Creation is the nexus between eternity and history. --Dávila
Now that we're flipping through the The One and the Many, might as well flip through to the end. Thus far we have touched on the questions of God's existence and immutability. Toward the end of the book is a chapter on The Metaphysics of Evolution, which ties these first two together nicely.
Evolution itself is an undeniable and empirical fact: for example, at one point in cosmic history there existed no rational beings, but here we are. By virtue of what principle is our existence even possible?
Put another way, in what kind of cosmos is it possible for free, self-aware, and truth-bearing primates to evolve into being? For just like anything else in this cosmos of ours, our existence isn't self-explanatory; rather, it obviously has a cause, but a purely material cause cannot have a spiritual effect:
Since such an immaterial nature has no material parts, but is a simple, inextended center of spiritual energy, it cannot be made out of different material parts provided by different material causes, e.g., the father cannot provide half a spiritual soul and the mother the other half... (Clarke).
Any metaphysician who actually is one recognizes that only God can create; or, if you prefer, if there is such a thing as real creation -- which is to say, of something from nothing -- then what we call "God" is its sufficient reason.
Now, creation and creativity are everywhere, at least their echoes. For which reason, in my view, the first words of Genesis are In the beginning God creates. No, not in the temporal beginning, rather, the ontological or principial beginning, which is always here and now (and cannot not be here & now).
The point is, the metaphysical categories of creator, creation, and beginning are thoroughly entangled. Frankly, I don't see how it is possible to have one without the others: as Father and Son necessarily coarise, so too do creator and creation.
And the most startling creation of all is of the unique individual person. We can generally understand the existence of ants, bees, and progressive atheists, but how to explain the unique individual subject?
[T]he appearance in our world of a new human being is something very special, as the Genesis story expresses imaginatively: the collaboration of heaven and earth, the earth rising up as far as it can [↑], and heaven reaching down to light a new spiritual fire in it from above [↓] -- the production of an embodied spirit that we call a human person, with a corresponding destiny extending through but beyond this whole material world.
Again, how is this even possible?
Nothing less than the creative initiative of a transcendent cause can render adequate sufficient reason for the emergence at the end of the cosmic story of this amazing microcosm, the human person that integrates within itself all the levels of creation from the lowest material to union with the highest spiritual, the Author of the whole story himself.
The evolution of our immaterial being is obviously a vertical and relational collaboration, otherwise it is stripped of its sufficient reason.
Some people think there can be a sufficient material explanation for such an intrinsically immaterial process, but these folks tend to be the same superstitious and conspiratorial types who troll this blog. In reality, reductive materialism
gives no adequate explanation, or even recognition, of the basic fact presented by evolutionary history, namely, that out of simpler unities new more complex ones emerge, with properties that are neither merely the sum of already existing properties of the simpler unities, nor deducible directly from them, but are distinctly on a new level.
Putting on my visionary cap, I see a vast metacosmic circle encompassing creativity-infinitude-kenosis-projection-involution on one end, and creation-exile-evolution-metanoia-return on the other. But I'm not the only one: first (ontologically, not temporally) there is
The Journey from the Many (all finite beings), projected outward from the One, their Infinite Source, by creation....
This is "followed" (again, ontologically) by
The Journey of the Many back towards reunion with the One, their Source, drawn by this same Source [the Great Attractor, O] through the pull of the Good built in to the very nature of every being through the mediation of final causality, which draws each being toward the fulfillment of its own nature... (ibid).
Speaking for myself, in comparison to participation in this absolutely riveting Great Circle, pretty much everything else is frankly boring, or a kind of tedious and distracting chore. We'll close with this:
the intelligibility of being -- all being -- is inseparable from the context of persons: it is rooted in personal being, flows out from it, to other persons, who complete the circle by returning it back again to its personal source. In a word, the ultimate meaning of being is: Person-to-Person Gift.
So, if creation is a gift, the mystic journey is just a regift.
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I don't why, but this post assists me in better understanding why in the Hebrew language there is no word for nature, something I've been thinking about while sitting on my back porch enjoying creation.
