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PS to my PS – the interfaith high school (and middle school) closed in 2015 due to lack of enrollment, http://www.thepeaceacademy.org/hs/. Still, the idea is interesting and perhaps relevant to your situation.

PS to Ben. This interfaith high school in Pasadena, California, may interest you: http://www.thepeaceacademy.org/hs/faculty.aspx

“The most difficult thing here is creating that space and not having it be coercive (socially, emotionally, etc.) If it is possible, I think it requires quite a bit of intentionality on the part of the teachers and the institution. I would be curious if Dr. McDaniel or anyone else has successful experiences of that kind of interfaith religious education.”

Ben, thank you for using the Process and Interfaith slideshow and highlighting those three ideas. At the end you raise a very practical and important question. How to “create a space” for hospitable dialogue, mutual transformation, deep listening, and a sense of mutual service to the world. For my part, I am part of an interfaith organization – the Interfaith Center – that creates such spaces often, including, among other things, an interfaith “friendship camp” for pre-teens. You can get a sense of it on its website, considering its programs: https://www.theinterfaithcenter.org/programs. This may give you some ideas.

In my own experience, the least productive spaces are those in which we talk about doctrines and philosophies, the most productive are those in which we share stories, listen to music, partake of the arts, and/or do volunteer work together. Toward this end I have found the “spiritual alphabet” of an organization called Spirituality and Practice very helpful, because it highlights some qualities of heart and mind that are shared across (and outside of) religions. “A” is for attention, “B” is for beauty, “C” is for compassion, etc. I use it often in the classroom and in interfaith work. You’ll find it in this page, and see how it links up with process thought: https://cobb.institute/educators-toolbox/process-spirituality/. One thing I appreciate about it is its availability to those who are religiously unaffiliated: the “nones” so to speak.

Your post makes me wonder if it might be good for the Cobb Institute and Spirituality and Faith to co-sponsor a “pop-up” or a couple of short workshops on “Encouraging Interfaith Friendships in High School Settings: Process Approaches.” Or something like that, Subjects could include the alphabet, art and music, ecology, volunteering, and the unique voices of the “spiritual but not religious.”

Any thoughts?

Jennifer, this is a great project. Just the kind of thing we hope for. Let me know if I can help in any way.

Kent…this might interest you. It’s a short pieace by Sandra Lubarsky, a process thinker and founder of Flagstaff College: Beauty and the environment: https://www.resilience.org/stories/2019-08-02/speak-the-name-of-beauty/

You might also be interested in the work of Patricia Adams Farmer on types of beauty: moral beauty, natural beauty, soul beauty, artistic beauty, and tragic beauty.

Sandra and Patricia present issues in non-technical ways. For a more technical approach, take a look at the intro to Process and Aesthetics. It costs 15 dollars on Kindle.

Let me know when and how I can help further.

Jay

Kent…this might interest you. It’s a short pieace by Sandra Lubarsky, a process thinker and founder of Flagstaff College: Beauty and the environment: https://www.resilience.org/stories/2019-08-02/speak-the-name-of-beauty/

You might also be interested in the work of Patricia Adams Farmer on types of beauty: moral beauty, natural beauty, soul beauty, artistic beauty, and tragic beauty.

Sandra and Patricia present issues in non-technical ways. For a more technical approach, take a look at the intro to Process and Aesthetics. It costs 15 dollars on Kindle.

Let me know when and how I can help further.

Jay

Thanks, Elvi. What important insights about what art reveals, and well connected to the Whiteheadian Process Thought tradition we are exploring. I could only access one attachment (figure 3). Is there a way to access the others? As you say, works of art are the outcomes of a creative process of concrescence, amid which the many become one, and they then function as lures for feeling and understanding to individuals and communities, taking on meaning that can often transcend the intentions of the creators…and in good ways. They are, as it were, objectively immortal. Their contrasts are key to their evocative power. Let us see more…and thank you.

