One thing I like about Matthew Fox is his ability to make fun charts. With a handy chart, Fox compares the popular Fall/Redemption model of spirituality with the Creation-Centered model of spirituality.
This is his appendix B from Original Blessing. In the book of course, it is in a side by side chart. I had to reproduce it the following way.
Fall/Redemption is in red and
Creation-Centered is in green.
Do know, beloveds, that the Fall/Redemption types were not amused by Fox's chart-making and had him reported.
He was later excommunicated from the Catholic Church by Cardinal Ratzinger the very same who was promoted to Pope. Fall-Redemption types are ruthless and calculating.
However, the good shall prevail. Choose your favorite Christmas color--red or green to match your spirituality!
Fall/Redemption and Creation-Centered Spiritualities
Key spokespersons: Augustine, Thomas à Kempis, Bossuet, Cotton Mather, Tanquerry
Key spokespersons: Yahwist author, wisdom writers, prophets, Jesus, Paul, Irenaeus, Benedict, Hildegarde, Francis, Aquinas, Mechtild, Eckhart, Julian, Cusa, Teilhard, Chenu, feminists, liberation theologians, artists, musicians, poets
Faith = “thinking with assent” (Augustine)
Faith = trust
Patriarchal
Feminist
Ascetic
Aesthetic
Mortification of body
Discipline toward birthing
Control of passions
Ecstasy, Eros, celebration of passion
Passion is a curse
Passion is a blessing
God as Father
God as Mother and Child as well as Father
Suffering is the wages of sin
Suffering is birth pangs of the creation
Holiness is the quest for perfection
Holiness is cosmic hospitality
Return to past to a state of perfection and innocence
Imperfection is integral to all nature
Keep soul clean
Make soul wet so it grows, expands, and stays green
Begins with sin
Begins with Dabhar, God’s creative energy
Emphasizes original sin
Emphasizes original blessing
Introspective in its psychology
Emphasizes extrovert meditation, i.e. art as meditation
Miracle is an outside intervention contravening the law of nature
Basic miracle is the wonder of existence, isness, creation
Egological
Ecological, cosmic
Sciences of nature are unimportant
Science, by teaching us about nature, teaches us about the Creator
Dualistic (either/or)
Dialectical (both/and)
Suspicious of body and violent in its body/soul imagery; “soul makes war with the body” (Augustine)
Welcoming of body and gentle in its body/soul imagery; “soul loves the body” (Eckhart)
Humility = “despise yourself” (Tanquerry)
Humility = befriend one’s earthiness (humus)
In control
Letting go – ecstasy, breakthrough
Pessimistic
Hopeful
Climbing Jacob’s ladder
Dancing Sara’s circle
Elitist
For the many
Particular
Universalist
No cosmic Christ
Cosmic Christ
Emphasis on Jesus as Son of God, but not on Jesus as prophet
Emphasis on Jesus as prophet, as artist, parable-teller, and Son of God who calls others to their divinity
Personal salvation
Salvation and healing of the people of God and the cosmos
Build up church
Build up Kingdom/Queendom
Kingdom = Church
Kingdom = Cosmos, creation
Human as sinner
Human as royal person who can choose to create or destroy
Struggle to clean one’s conscience
Struggle to make justice of injustice and to balance the cosmos
Time is toward the past (lost perfection) or future (heaven): unrealized eschatology
Time is now and making the future (heaven) happen now: realized eschatology
Spiritual journey follows three paths of purgation, illumination, union (Plotinus)
Spiritual journey follows four paths of Via Positiva, Via Negativa, Via Creativa, ViaTransformativa
Mysticism = mortify the senses
Mysticism = let go of today’s ideologies
Repent!
Transform and be transformed!
Eternal life is after death
Eternal life is now
All pleasure should be moderate (Tanquerry)
Enjoy divine ecstasy in creations’ pleasures
Contemplation is the goal of spirituality
Compassion, justice, and celebration are the goals of spirituality
A spirituality of the powerful
A spirituality of the powerless, the anawim
Emphasizes the cross
Considers the cross as significant for the Via Negativa, but also emphasizes the Resurrection, the coming of the spirit and creation, co-creation
Tends toward christolatry and docetism with an underdeveloped theology of the Creator and the Holy Spirit
Trinitarian in full sense of celebrating a Creator God, a prophetic Son of God, and the Holy Spirit of divine transformation
Emphasizes obedience
Emphasizes creativity (obedience to the image of God in one)
Tends to abstractions
Sensual
Righteousness
Justice
Duty
Beauty
Guilt and Redemption
Thanks and Praise
Purity from the world
Hospitality to all of being
Apolitical, i.e. supportive of the status quo
Prophetic, i.e. critical of the status quo and its ideologies
Soul is in the body to guard it
Body is in the soul to enlarge it
Nothingness as psychological experience
Nothingness as metaphysical experience
Humanity is sinful
Humanity is divine and capable of demonic and sinful choices
Faith is in the intellect
Faith is in the imagination
Suspicious of the artist
Welcomes the artist since all are called to be co-creators with God
Theistic
Panentheistic
John
ReplyDeleteI thought the seasonal color for Christmas was white. Did I get my stoles mixed up? :) Red is for Pentecost and Green is for "ordinary days." Except I don't believe there are any ordinary days.
Back when I was young, lo these many years ago Presbyterians didn't go in for seasonal colors. It was scarlet all the time on the pulpit and the lectern. And the pastor didn't wear any stole.
As to your dualisms (had to get that in) it seems to me that many if not most are both and not either or.
As to your dualisms (had to get that in) it seems to me that many if not most are both and not either or.
ReplyDeletetouche
Heh.
ReplyDeleteI always say I'm a "both-and" person in an "either-or" world.
but then I'm a heretic.
I like that!
ReplyDeleteIt seems to me that atonement theory by itself (or any other theory of Christ's work) is insufficient. The Bible uses a variety of images to talk about the work of Christ: redemption, which may or may not be atonement, reconciliation, taught by Christ's teaching and life on how to live as people of the Kingdom, defeat of the principalities and powers, etc. All the images are necessary to talk about the fullness of the work of Christ.
ReplyDelete