[Grace moves us under the normal conditions where thinkdivine and thinkgroup are exclusive and interpolating. Grace calls from the outside and the inside. One can entertain both consciencefree and consciencelacking at the same time. Conscience belongs to the realm of possibility.]
[So far, I have encountered at least three models suggesting ‘what grace could be’.
Here is one model:
A dual vertical axis intersection models the meaning underlying the word ‘religion’. The single actuality of the intersection of human thought (the divided vertical axis) and human action (the horizontal axis) is ‘what is good and what is bad’. This intersection serves as one model for generating and answering questions about grace.
Grace has the character of interpellation for thinkdivine.
Self-destruction has the the character of interpellation for thinkgroup.]
[Yet, these blogs have not explored the implications of this insight.
Consider how the contrast between the actualities of grace and self-destruction are reflected in familiar questions about grace:]
Is grace necessary?
If so, how is it distributed?
Are some destined to receive grace?
Are some destined to never receive grace?
Schoonenberg answered that nobody is excluded a priori from grace. Even pagans receive grace.
[Does that also imply that nobody is a priori excluded from self-destruction?
In fact, one can substitute the term ‘self-destruction’ for ‘grace’ in the preceding questions.]
Summary of text [comment] pages 72 and 73
In contrast to the concept that every virtue becomes impossible for man living in sin, Schoonenberg located the notion of grace. In Love, the Holy Spirit, all things are possible …
[… including God Recognizing Himself.
Grace is entangled in this relation. Up to this point, I have argued that ‘the state of grace’ belongs to the realm of actuality.
In this model, ‘grace’ differs from ‘self-destruction’.
‘Grace’ and ‘self-destruction’ are labels for the single actuality in the intersection of recognition and participation.]
[Oh, and speaking of Much to Do about Nothing.
Slavoj Zizek recently published a book entitled Less Than Nothing.
So far, I have barely made a dent in it.
The book starts with the ancient Greek philosopher’s views on nothing.
Zizek aims to elucidate a positive nothingness.
A void fills to the brim, even overflows, with nothing.
Oops, that sounds like American mainstream television.
Zizek is more than fun.]
[The few blogs could have been titled, Much To Do About Nothing.
Unfortunately, no one ends up married.]
[Schoonenberg did not explicitly engage the specter of modern nothingness.
Does anybody?
I suspect that the Shiites (the Party of Ali) do. Iranian mystics look at modern Western Progressives and see their Secular Society as less than nothing.
Western Progressive Society is ‘a nothing so negative’ that it appears ‘a positive something’.
Secular Society resembles branches growing without the tree. There are no roots. There is no trunk. There are only branches.
This is the ‘nothing’ that we have created without God.]
[Similarly, the vast nothingness that we see in contemporary American television is supported by the dynamics of ‘I recognize myself according to some … nothingness’.
This ‘nothingness’ consists of characters, such as ‘a helpless victim terrorized by a bad one’. The televised helpless victim inspires sympathy, because the viewer is also a victim (a disempowered person who cannot talk back to the television producers).]
[Take a look at the intelligent, apparently well-educated, modern Progressives.
They imagine that they know something, but ‘their something’ is ‘the nothing that has been done without Christ’.
Are they experts in anti-knowledge?
Consider the tax expert who knows which forms are required in order to qualify for a particular tax break. Every facet of “his” knowledge has been created ‘out of nothing, without Christ’, including the denial of unintended consequences.
Progressive experts go about their business in asserting their moral superiority and specialness. After all, they are certified. They hold university degrees. They are steeped in anti-knowledge.
Perhaps, deep down, they recognize the truth that they participate in.
‘Nothing’ keeps them in business.]
[This, of course, raises the specter of another topic.
If ‘nothing’ is accomplished without Christ, then what are we to make of all our constructions in our non-Christocentric world?
What is the nature of ‘this social nothing that we done without Christ’?]