Reading a book called The Two Cities: A History of Christian Politics, and it occurs to me that the anti-intellectualism of the secular left is rooted in the same old nominalism -- for example, in the denial of male and female nature. Not only is nominalism alive and well, but it's the basis of so much progressive kookiness, from attacks on the constitution to their obsession with grooming children and normalizing deviancy.
There's also a strong element of Luther in the Woke: as with him, sanctification is prior to justification. The woke have the same structure, just a different content, as in "believe this absurdity and you are among the virtuous, disbelieve it and you are cancelled."
I said that backward: for Luther justification confers sanctity, but the point is the same.
Notably, it seems important that what one must believe to be a virtuous progressive is always inherently absurd, or at least characterized by massive contradiction (for instance, "saving the environment" by using electric vehicles which cause far more environmental destruction than just using petroleum).
the intelligibility of being -- all being -- is inseparable from the context of persons: it is rooted in personal being, flows out from it, to other persons, who complete the circle by returning it back again to its personal source.
Like the motion of ocean waves, air currents, and respiration; all these things are fractal representations of the nature of reality.
Yes, the inherent absurdity is a big part of it: credo quia absurdum v2.
I suppose it's the inherent need for religion among those who most aggressively deny it: spirit abhors a vacuum.
Speaking of spirits and vacuums, I just received another 600 page monster in the mail called Dominion: The Nature of Diabolic Warfare that I'm hoping will help make sense of the present moment. Just as with more severe forms of mental illness, more serious forms of demonic infestation allow one to better perceive the underlying nature of the phenomena.
Timely; they aren't even trying to hide it anymore.
Apropos the religion of the left, I just read a passage about how post-reformation states "were increasingly interested in religious observance as a form of submission to the State," and how they "worked to both eliminate diversity within states and to minimize the pursuit of holiness in favor of the pursuit of conformity."
Woke religion in a nutshell: conformity, homogeneity, and submission.
Rob Henderson's latest also goes to this:
“Why do authoritarian governments engage in propaganda when citizens often know that their governments are propagandizing and therefore resist, ignore, or deride the messages?”
The common understanding of propaganda is that it is intended to brainwash the masses. People get exposed to the same message repeatedly and over time come to believe in whatever nonsense the authoritarian regime wants them to believe.
And yet regimes often broadcast silly, unpersuasive propaganda. Huang observes that propaganda might actually be counterproductive, because the official messages often contradict reality. Why display public messages that everyone knows are lies, and that are easily verifiable as lies?
He gives us an answer: Instilling pro-regime values and attitudes is one aim of authoritarian regimes. But it’s not their only aim.
Alongside the desire to brainwash people, the regime also wants to remind people of their power. When citizens are bombarded with propaganda everywhere they look, they are reminded of the strength of the regime. The vast amount of resources authoritarian regimes spend to display their message in every corner of the public square is a costly demonstration of their power.
... Authoritarian regimes aren’t necessarily trying to convince you of anything. They’re trying to remind you of their power.... The regime is saying: Yes, we know this message is tiresome and obviously false. But we are showing this to you to tell you that helpless to do anything about it....
People are deterred from dissenting against the regime not because they believe in their dull messages but because they believe the regime has more power than themselves. Moreover, these official messages dictate the terms of acceptable public discourse and drive alternative ideas underground. They habituate citizens into acting “as if” they believe in the official doctrine, if for no other reason than that they do not publicly question it.
“The greater the absurdity of the required performance, the more clearly it demonstrates that the regime can make most people obey most of the time.”
If the regime can make the people around you partake in absurdities, you are less likely to challenge it. You will be more likely to obey it.
Can't get more absurd than CRT, BLM, LGBTQ nonsense, AGW, men in women's sports, and grooming elementary school kids, but there it is.
Apropos, via Vanderleun: Peak Trans-Saturation
It all started when they took homosexuality out of the DSM for no reason whatsoever but politics, bullying, and skulduggery. Once you detach sex from nature, the rest is inevitable.
Gagdad said "...They’re trying to remind you of their power..."
