian views, but is merely a way of seeign the same thing?

Thus the view comes down to language largely....

like stating you have to climb the mountain, and yet there is no mountain.

 

[Muffled]

]Process theology is a theory that God made mistakes and learned in the story of God in the Hebrew bible and New Testament.[/COLOR] God created humans imperfect - with the ability to sin - and introduced them in an environment that made sin and evil on earth possible.

Now we have a long history of human and divine evil.

Humans have the right to be angry with God because God refuses or is unable to stop the evil that plauges our world. In this we judge God for being Divine, "You refuse to stop the evil that you created!"

God has the right to be angry with humans, "You're still responsible for your actions!"

In Christianity, God has become incarnate in Jesus Christ. He pronounces himself guilty as charged and dies as a human being for the sins of all humanity.

I have never seen anywhere that God has admitted to making a mistake. It is difficult to construe a process on God's part since all of time is available to Him. Of course it is quite reasonable to say that man is in the process of redemption.

This is contrary to scripture. God created everything and declared it good.

In reality God has the ability to sin also but He does not. Having been created as beings without sin, there was no reason to change.

The environment had nothing to do with it. Adam and Eve did fine in the earth environment without sin.

We have an even longer prehistory of both evil and perfection cycles.

Humans are not justified in the least on this because repentence and acceptance into the Kingdom of God is always available. If the cycle is evil they can stay in Heaven or the cycle is good then they can return to a perfect life on earth. Those who love evil can't complain either because they prefer it to perfection. As the saying goes, if they don't want to do the time then they shoudn't do the crime.

That is BS. Jesus never declared any guilt. He was found guilty of being good by those who love evil. The word "for" can mean "because of." I can't believe that He who came to save us from our sin would die to permit us to sin. He bore our sins ie He allowed our sins to take him to the cross.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

Damn I hate being colorblind.

 

[Enoch07]

The idea that God created evil is accepted widely in Judaism unless I am mistaken.

However, for my idea to work I think that all you would need to assent is that God created humanity with the ability to sin and to die - a presumption that I think that you can accept. It seems to me that in Christian theology God will eventually resurrect humans to perfection: the inability to sin and die. It seems then that God is correcting a mistake - God should have made humanity unable to sin and die in the first place.

He did. That is what your soul was initially created as. We effed that up in the first earth age when Satan rebelled.

The resurrection to perfection is when our physical bodies die, and we go back to just being a spirit...perfect and unable to die or sin. God created our physical bodies to experience sin and death, so that we are able to redeem ourselves, especially the fallen 1/3rd of those who sided with Satan during the rebellion.

Simple: by not allowing evil choices as possibilities and only good choices.

The Garden of Eden myth provides an excellent model for this kind of Eutopia:

The Lord places Adam and Eve in the Garden, and gives them the freedom to be completely human without the possibility of sin. They can choose where and what to farm, create art and music, and have sex. Evil choices are not a possibility: God creates Adam and Eve without the ability to exploit one another, be selfish, or disobedient to God. God does not create any animal or person with the ability for guile or deceit.

It's entirely possible.

Wrong there. Evil choices was a possibility, if you consider being disobedient to God an evil action/choice. God told them what they could and could not do. They disobeyed God, by partaking of the tree of knowledge of good and evil.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

I think there is possibly something valuable in what you are saying.

I hope it can now address your disbelief.

 

[Werden]

Process theology is a theory that God made mistakes and learned in the story of God in the Hebrew bible and New Testament. God created humans imperfect - with the ability to sin - and introduced them in an environment that made sin and evil on earth possible.

Now we have a long history of human and divine evil.

Humans have the right to be angry with God because God refuses or is unable to stop the evil that plauges our world. In this we judge God for being Divine, "You refuse to stop the evil that you created!"

God has the right to be angry with humans, "You're still responsible for your actions!"

Regarding this description I am curious on a few issues.

1 - how does Process Theology relate to the Process Philosophy of A.N. Whitehead? I understand that it springs from his ideas.

2 - how is this description different from a contemporary Gnostic Christianity? From my understanding of Gnosticism this varies little from the ideas of early Gnostic Christianity (ie. Demiurge="god who created humanity and can make mistakes", Jesus="god of redemption" etc.)

In Christianity, God has become incarnate in Jesus Christ. He pronounces himself guilty as charged and dies as a human being for the sins of all humanity

And this reminds me of Arianism (the 'heresy' of Arius) in a way as well as Gnosticism.

Not criticizing anyone or anything, just trying to understand Process Theology since I have been working to understand Process Philosophy.

 

[lunamoth]

Process theology is a theory that God made mistakes and learned in the story of God in the Hebrew bible and New Testament. God created humans imperfect - with the ability to sin - and introduced them in an environment that made sin and evil on earth possible.

Now we have a long history of human and divine evil.

Humans have the right to be angry with God because God refuses or is unable to stop the evil that plauges our world. In this we judge God for being Divine, "You refuse to stop the evil that you created!"

God has the right to be angry with humans, "You're still responsible for your actions!"

In Christianity, God has become incarnate in Jesus Christ. He pronounces himself guilty as charged and dies as a human being for the sins of all humanity.

Hi AE,

Is this still your view of process theology? I've been reading a bit about it lately and to me it does not seem nearly this personified and judgmental.

luna

 

[angellous_evangellous]

Hi AE,

Is this still your view of process theology? I've been reading a bit about it lately and to me it does not seem nearly this personified and judgmental.

luna

I'm not sure what to do with this.

I read some process theology too since I started the thread and discovered that the OP has nothing to do with it. There's just no redemption for this, so I've been waiting for someone to notice.

 

[lunamoth]

I'm not sure what to do with this.

I read some process theology too since I started the thread and discovered that the OP has nothing to do with it. There's just no redemption for this, so I've been waiting for someone to notice.

OK then!

(Process philosophy and process theology are fun, but I would guess you are much too busy with other things to pick this up again now.)

 

[angellous_evangellous]

OK then!

(Process philosophy and process theology are fun, but I would guess you are much too busy with other things to pick this up again now.)

Yeah, they are.

Unfortunately I brushed up on process theology after I wrote the OP.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

OK, I changed the title and edited the OP to reflect the correction that was needed.

Thanks Luna.

 

[doppelganger]

OK, I changed the title and edited the OP to reflect the correction that was needed.

Thanks Luna.

I was confused for a sec, because I remember this being called "Process Theology of the Cross." We had dueling process "theology" threads at one point several years ago (though, technically speaking, I don't do theology).

 

[angellous_evangellous]

I was confused for a sec, because I remember this being called "Process Theology of the Cross." We had dueling process "theology" threads at one point several years ago (though, technically speaking, I don't do theology).

Neither do I, apparently.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

Dude, my mind is mush.

 

[lunamoth]

We had dueling process "theology" threads at one point several years ago (though, technically speaking, I don't do theology).

I forgot about that. Do you recall what the other thread was called?