[Model two is the intersection of participation and recognition.
The single actuality belonging to ‘the intersection of recognition (vertical axis) and participation (horizontal axis)’ is a state of existence.
Existence reflects either ‘grace’ or ‘self-destruction’.]
[Grace becomes a hidden attractor under conditions of alienation, when an infrasovereign thinkgroup has gained sovereign power. In this case, the parallel vertical axes become thinkpro-object and thinkanti-object. Thinkdivine is forcibly veiled by thinkpro-object.
Here, grace calls from the outside. Whenever one turns away from the totalitarian system, one senses the attractor, thinkdivine, not as an idea, but more like a melody.
Consciencepro-object senses the possibility of consciencefree.]
[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).]
