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Update: Chapter 16 – Perspectives of the True Church: Part II (1492 – 1517) – The Expulsion of the Jews in Spain, the Spanish Inquisition, and Erasmus
Here are our responses from last night as we finished up Chapter 16.
We focused on the Spanish Inquisition and the legacy that Erasmus left in influencing the Protestant Reformation.
We had a lively discussion last night, mainly spurned on by Erasmus’ preference of Origen’s theology over and against Augustine. We discussed the nature of original sin, and I was surprised to find out that basically half the group still held on to (or were at least somewhat reluctant about abandoning) the doctrine of original sin. Though we all agreed with the basic understanding of human evolution, most of the group still believed that God somehow interfered in the process and specially endowed human beings with the capacity to know and understand God. (I personally am in the very small minority of believers who believe that was not the case – in terms of divine interference in human evolution – but I’ll leave that for a future post perhaps.)
Does God Change in Response to Suffering? Motlmann, von Speyr, the Cross, and the Suffering of God, the Trinity
Matthias Grünewald, Isenheim Altarpiece, chapel of the Hospital of Saint Anthony, Isenheim, Germany, c. 1510-15, oil on wood
Undoubtedly, suffering and death changes us in some degree or another. It’s a given in life. A death of a close friend, parent, or loved one can profoundly affect the outlook of one’s life.
I can only imagine the unimaginable pain a parent has to go through if their child dies. It would undoubtedly change the parent’s life.
Is it the same for God then? Did God change when he experienced Jesus’ death? Does God himself change in response to suffering, pain, and death?
Plato and Theology
In order to really get a good understanding of Christian theology and Christian philosophy, you first need a solid foundation of understanding Plato’s philosophy.
There’s just no way around it. Even Paul’s writings contain Platonic thought and ideas.
Plato’s philosophy still heavily influences Christianity today as well – for instance, our ideas about body/soul dualism, the afterlife, the spiritual being greater than the flesh/material, repentance, conversion, etc.
Here are some summaries we wrote about Plato’s and Greek philosophy’s impact on Christian thought here in terms of church history.
Here is Prof. Andrew Davison of St. Johns College, Nottingham, UK, talking about how Plato influenced Christian philosophy – especially that of Augustine, who was heavily influenced by Plotinus and Neoplatonism.
Does God Play Dice with the Universe? The Role of Chance and Providence in Theology and Science
“God does not play dice with the universe.”
– Albert Einstein
“Einstein, stop telling God what to do.”
– Niels Bohr, in reply to Einstein
In Gerald L. Schroeder’s book, The Science of God: The Convergence of Scientific and Biblical Wisdom, he describes the blind forces of nature that lie behind much of human grief:
“An earthquake shakes a bridge from its foundation, dropping it onto a crowded bus passing beneath. A chance cosmic ray smashes into an ovum, produces a free radical which in its natural drive to establish electrical balance tears and mutates a chromosome. As a result, a crippled child is born. The same Creator that produces the beauty of a sunrise and the colors of a flower must be credited with these horrors as well.” (p. 168)
Last year, while I was attending classes at a city college, I would always pass by a cerebral palsy center. From time to time, I would see patients from that center lined up outside, mostly in their motorized wheelchairs, waiting to be assisted upon by their caretakers or be helped unto a transport truck.
For some reason, thoughts and questions would run through my head each time I would see these patients –
What if I were them? What made me so special that I was born normal – even though my mother had a complicated pregnancy with me, I came out relatively normal? But what about these patients afflicted with cerebral palsy? Was God directly involved in contributing to their physical and mental conditions? Or was it by pure, random chance, with no discernible reason whatsoever that they were in the condition that they were in? Didn’t God have the power to divert the cosmic ray from hitting the ovum and mutating the chromosome perhaps? Did he do that for me? Why me then and why them?
Or perhaps there’s just no reason or purpose whatsoever in all this.
It was by pure random, blind chance that I was born this way and not another.
And you can run a billion what-if scenarios in your head and ruminate what your life would’ve been like if you made this decision or that, etc.
Did we even have a choice to begin with?
Through the Wormhole: Did We Invent God?
Through the Wormhole with Morgan Freeman is one of my favorite series to watch on tv that’s on the Science Channel.
From time to time, they’ll show episodes concerning God and science.
This episode explores the latest research done in psychology and neuroscience about where the origins of human belief in the supernatural may have come from.
This episode poses interesting questions, such as:
- Does God only exist in our minds?
- Is a belief in God “hardwired” within us?
- What is required to believe in a God or supernatural entity? Can animals believe or sense the divine? (i.e. at the bare minimum you need a theory of mind as far as we can tell.)
- Is belief in God just a remnant from our evolutionary past to explain what’s going on in our world?
- Is it just childish superstition that we haven’t outgrown?
- Did God create us? Or did we create God?
Why study Thomas Aquinas?
In Chapter 12 of Prof. MacCulloch’s book, he went over one of the great “doctors” of the Catholic Church, St. Thomas Aquinas.
In this clip, Dr.Simon Oliver from the University of Nottingham discusses why he devotes so much attention to the medieval Dominican theologian, Thomas Aquinas (1225-74); he argues that when someone today comes to grips with his thought, that learning experience trains one to think theologically.
Also added a link to the “Resources” Page for the University of Nottingham’s youtube channel. Great talks with professors about Christian theology, philosophy, church history, and religion.
Project Augustine 