Two Reservations about Process Theology
Throughout my life I've entertained, held, or expressed sympathy for a lot of heterodox ideas. Some of these ideas I've rejected, but some I still hold onto. But one of the ideas I've never really embraced is process theology.
Process theology is sprawling and complex and I don't want us to get too lost in the weeds, but I need to share some basic ideas to get everyone on the same page. Two of the key ideas behind a lot of process theology are the following:
God as Dynamic and Relational: Unlike classic theism, which describes God as immutable and omnipotent, process theology argues that God is deeply involved in the world and is affected by it. God experiences the joys and sufferings of creation and changes in response to these experiences. This relationship emphasizes God’s empathy and responsiveness rather than dominance.
God’s Power as Persuasive, Not Coercive: Rather than exerting unilateral control over the world, God works through gentle persuasion, inviting beings toward greater harmony, creativity, and beauty. Process theology rejects traditional views of divine omnipotence, emphasizing instead that God influences rather than controls creation.
Basically, process theology emphasizes the relationality between God and the world in a way that rethinks God's immutability and unchanging nature along with envisioning God's influence upon the world as persuasive and non-coercive. Simply put, God changes and is not all-powerful (as traditionally understood).
If you're wondering what the theological "win" here is the advantages of process thought concern both theodicy and ethics. Regarding theodicy, process theology is much more willing to say God "can't" eliminate pain and suffering because God's power just doesn't work in that "top-down" sort of way. Regarding ethics, we become what we worship, and if we worship a God who reigns omnipotently over creation we'll come to valorize power, dominance, and coercion. And we do see a lot of that temptation among Christians today. (Hello, evangelicals!) By placing before us a vision of God whose power is more relational and "bottom-up" process theology sets before us a "better" God in the hope of making "better" Christians.
To my mind, these are clear "wins." So, I've always understood the attractions of process thought. But I've never myself found the idea plausible. I get the wins, I just don't buy the ideas that get us there. For two reasons. Call these the Ontological Objection and the Teleological Objection.
First, the Ontological Objection.
Did God create the world ex nihilo? If God did not create the world the word "God" would not be referring to the Source of being itself, which means the word "God" is being used improperly. If God and creation are coterminous then the ground of both God's being and creation's being would be left unaccounted for. And in the Christian imagination the word "God" should point to the ground of being itself. Stated in a more philosophical way, I suspect that the word "existence" is being used in process thought too univocally in relation to God and creation.
If, however, process folks are concerned about creation ex nihilo placing God at a deistic remove from creation, I'd simply clarify that the Christian understanding of creation ex nihilo isn't imagining something like Big Bang cosmology but is, rather, describing creation's continuous ontological dependence upon God. Again, I think process thought tips too far toward a scientistic vision of being, trapping itself in a metaphysical cul-de-sac of univocity. Properly understood, creation ex nihilo is a deeply and profoundly relational doctrine. We exist only in a continual relation to God. We exist because of love.
Next, the Teleological Objection.
Process theology assumes that both God and creation are on a shared, developmental journey toward love. Love is the telos of cosmic evolution. But if God is open to change why is it assumed that we end up in a peaceful, loving place? If God's nature is not fixed why wouldn't it be possible that creation devolve into violence and chaos? That is to say, if the future of the God/Creation relation is open and dynamic, what prevents the evolution of the cosmos from going sideways? Either the relationship is less open than process theology assumes or the final telos of love has to be jettisoned as our only trajectory. We might be on the Highway to Hell. Basically, if God's nature changes we've got no guarantee we get to a good place. And if God's nature doesn't change, then God's relationship with creation might "affect" him but not in a way that changes his nature.
Concisely stated, there's an inconsistency between process theology's teleological optimism and vision of God's dynamic, open, and changing nature. Embrace teleological optimism and God's nature really doesn't change at all, not in any way that teleologically matters for the God/Creation relationship. Sure, God might have "experiences" with Creation on its journey, but if the teleological outcome is fixed you're evacuating the word "experience" of much of its celebrated status in process thought. If God's "experiences" of creation do not change creation's ultimate future this sounds just like how God's "experiences" are treated in classical theism.
Now, I expect process theologians have rejoinders to all this. And I do want to say that a loving, relational vision of God is my own vision. I just get there with different theological tools. To be sure, my suite of convictions has its own tensions and conflicts. I don't think anyone escapes criticism, not classic theism nor the process folks. I'm just sharing where I experience some frictions with process thought.
Process thinking, which 'started' with Whitehead and then Hartshorne, is right at one end of a spectrum of beliefs that Tom Oord has called Open and Relational Theology. At the other end are evangelical scholars like Clark Pinnock and John Sanders. The Whitehead end, which today might be represented within the church by someone like Ilia Delio, would seem barely Christian to evangelicals, and many process philosophers consider Whitehead's use of the word to be anachronistic and unnecessary, so perhaps they are right.
It sounds like you might be an open and relational thinker of another kind, so don't close that door completely! I don't know of any process or Open Theist scholars who say God changes God's nature, only that God may acquire new information that results in something that looks to us like God changing God's mind about what the common good might look like.
Many ORT scholars picture God as creating the universe ex nihilo and then voluntarily entering the space-time continuum in order to have genuine relationship with us. Even Whitehead believed that God had one 'pole' that was within time and one outside it.
I think a teleological objection remains, though. If God cannot make the universe bend to God's will, how will the new creation ever happen? What remains of hope?
Yeah I like some of the philosophical ideas from Whitehead but I think some of the ways people try to use them are ill-informed. This is just doubly problematic because the ideas themselves are largely kept alive via a theology school itself. I’m under the impression you can get more or less the good aspects without the bad by just going straight back to some strains of German idealism. Schelling became pretty orthodox late in his life yet didn’t seem to renounce all the things he said earlier, he just seemed to realize they pointed toward the Bible after all. Part of me wonders if process theology was just an attempt to make Schelling more materialistic and less mythical and that involved basically dropping Christ entirely but not being able to drop God. Disclaimer, I’m not a theologian. And yeah I don’t think process theology leads anywhere loving at all. If God’s basic nature changes, and God starts out good, logically, God would have to change to not be good. If God starts out all-powerful, logically, God would change not to be all-powerful. I think some ideas from process philosophy can be useful, but I think if you were to use the dipolar idea, you’d have to say God has an eternal pole and a temporal pole, which is probably true, for example, things like God being love and all-powerful would be eternal, while God being a burning bush for Moses or walking past Sodom and Gomorrah would be temporal, but that’s never how it’s interpreted in process theology, and also, I’m not a theologian, so please no one take that super seriously just because I commented and speculated about it.