John, thanks for using that phrase “the great expanse of original wisdom.” My own Zen teacher, Keido Fukushima, used to speak of enlightenment as ever-expanding, and your phrase helps me re-feel that idea.

Jace,

When it comes to death, process thinkers have much to say. Some of it is articulated on this page; please take a look: https://www.openhorizons.org/life-after-death-process-reflections.html.

One thing for sure, since God is the Deep Memory of the universe, nothing is forgotten by God. Every single instance of experience in your son’s life, even if forgotten (or never known) by you, is known and appreciated by God with, in Whitehead’s words, “a tender care that nothing be lost.” And yet, just possibly, what you don’t know in this life, you may nevertheless know in a continuing journey after death. Process theology is quite open to images of reunion.

Jay

Mike, what I mean to say is that each and every actual entity – protonic, cellular, human, divine, whatever – is itself an act of decision. We might say that it “makes” decisions, but it is more accurate to say it is an act of decision. And this quite apart from whether we speak of “it” as “he” or “she.” “It” can be an it. As for the ontological status of the universe as a whole, it is a datum for God and, in this sense, a vast “many” that is “becoming one” in the divine life. This “many” would be a nexus and/or a multiplicity: not sure which. The actual entities composing it are “together” in God’s experience. But the nexus as such does not make decisions; only the actual entities to. Here is the passage in PR where Whitehead refers to decision as the very essence of actuality: that is, a defining feature of each and every actual entity:

“For rationalistic thought, the notion of ‘givenness’ carries with it a reference beyond the mere data in question. It refers to a ‘decision’ whereby what is ‘given’ is separated off from what for that occasion is ‘not given.’ This element of ‘givenness’ in things implies some activity procuring limitation. The word ‘decision’ does not here imply conscious judgment, though in some ‘decisions’ consciousness will be a factor. The word is used in its root sense of a ‘cutting off.’ The ontological principle declares that every decision is referable to one or more actual entities, because in separation from actual entities there is nothing, merely nonentity—‘ The rest is silence.’ The ontological principle asserts the relativity of decision; whereby every decision expresses the relation of the actual thing, for which a decision is made, to an actual thing by which that decision is made. But ‘decision’ cannot be construed as a casual adjunct of an actual entity. It constitutes the very meaning of actuality. An actual entity arises from decisions for it, and by its very existence provides decisions for other actual entities which supersede it.”

Jennifer,bthanks for such good questions. Rightly or wrongly, Whitehead believed that some things are non-temporal and, in that sense, eternal. These things – eternal objects, pure potentialities – can be embodied in different contexts, but are not themselves temporal. His examples are abstract numbers, such as twoness, and abstract emotions, such as attraction. Might they be ‘evolving,’ too? He thinks not, but he might be wrong. Related to this is the question of whether, in fact, the laws of nature are changing. A physicist, Lee Smolin, thinks they might. Here’s a web page on that possibility: https://www.openhorizons.org/is-there-a-place-for-god-in-an-evolving-universe-ingram-smolin-mcdaniel.html

Thanks, Kent. Glad you found these passages from Whitehead and share them with us. Both are profound in different but important ways.

Jennifer,

Here’s the link for Process and Faith: https://processandfaith.org/. If you become a member (it’s free), you can help shape it. It has about 200 members from around the world now.

As for Process Theology and Open and Relational Theology, process is one kind of Open and Relational Theology, of which there are others. Here’s how Thomas Oord puts it: “According to my understanding, people drawn to narrative theologies, to liberation theologies, and perhaps even to ‘generously orthodox’ theologies are part of the Open and Relational community. Process theologians are part of a larger and more expansive open and relational community, itself becoming ever more ecumenical and multi-religious.”

Make sense?

Yes, that’s right, Kent. Sorry to be late in responding.

Jay

PS The videos are intended to help people read Process and Reality, the learning of which is complemented by oral assistance – at least in my experience and the experience of those who have taken courses in Process and Reality. Very hard to read without such assistance.

Just seeing this, Rolla. I’ll share with Richard and see if there’s some way we might develop a list. Good idea…and thanks!