[Buddha-l] Fighting creationism

[SJZiobro at cs.com]

Vicente Gonzalez <vicen.bcn at gmail.com> wrote:

>Scc> The Christian understanding I am familiar with (and I'm not
>Scc> alone) is that an infinite Goodness and Wisdom created the
>Scc> universe out of Love so that what was not would, in various ways,
>Scc> participate that Goodness and Wisdom.
>
>Quietists noted when God is eternal and he is everywhere, then he
>cannot be the first cause, because there is not a place or time in
>where he was not present. That rectification makes this religion more
>coherent. And by the way, it is in agreement with the point of view of
>Buddha about Brahma the creator; which is a happy coincidence.

Vicente,

I thought your remarks relative to the Molino quietists cogent and meant to reply earlier than I presently am.  This manner of conceiving a non-first cause makes sense to the extent that the cause here is considered as the first in a series occurring in time and occupying some dimensive quality (It has to be some sort of thing).  Deny the antecedent, namely, that God is the first thing in a series, then it follows that God is not a first cause.  If, however, one conceives of the creative act itself as entirely free and unrestricted by any considerations of space and time, then there is nothing to prohibit conceiving of God as the first cause, because here God is not some first thing in a series occurring in time and occupying some dimensive quality.

>Quietist were heretics although probably it is not important, because
>they were a main influence in the all the best Christian mystics.
>It is part of a very old battle inside the Church across the History,
>so anyone can extract his own conclusions.

This is a very fair remark with regard to the tension between the utterances of mystics and the inability of some theologians to contextualize the import of these utterances within some theological framework.  Molino's teachings in many ways parallels Eckhart's, and it's probably no surprise that he met with much the same fate that awaited Eckhart had he (Eckhart) not first died. 

>In the Coelestis Pastor bull of Pope Innocent XI against Quietist,
>there is a catalogue of nice things. Most of them can be enjoyed by
>Zen fans:
>
>http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Innoc11/i11coel.htm

This was a good read.  Clearly the papal theologians and others were unable to appreciate much of what they condemned.  As far as I can judge the matter most of the condemned propositions can easily enough be reconciled with theological principles.

Regards,

Stan