Comments on: Bulgakov with Herbert http://www.thelandofunlikeness.com/2007/09/22/an-anglican-take-on-sofia/ Catholic Anglican Reflections on Theology and Culture Thu, 04 Dec 2008 06:33:03 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.3.3 By: Janet Leslie Blumberg http://www.thelandofunlikeness.com/2007/09/22/an-anglican-take-on-sofia/#comment-323 Janet Leslie Blumberg Tue, 25 Sep 2007 18:04:14 +0000 http://www.thelandofunlikeness.com/2007/09/22/an-anglican-take-on-sofia/#comment-323 Thanks very much! Good overview and link. Thanks very much! Good overview and link.

]]> By: DWM http://www.thelandofunlikeness.com/2007/09/22/an-anglican-take-on-sofia/#comment-322 DWM Tue, 25 Sep 2007 00:10:51 +0000 http://www.thelandofunlikeness.com/2007/09/22/an-anglican-take-on-sofia/#comment-322 Janet, it's a sad time to be an Episcopalian, but an exciting time to be Anglican. {wuuuhhh!?!?!} I mean, the Episcopal church is being asked to do some pretty extraordinary things - however you look at it, TEC's progressive {some would say hasty} stance and actions re: gay bishops, etc.. have resulted in a worldwide call to action. The AC wants TEC to make concessions that many bishops don't want to make, for any number of reasons, and not just deu to partisan politics. A lot of canon law is at stake. That's the sad part. But the exciting part is that we're witnessing Anglican theology as it's being tested, as it's taking an even more concrete shape than it has in a while. This is what really has me hopeful, despite the nay sayers. I believe that if folks like us demand theological rigor and authenticy as these decisions are made will see a host of benefits. Unfortunately, some of this will come at the cost of division in the church. Hopefully I or Aron will have more to say in the next couple weeks, despite the fact that we try to stay away from most of the politics here at TLOU... guess that's wishful thinking for an Anglo-Catholic/Catholic Blog! I'm hesitant to say more as I don't give a lot of stock to these blogs you mention. Look back over the past year and they keep chanting a lot of the same partisan slogans. But you can read the actual news here - http://www.thinkinganglicans.org.uk/ Cheers! Dan Janet, it’s a sad time to be an Episcopalian, but an exciting time to be Anglican. {wuuuhhh!?!?!} I mean, the Episcopal church is being asked to do some pretty extraordinary things - however you look at it, TEC’s progressive {some would say hasty} stance and actions re: gay bishops, etc.. have resulted in a worldwide call to action. The AC wants TEC to make concessions that many bishops don’t want to make, for any number of reasons, and not just deu to partisan politics. A lot of canon law is at stake. That’s the sad part.
But the exciting part is that we’re witnessing Anglican theology as it’s being tested, as it’s taking an even more concrete shape than it has in a while. This is what really has me hopeful, despite the nay sayers. I believe that if folks like us demand theological rigor and authenticy as these decisions are made will see a host of benefits.
Unfortunately, some of this will come at the cost of division in the church.
Hopefully I or Aron will have more to say in the next couple weeks, despite the fact that we try to stay away from most of the politics here at TLOU… guess that’s wishful thinking for an Anglo-Catholic/Catholic Blog! I’m hesitant to say more as I don’t give a lot of stock to these blogs you mention. Look back over the past year and they keep chanting a lot of the same partisan slogans. But you can read the actual news here - http://www.thinkinganglicans.org.uk/

Cheers!
Dan

]]> By: Janet Leslie Blumberg http://www.thelandofunlikeness.com/2007/09/22/an-anglican-take-on-sofia/#comment-320 Janet Leslie Blumberg Mon, 24 Sep 2007 19:30:01 +0000 http://www.thelandofunlikeness.com/2007/09/22/an-anglican-take-on-sofia/#comment-320 Also, I just read the great Time magazine stories on Mother Theresa and especially on her crisis of faith and I am filled with conflicting responses.... Maybe a post topic for you guys, to start a discussion? Also, I just read the great Time magazine stories on Mother Theresa and especially on her crisis of faith and I am filled with conflicting responses…. Maybe a post topic for you guys, to start a discussion?

]]> By: Janet Leslie Blumberg http://www.thelandofunlikeness.com/2007/09/22/an-anglican-take-on-sofia/#comment-319 Janet Leslie Blumberg Mon, 24 Sep 2007 19:27:32 +0000 http://www.thelandofunlikeness.com/2007/09/22/an-anglican-take-on-sofia/#comment-319 Folks, can you fill us in on what's happening in New Orleans? There are some hysterical posts out there in the Blogosphere that I don't understand. Or it is just business as usual? Folks, can you fill us in on what’s happening in New Orleans? There are some hysterical posts out there in the Blogosphere that I don’t understand. Or it is just business as usual?

]]> By: A.D. http://www.thelandofunlikeness.com/2007/09/22/an-anglican-take-on-sofia/#comment-318 A.D. Mon, 24 Sep 2007 15:45:26 +0000 http://www.thelandofunlikeness.com/2007/09/22/an-anglican-take-on-sofia/#comment-318 Bulgakov, I think, comes at it from the standpoint of time. And just like we cannot ask what God was doing before he created time, we can neither ask what creation was doing before time was created. And there was creation before there was time (he sees time as created on the fourth day). Sophia, as the plan of creation, or the seed of creation in God, was always there, did not find a starting point in time, but exists with God, if not as God. Bulgakov, I think, comes at it from the standpoint of time. And just like we cannot ask what God was doing before he created time, we can neither ask what creation was doing before time was created. And there was creation before there was time (he sees time as created on the fourth day). Sophia, as the plan of creation, or the seed of creation in God, was always there, did not find a starting point in time, but exists with God, if not as God.

