Category Archives: Defining Religion

10/12/16

Man and Sin by Piet Schoonenberg (1964) 2.2 CK

Summary of text [comment] page 75

[The moment that I try to affirm ‘a good that derives solely from nature’ [that is, from consequences (normal context) and dispositions (potential)], I set myself up to miss the mark, even though I may appear to improve the situation at first.

Why?

When I ‘try to do good’, I inevitably place an actuality into context. That is, I apply ordinates to ‘what I regard as actuality’. These ordinates are projections of ‘what I regard as natural’.

I define consequences and dispositions in terms of ‘what is natural’. When the tragic results start to roll in, I cannot comprehend why things go wrong and why people are distressed.]

10/11/16

Man and Sin by Piet Schoonenberg (1964) 2.2 CJ

[So what did Schoonenberg intend with ‘his use of the word ‘nature’‘?

To me, his arguments point to the horizontal axis of several of the recently discussed intersections.

For example, in ‘the message underlying the word ‘religion’‘, Schoonenberg’s use of the word ‘nature’ points to the horizontal nested form:

Lawessential or Consequences3H( sin and virtue2( dispositions1H))

In the tension between I recognize myself as an image of God and human nature is to participate in divine nature, the horizontal nested form is:

My divine nature to be the seat of choice3H( state of grace or state of self-destruction2( my potential for participation1H))]

10/6/16

Man and Sin by Piet Schoonenberg (1964) 2.2 CG

[I suspect that the so-called ‘natural’ attempts to access our evolved nature are cultural phenomena.

They are scams, inducing self-destruction.

Why?

Natural ordination cannot be obtained in our current Lebenswelt.

The ordination of talk has changed. Before the first singularity, hand-speech talk held the qualities of reference. After the first singularity, speech-alone talk holds only symbolic qualities. Reference must be projected into words.

So what does ‘the projection of ‘what is natural’’ into words suggest?]

10/4/16

Man and Sin by Piet Schoonenberg (1964) 2.2 CE

[In our current Lebenswelt, humans no longer have these options, even when the band itself is specialized (say royalty or blacksmiths).

Concupiscence has been unloosed.

To me, this unloosing resonates with Rene Girard’s descriptions of ‘unconstrained mimetic desire’.

Cupid is the god of mimetic desire.

After the first singularity, religious traditions wrestled with concupiscence, at first through thinkgroup (which originally served as thinkpost-first-singularity for a band or a specialization), then through a slow awakening to a trans-thinkgroup, which I label thinkdivine].

09/16/16

Man and Sin by Piet Schoonenberg (1964) 2.2 BV

[‘Grace’ is not What the Father Recognizes.

‘Grace’ is not the Son, the Object of the Father’s Love and Recognition.

‘Grace’ is like the dynamic of their Love and Recognition. This dynamic belongs to Creation because ‘the possibility of Creation’ synchronizes with ‘the Potential of God Recognizing Himself’.

Perhaps, the theological One True Triune God may be regarded as ‘a relation outside of time (eternal and archetypal)’ even as it engenders, by belonging to the realm of actuality, ‘another relation inside of time (immanent and conditional)’.]