First I wanted to thank you for the article. I thought it was great and a good thought process brother. I wasn't aware of this subculture of ai tech Christianity and it's nice to see.
I just wanted to clarify metamodernism. It's not meant, nor able, to do as you say and I'm here skipping your metaphysical position on this which would add justification for it. I'm just speaking as it is and was interpreted historically. Metamodernism is a development of modernism which supplants the romantic, and previous, notion that we had direct access to reality (for romantics by the sublime through aesthetics). Postmodernism buys into modernism but really intensifies that. Where modernism thought we could reach a societal narrative, postmodernism claims we can only seek but can't actually reach it. Metamodernism then says we cannot actually reach it but we can pretend we reached it in an insincere manner. The ironic nationalism of 4chan or the pomo social groups from tumblr, like neogenders or animalkin, which are given modernist narratives exemplify metamodernism. Christianity would have to be taken in an insincere manner to be metamodernist and given how long anything in metamodernism lasts, it'd be too temporary.
We're also not supposed to deal with narratives functionally, much less spiritually. Salvation by things of man is impossible. We're not supposed to be sectarian. As you said, with God, through Christ, everything is one in the body. If we instead try to make successful narratives of it then we are missing the important part. Even if we do engage with theology, christology narratives we still fundamentally have to act and carry our cross the same so there's no reason to engage with narratives. Christ is powerful on his own and we don't meaningfully have to do anything except the great commission and sanctifying which follows from salvation.
It doesn't really matter if you are emergentist or emanativist but in terms of emergence and those examples, we're scripturally fallen sinners who are reconciled to God through Christ (2 cor 5:18-19). I do feel that leans towards emanation but it doesn't really matter either way.
"If there wasn’t this loving embrace of the paradox of individuality and universality, of plurality and unity, of the identity of identity and difference, then no human society of this size could continue to peacefully coexist on this planet."
Much less this universe or in science or anything. Well said.
"I like the idea of God as learning process and the living out of that, but I worry then, if we just say that God is beyond the horizon, we end up with a kind of God as the Jungian unconscious, or we end up with a kind of psychologization of Kantianism, where we’re only ever going to have access to the phenomenal and never really be able to come face-to-face with the noumenal, the archetypal reality, or the natural reality even, that we’re just seeing through a mirror darkly. "
How do you account for personal experience historically then or even saints? They accepted God in their ways.
"An individual can know that their society is unjust and appeal to a transcendent Good in defense of that belief. That’s new in the axial age, and that’s a valuable insight."
There was wisdom literature which appealed to a greater transcendent good and could be negative. It definitely developed but I'm not sure I really buy an "axial age" category.
Thanks for this. I am not at all convinced that a "metamodern" Christianity is really possible, either. I like Brendan's project, but as I try to spell out at the end, sincere irony just doesn't cut it.
You're right about the earlier intimations of the Axial insight. Akhenaten was a bit too early to the monotheism party, but he saw where human evolution was headed.
No doubt. I find monotheism to be implied within polytheism (after all if gods can take over and lose domains and the god with the most domains owns worship within said domains, why would one god over all of them not be the most powerful if not, through parsimony, be the most consistent). Akhenaten was a weird one though but his poem was on point. Very monotheistic. I'd say the same for animism and polytheism too. What is Athena but olive trees, owls etc animist spirits further defied as wisdom? I think burial cults preceded animism but I'm not exactly sure how one implies the other but ancestor worship obviously is a development of burial cult stuff within animism.
Thanks for your heartfelt advocacy. Please let me add:The spiritual world is hugely and totally different from its manifest pictures. No amount of conceptual clarity will suffice to turn it into a transferable commodity. Your sacrifice in trying to open us to Christ touches my heart. thanks again.
Thanks Matthew, I like the focus on personhood as a kind of fulcrum for the inquiry, and wonder how it relates to “non-duality all the way down”. My intuition is that making sense of God requires a recognition that subjectivity is objective and vice versa, but in a way that is not merely transjective, but more like the entelechy in which and through which proto-persons become persons.
I’m also intrigued by the need for a new axial turn and what that means metapolitically when considering our historical predicament, awash with catastrophic risks of various kinds. Clearly we can’t legislate for a new axial age, but does it even make sense to advocate for it? Relatedly, if the axial turn relates to Barfield’s “final participation” do you see that as meaningfully distinct from Gebser’s diaphanous awareness/integral consciousness. Assuming those differences are slight(as it appears to me) what is the relationship between them as evolutionary transformations and Kripal’s injunction that it’s time to “flip”? I see Wilber’s stage/streams/states distinction in play here, but it all feels a bit entangled…
I’d also put a word in for those Christians (not me) who want to fight for ‘the scandal of particularity’ as toe beauty of particularity. There is a claim which many feel as a lived experience that incarnation depends upon uniqueness because, they say, *the only way* for God to be a person in the way that we are persons (and therefore bridge the divide) is to be one particular person at one point in historical time, because that, they say, is the sine qua non of the human experience…I’ve always found it a challenging argument.
