Counting the Cost

(This is part four of a series on process theology. Here are links to parts one, two, and three.)

The first sign of trouble with process theology for me was Hartshorne’s understanding of immortality. He makes the very good point that concern for one’s continued subjective existence after death is inherently selfish. If one loved God and all other persons and things with a perfect love, impartial but not disinterested, then it would really make very little difference whether one’s own existence continues forever as long as the whole show goes on and is enriched for one’s having been a part of it. To be without end is the property of God alone, and we should not hope to rival God, but be content and consoled that we will always exist objectively in God. He makes the secondary point that we would eventually be bored, so the finite duration of our subjectivity is a blessing.

Frankly, I find this weak in several respects. First, it would seem that Hartshorne has no sense of mystery or imagination on this point. How could he possibly know that we would get bored? Does God suddenly cease being the source of novelty?

Other process theologians have differently nuanced views, but the ones I read back in college usually play some variation on the objective immortality theme. John Cobb suggests that after death, God may allow our subjective existence to continue as long as we wish it, but we would continue to grow in love, and would eventually care no more for the series of occasions that is us than for every other future occasion, especially for God. At that time, one would cease to have subjective experience and would simply be immortal as a beloved memory of God.

Now maybe it’s just my idiosyncratic reading of scripture, but I find this account inadequate for three reasons, the first of which is unique to this point, while the second and third reappear in different forms in all of my objections to most process theologies with which I am acquainted. First, I thought that much of the benefit of a process understanding of God lies in the fact that it relieves us of an understanding of love that is disinterested. Perfection in love (my, aren’t we sounding Methodist) may mean impartial love, by which I would not love myself more than other beings. But I would still love myself. In fact, my love of myself and my love of others would enhance one another. I would therefore desire what is good for me. Perhaps subjective immortality isn’t, but I don’t find this business about rivaling God all that persuasive. Second, if process theologians claim that their theology is a better way of making sense of the biblical witness than classical theism (whatever that is), then it is rather odd that their account of immortality has nothing to do with the promise of the resurrection that is so important in so much of the New Testament. Objective immortality would be better than just being forgotten, but it does not induce the hope that is so characteristic of the early Christian witness. But it is the lack of imagination and mystery that is my chief complaint. It is this latter objection that I will raise again and again. Perhaps the best verse in the Bible that pertains to the resurrection is 1 John 3:2: “Beloved, we are now children of God. What we shall be has not been revealed, but we know that when it is revealed, we shall be like him, for we shall see him just as he is.” Saying anything more than that is dangerous, but this would seem to indicate some sort of subjective experience.

Process theology also has difficulties accounting for the Trinity. Now any metaphysical view of God is likely to have difficulties here, and the patristic and medieval witness is usually at its most compelling when it is its least metaphysical (I think Augustine has the most compelling version of the doctrine, and he pretty much says that the terms used for the godhead and the three persons are just placeholder terms, since we don’t know what else to say). Still, the standard process understanding of the Trinity seems to focus on various aspects of God’s activity in the world rather than a real distinction (however mysterious) in the godhead itself. On the process and faith website, Cobb points to Augustine as a precedent for this way of thinking about the Trinity, but he misreads Augustine (it’s the same misreading on account of which the Orthodox are always accusing Western Christians of modalism). Now I haven’t really written about the Trinity on this blog, though it is one of my main interests. On another occasion, I will write about why the Trinity is important, but since I can’t do it in a single sentence, I’m simply going to presume that the reader already knows.

Here’s one reason though: lacking a Trinitarian godhead, one will have a very difficult time with the Incarnation. In this sort of theology, Christ usually gets identified with the principle of creative transformation, and as such, process theologians can say that the Word is partially incarnate in every actual occasion. Now at least some process theologians, Cobb being an example, do also hold that there was something unique about the person of Jesus of Nazareth, but they usually more or less follow the example of Schleiermacher, and locate the divinity of Christ in Jesus’ perfect actualization of the initial aim. Cobb has been known to claim that this puts him firmly within the camp of St. Athanasius against Arius. I think that’s disputable, though he’s certainly no Arian. However, he might be something of a Nestorian (the parallel isn’t perfect, but who cares). The man Jesus has a very close association with the Word (or creative transformation), that it is fitting to speak of Jesus as divine and his life has salvific effects. He holds that Christ’s life created what he frequently calls a “field of force” that exerts an influence on all subsequent occasions, especially the church. I give him a A for effort, but again, I think that the witness of the Christian tradition (especially in scripture) seems to be getting at something a little more robust than a the force.

In summary, I think that defining God as the chief actual occasion has disastrous effects for Christian theology, though it does look nice. The comment left by Quodvultdeus on the previous post basically hits the nail on the head. In the theology of the Greek fathers in particular, God is related to every creature precisely because God is radically different from all creatures. It is in that framework that the doctrines of the Trinity and the Incarnation make sense (allow me to take this moment to plug Kathryn Tanner’s book Jesus, Humanity, and the Trinity, especially the first chapter). Divinity and humanity can be joined in the same subject (hypostasis, if one prefers) because they are not two sorts of being located at different places on a continuum, such that one takes up where the other leaves off. Process theology has gained something by thinking of God as a sort of thing, but I’m not sure it’s worth what is lost. In the next (and tentatively final) post in this series, I will explore ways of keeping some of those gains without forfeiting the insights of the traditional emphasis on divine transcendence.