]]> By: Scott http://www.thelandofunlikeness.com/2007/09/22/an-anglican-take-on-sofia/#comment-315 Scott Mon, 24 Sep 2007 00:57:15 +0000 http://www.thelandofunlikeness.com/2007/09/22/an-anglican-take-on-sofia/#comment-315 AD wrote: '(Bulgakov denies the position that God might not have created, even though he affirms God’s satisfaction apart from creation).' Is this something like the following: God is fully actual in Godself, requiring no creature for God's own perfection. Yet, God will create creatures given an over-determined creative act. Basically, is B.'s position that God's perfection is over-determined? God is fully actual in Godself, yet God also creates given that God is God, and there is no 'new' causal basis for God's creative act. It is only explained as though given God's own perfection, God (necessarily) creates?? God's own perfection is enough for God to be perfect(ly actual), yet God also creates creatures b/c God's action is overdetermined, i.e. it includes divine infinity and finite creatures. AD wrote: ‘(Bulgakov denies the position that God might not have created, even though he affirms God’s satisfaction apart from creation).’

Is this something like the following: God is fully actual in Godself, requiring no creature for God’s own perfection. Yet, God will create creatures given an over-determined creative act. Basically, is B.’s position that God’s perfection is over-determined? God is fully actual in Godself, yet God also creates given that God is God, and there is no ‘new’ causal basis for God’s creative act. It is only explained as though given God’s own perfection, God (necessarily) creates?? God’s own perfection is enough for God to be perfect(ly actual), yet God also creates creatures b/c God’s action is overdetermined, i.e. it includes divine infinity and finite creatures.

]]> By: A.D. http://www.thelandofunlikeness.com/2007/09/22/an-anglican-take-on-sofia/#comment-314 A.D. Sun, 23 Sep 2007 23:47:54 +0000 http://www.thelandofunlikeness.com/2007/09/22/an-anglican-take-on-sofia/#comment-314 Great points Janet, I knew I could get some goods from you by dangling a little Herbert out there! The tower image is deeper now, I love the way God is seen here overcoming doubling upon doubling in our hysterical quest to put something in between . . . . Great points Janet, I knew I could get some goods from you by dangling a little Herbert out there! The tower image is deeper now, I love the way God is seen here overcoming doubling upon doubling in our hysterical quest to put something in between . . . .

]]> By: Janet Leslie Blumberg http://www.thelandofunlikeness.com/2007/09/22/an-anglican-take-on-sofia/#comment-313 Janet Leslie Blumberg Sun, 23 Sep 2007 20:00:43 +0000 http://www.thelandofunlikeness.com/2007/09/22/an-anglican-take-on-sofia/#comment-313 About your last sentences, they remind me of the Wisdom of Proverbs, by whom God made the world. "And she finds her delight in the sons of men." Because they are the site wherein ingenuity dwells, and because they care for, they care ABOUT, the ingenuity manifest in the entire creation, in the law, in every created thing. About your last sentences, they remind me of the Wisdom of Proverbs, by whom God made the world. “And she finds her delight in the sons of men.” Because they are the site wherein ingenuity dwells, and because they care for, they care ABOUT, the ingenuity manifest in the entire creation, in the law, in every created thing.

]]> By: Janet Leslie Blumberg http://www.thelandofunlikeness.com/2007/09/22/an-anglican-take-on-sofia/#comment-312 Janet Leslie Blumberg Sun, 23 Sep 2007 19:29:41 +0000 http://www.thelandofunlikeness.com/2007/09/22/an-anglican-take-on-sofia/#comment-312 A.D., I think your point is made even more strongly if you read "sinner's tower" as being, perhaps, not just an image of the sinner's rebellious "tower of Babel," but also, at the same time, an image of the offensive military "tower" that the armies of Herbert's day employed when besieging a walled city or an armed fortress. God's hatred of sin walls God's city against us, but our prayer is a battering ram and a seige-tower (think of the storming of the rock fortress in Peter Jackson's "LOTR: The Two Towers"). Because Christ has stormed heaven for us, prayer enables us to storm the battleworks of an alienated God and win re-entry into the city of Grace. This unstoppable power of love and inclusion overcomes all partition and all of the defensive structures that arise from our unworthiness and our blindness to this love. Thus it lines up with "Christ-side-piercing spear," which is simultaneously an image of blind human agression and at the same time of the paradoxical result, the releasing of the water and blood that flowed out to save all the world. (As Ransome says in Perelandra, "Is Maleldil a beast, that He should not bring forth good out of evil?") A.D., I think your point is made even more strongly if you read “sinner’s tower” as being, perhaps, not just an image of the sinner’s rebellious “tower of Babel,” but also, at the same time, an image of the offensive military “tower” that the armies of Herbert’s day employed when besieging a walled city or an armed fortress. God’s hatred of sin walls God’s city against us, but our prayer is a battering ram and a seige-tower (think of the storming of the rock fortress in Peter Jackson’s “LOTR: The Two Towers”). Because Christ has stormed heaven for us, prayer enables us to storm the battleworks of an alienated God and win re-entry into the city of Grace. This unstoppable power of love and inclusion overcomes all partition and all of the defensive structures that arise from our unworthiness and our blindness to this love. Thus it lines up with “Christ-side-piercing spear,” which is simultaneously an image of blind human agression and at the same time of the paradoxical result, the releasing of the water and blood that flowed out to save all the world. (As Ransome says in Perelandra, “Is Maleldil a beast, that He should not bring forth good out of evil?”)

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