And it's worth emphasizing that they aren't just reminding you of their power, they are exercising their power upon you, in doing that. I've got a quote in this post from Dietrich Bonhoeffer, writing from in 1920's-1930's Germany, that's very relevant to today:
"Upon closer observation, it becomes apparent that every strong upsurge of power in the public sphere, be it of a political or a religious nature, infects a large part of humankind with stupidity. … The power of the one needs the stupidity of the other...."
See our aninnymice for further reference.
Indeed, most of them are so inured, so hopelessly dependent on the system, that they will fight to protect it.
I know this steak doesn't exist. I know that when I put it in my mouth, the Matrix is telling my brain that it is juicy and delicious. After nine years, you know what I realize? Ignorance is bliss.
I don't want to remember nothing. Nothing! You understand? And I want to go back to the 70’s, back when America was still great. You know, I want to be someone oblivious, like one of those actors in that 70’s Show. Better yet, Dazed and Confused. Nobody knew that everything was turning to shit back then.
Reminds me of an aphorism: "Everything in history begins before where we think it begins and ends after where we think it ends."
So, when did our current endarkenment actually begin? With original sin? Nominalism? The Reformation? Mass media? Affluence and consumerism? Widespread "higher" "education"? I always come back to history as the moving image of human nature, which accounts for both the horrifying surprises and the tedious predictability.
Which also reminds of the idea that the real question isn't why bad things happen, but why anything good?
There's the real miracle.
As to history, human nature, current year atrocities, etc., sometimes - more and more often - I think that things have been this bad if not worse for a very long time, only now they aren't bothering to hide it anymore. There's no more veneer or fig leaf of good intentions, just brute force demanding to be served.
Powerful meme right here.
I never thought the breaking up of light into its different wavelengths could be considered diabolical, given the Biblical significance of rainbows, but it's an interesting idea.
Some 40 years ago Fr Seraphim Rose wrote the following:
“There was a particular philosopher in China in the late nineteenth century who brought this philosophy to its logical conclusion, as far as it could go. His name is K’ang Yu-Wei (1858-1927). He’s not particularly interesting except as he incarnates this philosophy of the age, this spirit of the times. He was actually one of the forerunners of Mao Tse-Tung and the takeover of China by the communists. He based his ideas not only on distorted Christianity, which he took from the liberals and Protestants in the West, but also on Buddhist ideas. He came up with the idea of a utopia that was to come into being, I think, in the twenty-first century according to his prophecies. In this utopia, all ranks of society, all religious differences, and all other kinds of differences that affect social intercourse will be abolished. Everyone will sleep in dormitories and eat in common halls. And then with his Buddhist ideas he began to go beyond this. He said that all distinctions between the sexes would be abolished. Once mankind is united, there’s no reason to halt there—this movement must go on further. There must be an abolition between man and animals. Animals also will come into this kingdom, and once you have animals… The Buddhists are also very respectful to vegetables and plants; therefore, the whole vegetable kingdom has to come into this paradise, and in the end the inanimate world, also. So, at the very end of the world, there will be an absolute utopia of all kinds of beings who have somehow become intermingled with each other, and everybody’s absolutely equal.”
Of course, you read this and you say that the man must have been be crazy. But if you look deeply, you see that this is coming from a deep desire to have some kind of happiness on earth. No pagan philosophy, however, gives happiness; no man-made philosophy gives happiness. Only Christianity gives hope for a kingdom that is not of this world. The idea to have a perfect kingdom comes from Christianity, but since the early Socialists did not believe in the other world or in God, they dreamed of making such a kingdom a reality in this world. That is what communism is all about.
But what has changed since then? One thing that did change is that these communist ideals have not at all dissappeared but have made their way into the Church through the adoption of various social doctrines (often in local synods). In other words the Church’s mission has been corrupted to preach earthly ideals such as justice and equality, care for the environment and for the ecological systems etc, thus making the Church a militant activist for a false cause: happiness on earth just as described by Fr Seraphim in his lecture.
