Part 2 - Process Theology - God Nurtures, Rather Than Dominates

Last week I watched a TV program of a mother doing all she could to encourage her fourteen-year-old daughter to become, not just a model, but a super model. That was her vision for her daughter, and come hell or high water, that's what her daughter was going to become. It was tragic to watch because it was clear to everyone that that was not what the daughter wanted for her life. In the whole situation there was very little nurturing and freedom and at times it all resembled a boot camp, rather than a loving relationship between parent and child. It had more to do with the mother's failed vision of herself and her vicarious living through her daughter.

Any good parent knows how detrimental it is for a youthful spirit to be shaped and forced in to a destiny it feels it can't accept, especially in a context where the possibilities are infinite. If this is the case with a human parent, how much more so with the Divine?

And so with this in mind, let me share the following:

I struggle deeply with the concept of pre-determination in our relationship with the Divine. Many believe, especially in more fundamentalist circles, that God has a fixed vision for every person, community, nation  and the world and that through Divine power and control persistently shapes it all in to that vision.  The Jeremiah text  1:4-5 is often quoted as an example of this: "The Lord said to me, 'I chose you before I gave you life, and before you were born I selected you to be a prophet to the nations.' " 

Of course a key example of this is also found in that of Jesus. He fulfilled all the prophecies that were made of him as if his life was completely planned out down to the minutest detail. His very death on the cross was  seen to be inevitable because that's the way God had planned it. He had to die on a cross. That's the way it had to happen.

Under this kind of scenario Jesus becomes more of an automated robot, controlled by an unmoving and unbending Divine mind, than a free creative, decision-making human being. I sense this way of thinking goes back to the previous post where we looked at the distinction between God working on life, rather than in and through life. The first is dominant and authoritarian concerned little with freedom and creativity,  while the second is participatory, nurturing, free and full of creativity and possibility. Process theology is far more akin to the second.

While we're here I just want to say a word about God's call on the lives of women and men.

Too often, I feel, we see this call as only being something God initiates and imposes on us. Our task is to discern and accept it. It kind of comes from the outside, as in the diagram, and we have to obediently submit to it.. What if the initiative is within us? What if call is something that rises up within, and in participation with us, the Divine encourages, nurtures and affirms it? What if we were to read the calls of Samuel, Jeremiah and the many other great Biblical characters in this way? What if we were to see God's call on the lives of modern day men and women in this way as well? It's an aspect and dimension which process theology also takes very seriously.

Let me end this post with the words of Bruce Epperly in his book, "Process Theology - A Guide for the Perplexed: "Although God's vision is intimate and global and embraces infinite possibilities, process theology suggests that God can be imagined as an intimate, creative and freedom supporting parent who says to her/his child, 'Surprise me, do something I hadn't fully expected so that together we can bring about something new and exciting.' "  The Divine, for Process Theology, is always filled with profound encouragement when it comes to human initiative and creativity, rather than condemnation and unbending control.

In the next post we'll take a closer and more practical look at what has been shared here, and also how it was reflected in the life of Jesus.