"In our post-Newtonian world we've come to imagine our world mechanistically.... [But] the empirical findings of science aren't the problem.
"The problem, since Isaac Newton, is with a particular way of imagining the world, the rise of a mechanistic imagination. This mechanistic imagination also seeps into our theological thinking."
As a child of the 1960s and 70s, I joined the wide and deep counter-movement to which I still belong at age 74. Many of our generation walked away from the hierarchical, mechanistic belief systems of our native religions. We are still here.
The so-called New Age, for all of its silliness and deluded self-gratification, was also a turning point in the rediscovery of enchantment.
Many, perhaps most of us, were overwhelmed by the cultural and political backlash that followed.
That backlash still dominates 21st century America with more financial and spiritual violence than ever. Yet it cannot overwhelm the truth.
One of the potential problems with moving away from a mechanistic or causal view of reality and God is that humans then are left even more in the dark. Cause and effect are understandable even if they can oversimplify reality and God. It doesn't really resonate as true to me that a mechanistic view of the world has caused disenchantment (although I am not sure what exactly you mean by this term) but rather a mechanistic view in which man is a "cog" and there is no real purpose or freedom for the individual to bear. When I have fixed something that has gone wrong with my car or improved something mechanically I feel a great sense of accomplishment. I can wrap my mind around a machine and how it works. Perhaps God created a reality wherein we don't actually understand how it works. That seems possible and in line with another step from ptolemy to copernicus to quantumania. And while I revel in the failure of the enlightenment projects desire for control I also feel the sadness in it's desire for understanding.
"In our post-Newtonian world we've come to imagine our world mechanistically.... [But] the empirical findings of science aren't the problem.
"The problem, since Isaac Newton, is with a particular way of imagining the world, the rise of a mechanistic imagination. This mechanistic imagination also seeps into our theological thinking."
As a child of the 1960s and 70s, I joined the wide and deep counter-movement to which I still belong at age 74. Many of our generation walked away from the hierarchical, mechanistic belief systems of our native religions. We are still here.
The so-called New Age, for all of its silliness and deluded self-gratification, was also a turning point in the rediscovery of enchantment.
Many, perhaps most of us, were overwhelmed by the cultural and political backlash that followed.
That backlash still dominates 21st century America with more financial and spiritual violence than ever. Yet it cannot overwhelm the truth.
One of the potential problems with moving away from a mechanistic or causal view of reality and God is that humans then are left even more in the dark. Cause and effect are understandable even if they can oversimplify reality and God. It doesn't really resonate as true to me that a mechanistic view of the world has caused disenchantment (although I am not sure what exactly you mean by this term) but rather a mechanistic view in which man is a "cog" and there is no real purpose or freedom for the individual to bear. When I have fixed something that has gone wrong with my car or improved something mechanically I feel a great sense of accomplishment. I can wrap my mind around a machine and how it works. Perhaps God created a reality wherein we don't actually understand how it works. That seems possible and in line with another step from ptolemy to copernicus to quantumania. And while I revel in the failure of the enlightenment projects desire for control I also feel the sadness in it's desire for understanding.