Perhaps "non-duality" was too vague (I was borrowing B. G. Dempsey's statement from his dialogue with J. Vervaeke) and something like "relational polarity" would be more appropriate for this kind of personalist ontology.
No, a second axial turn would not come from the political sphere as some new sort of legislation. Politics is way downstream of culture, imo. I'm more and more convinced that there is no political solution to the major social and ecological problems of our time. Of course, given how glued most people are to their screens and obsessed with celebrities, etc., culture can be manipulated and astro-turfed to some degree. But it always bursts free of any such attempts to corral it. I do think it makes sense to advocate for new forms of meaning, even if the transformation can only take root in adequately ripened souls. History does evince periods of rapid cultural awakening.
Gebser was aware of anthroposophy and if I recall correctly says in a footnote to EPO that it remains beyond the scope of his study. I would have to think more about possible differences between Barfield's final participation and Gebser's integral structure. I can't think of any major incompatibilities off the top of my head.
I do think there is something precious and unique about Jesus as a historical person. I also think the Christ that took up residence in Jesus was resurrected as a universal Spirit who lives in each and all of us.
One foundational source maybe Steiners “the mission of evil“ Where he touches on many of the current, thanking you so wonderfully illustrate and synthesize.
As a (reluctant) atheist I must say this is a brilliant, brilliant essay. I will need to read it again to better understand, but a couple of observations: you say -
"I like the idea of God as learning process and the living out of that, but I worry then, if we just say that God is beyond the horizon, we end up with a kind of God as the Jungian unconscious..."
But earlier you say God is love. Would it not follow that whatever is done out of love, whether love of our job our passion, love of another, our family, our community is to be in communion with God? Is not God both real and present wherever we find love?
Also, have you read Bobby Azarian 'The Romance of Reality'? A lot of your ideas above connect with the science of complexity outlined in the book. Anyway thanks for a great essay, lots to reflect on.
Love in the bible is agape. It differs strongly from eros, philos (brotherly love) or even the modern romantic sense. None of those three conceptions, or any others, would be universal enough for it.
I don't think this is a real dosto quote but this sorta exemplifies the universality of it: "To love someone means to see them as God intended them."
A similar analogue would be "to love someone is to see them as a brother/sibling intends them". Which with all positive intentions can still be empty or unsatisfying. A few more: "to love someone means to see them as woman intends them", "to love someone is to see them as some lust intends them." Even an ambiguous concept of nature can't give us enough hope.
Thanks for the comment Shawn. Actually when I think of love I think of what it inspires within us: the willingness to sacrifice for the other. Whether that be our work or passion or our love for another. As an atheist (lol) I shouldn't be saying this, but God's love for humanity inspired Him to sacrifice His Son on the cross for all humanity. In this sense, love that does not inspire sacrifice is not really love.
I mean fair enough but I'd say sacrifice depends on what someone defines love as. With agape love, and sacrifice, pulls us to God. It's hard to define God by "love of God" even if it represents the full relationship between us and God.
As a reluctant atheist it is kind of hard to have this kind of conversation. I would not define God as a thing or being, or something or someone to love. I would define God as love. As such the greater the love, the greater the sacrifice the closer to God one would be.
Well I'm not sure if you're a materialist but there's always hope (for unity) beyond what any material thing can do. Idk if I'm preaching to the choir on that but I feel like that's a rejoinder there.
Nope, I am not a materialist - it is why I describe myself as a reluctant atheist. I am here reading because I find religious thought to contain far more depth (and meaning) than reductive materialism favored by many atheists.
First I wanted to thank you for the article. I thought it was great and a good thought process brother. I wasn't aware of this subculture of ai tech Christianity and it's nice to see.
I just wanted to clarify metamodernism. It's not meant, nor able, to do as you say and I'm here skipping your metaphysical position on this which would add justification for it. I'm just speaking as it is and was interpreted historically. Metamodernism is a development of modernism which supplants the romantic, and previous, notion that we had direct access to reality (for romantics by the sublime through aesthetics). Postmodernism buys into modernism but really intensifies that. Where modernism thought we could reach a societal narrative, postmodernism claims we can only seek but can't actually reach it. Metamodernism then says we cannot actually reach it but we can pretend we reached it in an insincere manner. The ironic nationalism of 4chan or the pomo social groups from tumblr, like neogenders or animalkin, which are given modernist narratives exemplify metamodernism. Christianity would have to be taken in an insincere manner to be metamodernist and given how long anything in metamodernism lasts, it'd be too temporary.