Of course a spiritual person with a deep spiritual life understands that all things were created by God and would not try to destroy them. With the fall of Adam, together with man the whole world got corrupted, for the world was created for man and not the other way around. So we can see that this whole world, in its current state, is heading for destruction with the hope of restoration into another world which we know as paradise. The Church teaches that the redemption of the world is through repentance, death and resurrection into a new world. We can see why the hope for perfection in this world is at best misplaced. We as Christians understand that perfection can only be attained “in the other world” through salvation. Thus any doctrine that comes to preach perfection in this world can only be of the Antichrist.
So, when did our current endarkenment actually begin? With original sin? Nominalism? The Reformation? Mass media? Affluence and consumerism? Widespread "higher" "education"? I always come back to history as the moving image of human nature, which accounts for both the horrifying surprises and the tedious predictability.
Since our friend Nicholas is on vacation (in Vegas I believe) please allow me to try and fill in.
Our current endarkenment is as you’ve noted, always at play. Good vs Evil. Ying vs Yang. Dolphins vs Patriots. It’s been a theme since God declared the whole thing a mess and flooded the place.
What modern Christians seem to have forgotten, is that God did indeed, flood the place. He could’ve just forgotten about the evil land animals and carried on with the fishes. But he reset humanity and its land animals, so that the game could resume, did he not?
So how do you know that it isn’t that balance (and the fight) which is important to God?
Did you yourself not fight the good fight against Sharia Law and the transgendered? What you seem to be asking, is what’s the point of Bob putting so much energy into insultainment if everybody including all the good guys are just sinning assholes and everything material is irrelevant?
No, no, don’t speak. For some moments in life, there are no words. Run along now.
Thus any doctrine that comes to preach perfection in this world can only be of the Antichrist.
So why do good parents always want the best schools for their kids?
My own father was a minister who tried to be the good parent. He ministered to me that life is just a transitory blip but that heaven is eternal. I always had to live that way while under his roof. A kid monk, if you will. He didn’t teach me much else. Well, besides “never a borrower or lender be”. With him as a father I was on my own for any of that real world stuff. And so, I had to either learn self-reliance, or die not trying (suicide).
Sometimes life got that bad.
Yet I chose the former. After years of living through many hard knocks, I eventually came to live freely on my own terms, even by being the prototypical “ethical nice guy”. Not an easy feat in this world.
Still, my father never visits. He couldn’t care less to see what latest home or garden project I’m working on, or to practice preaching, or to discuss metaphysics, or for any reason whatsoever. He’d rather visit my wealthy sister, an evangelical who married well. She has a massage recliner, luxury foods, and a big screen TV for his material pleasures. Outside of family dinner grace, they rarely ever speak of Jesus.
After receiving his own inheritance he dragged mom along on many 5 star vacations and cruises. She wanted him to spend more time with his kids. He always bought his cars new, thanks to grandpa. He’s not a bad guy, just an unwitting hypocrite, full of mental defenses. These behaviors tend to blunt the spiritual message. And thus his church died, BTW. Where's God's plan in that?
I don’t think things are as black and white as you’re preaching. Nobody is preaching perfection in this world (except for the grifters), only that striving to improve oneself and ones environment, both materially or spiritually, is a lot better for all than just going along with sinful impulses to live a life of screwing others over, either intentionally or unwittingly.
It is impossible to speak in such that one cannot be misunderstood.
No one is suggesting that you shouldn’t strive to “improve oneself and one’s environment, both materially and spiritually” or that it’s acceptable to give in to “sinful impulses to live a life of screwing others”. Clearly your father was a disappointment and his church died precisely because he “blunted the spiritual message” through his “unwitting hypocrisy”. To my mind, there was definitely a divine plan in that outcome if you care to think about it.
It's only been 30 years since I was licensed, but in that span of time the field of psychology has become totally unrecognizable. These people aren't psychologists, they're ideological hygienists.
That's a good way to put it. At a cursory glance, everything in there appears to be geared toward destroying actual mental healthiness.
The natural sciences, where the process of falsification prevails, take only errors out of circulation; the social sciences, where fashion prevails, also take their achievements out of circulation.
Gagdad said "ideological hygienists"
On target.
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