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Ryan, these are great questions! I wonder about similar ideas – especially regarding trying to do Youth Ministry from a Process lens.

I wonder if a part of the sin or evil that functions within our relationships and lives is participation in life selfishly rather than being lured to trust things as interconnected. If we were to assume that a part of God’s lure is also the lure of other entities, would rejecting any of the lures toward connection, beauty, harmony, etc. be a sin? Also as much as I want to reject or ignore it, it seems like a possibility that in the same way God is a primordial expression of creativity, I could see an expression of creativity that lures towards isolation, separation, discord, etc. If creativity holds the potential for good and bad, wouldn’t it be possible for there to be something that is coercive in the style of luring toward ill?

I like Tolkien’s mythology when it comes to thinking about God’s action in the world and a process view – no shot Tolkien thought this way fully, but in “The Silmarillion”, it talks of the main creative force crafting the world through a song. Adding notes, rhythm, harmony, and more. A force in the world in contrast to that creator seeks to ruin or set off the song. Rather than start new, the creative force weaves in the dissonance, the off-key notes, the rhythmic disruptions and finds creative and novel ways to continue the song and it’s flow. I still hold onto a desire for God’s ultimate “win” in life…that is something that is bit more difficult for me to process within process thought.

Additionally, I have, long before Process Ideas found me, prayed the Lord’s Prayer as “Lead us away from temptation and deliver us from evil” rather than the more traditional English of “Lead us not into…” I found a much more compassionate God in one that would never even consider leading us into temptation…that’s a God that I would hope would be in Process and find themselves in a much more whole place.

And is there a point for all of us where we become so comfortable with what we have become that we opt for being? Does being become the experience of staying in the past but driving it into the present?

Or would whitehead say there is no option for that? To even try and stay “the same” is to change your view on changing?

Interesting! Would the solitariness of religion only be limited to the individual – or would that experience of religion impact a multitude of other “others”?

I guess I wonder does Whitehead’s “Immanence” allow for the both and here – an expression and understanding of where religion can be and is deeply solitary, while also being deeply unified with the whole. Is my experience of the divine held only within myself? Or does my experience of the divine then connect me at another level with others experiencing the same presence but in their unique expression?

Thanks, Dennis. Looking forward to your insights!

Thanks, David! Jay will need to update his video now. Looking forward to hearing your thoughts and the sharing of your experience.

Thanks, Brian. I appreciate your humility and desire to learn! Grateful for your presence in this program.

Thanks, Allen. I enjoyed your God exercise – I think it may be worth all of us doing from time to time.

Thanks for sharing, Tom! Looking forward to sharing this program with you.

Thanks for sharing, Lynndal! I’m excited to learn from you in this program.

Thanks, John! Looking forward to exploring these ideas with you here as well as in our book club about the Tao!

So cool, Ryan! I am with you – I come from and work for an acapella church of Christ (so reformed in origins but a little less dogmatic now). But my exploration of process thought has caused some to be uneasy with my “lack of certainty” (their language) around God’s action in the world.

I also have found Whitehead to be a bit difficult to fully understand. I hope we all can add to our collective ability to move through this!