We're also not supposed to deal with narratives functionally, much less spiritually. Salvation by things of man is impossible. We're not supposed to be sectarian. As you said, with God, through Christ, everything is one in the body. If we instead try to make successful narratives of it then we are missing the important part. Even if we do engage with theology, christology narratives we still fundamentally have to act and carry our cross the same so there's no reason to engage with narratives. Christ is powerful on his own and we don't meaningfully have to do anything except the great commission and sanctifying which follows from salvation.
It doesn't really matter if you are emergentist or emanativist but in terms of emergence and those examples, we're scripturally fallen sinners who are reconciled to God through Christ (2 cor 5:18-19). I do feel that leans towards emanation but it doesn't really matter either way.
"If there wasn’t this loving embrace of the paradox of individuality and universality, of plurality and unity, of the identity of identity and difference, then no human society of this size could continue to peacefully coexist on this planet."
Much less this universe or in science or anything. Well said.
"I like the idea of God as learning process and the living out of that, but I worry then, if we just say that God is beyond the horizon, we end up with a kind of God as the Jungian unconscious, or we end up with a kind of psychologization of Kantianism, where we’re only ever going to have access to the phenomenal and never really be able to come face-to-face with the noumenal, the archetypal reality, or the natural reality even, that we’re just seeing through a mirror darkly. "
How do you account for personal experience historically then or even saints? They accepted God in their ways.
"An individual can know that their society is unjust and appeal to a transcendent Good in defense of that belief. That’s new in the axial age, and that’s a valuable insight."
There was wisdom literature which appealed to a greater transcendent good and could be negative. It definitely developed but I'm not sure I really buy an "axial age" category.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wisdom_literature
"What is this air passing through the mouth conveying? Meaning."
You can't build a scientific narrative or anything based on that. Meaning is definitely derivative of objects onto us as an object.
Thanks for this. I am not at all convinced that a "metamodern" Christianity is really possible, either. I like Brendan's project, but as I try to spell out at the end, sincere irony just doesn't cut it.
You're right about the earlier intimations of the Axial insight. Akhenaten was a bit too early to the monotheism party, but he saw where human evolution was headed.
No doubt. I find monotheism to be implied within polytheism (after all if gods can take over and lose domains and the god with the most domains owns worship within said domains, why would one god over all of them not be the most powerful if not, through parsimony, be the most consistent). Akhenaten was a weird one though but his poem was on point. Very monotheistic. I'd say the same for animism and polytheism too. What is Athena but olive trees, owls etc animist spirits further defied as wisdom? I think burial cults preceded animism but I'm not exactly sure how one implies the other but ancestor worship obviously is a development of burial cult stuff within animism.
Thanks for your heartfelt advocacy. Please let me add:The spiritual world is hugely and totally different from its manifest pictures. No amount of conceptual clarity will suffice to turn it into a transferable commodity. Your sacrifice in trying to open us to Christ touches my heart. thanks again.
Love Bryn.
Thanks Matthew, I like the focus on personhood as a kind of fulcrum for the inquiry, and wonder how it relates to “non-duality all the way down”. My intuition is that making sense of God requires a recognition that subjectivity is objective and vice versa, but in a way that is not merely transjective, but more like the entelechy in which and through which proto-persons become persons.
I’m also intrigued by the need for a new axial turn and what that means metapolitically when considering our historical predicament, awash with catastrophic risks of various kinds. Clearly we can’t legislate for a new axial age, but does it even make sense to advocate for it? Relatedly, if the axial turn relates to Barfield’s “final participation” do you see that as meaningfully distinct from Gebser’s diaphanous awareness/integral consciousness. Assuming those differences are slight(as it appears to me) what is the relationship between them as evolutionary transformations and Kripal’s injunction that it’s time to “flip”? I see Wilber’s stage/streams/states distinction in play here, but it all feels a bit entangled…
I’d also put a word in for those Christians (not me) who want to fight for ‘the scandal of particularity’ as toe beauty of particularity. There is a claim which many feel as a lived experience that incarnation depends upon uniqueness because, they say, *the only way* for God to be a person in the way that we are persons (and therefore bridge the divide) is to be one particular person at one point in historical time, because that, they say, is the sine qua non of the human experience…I’ve always found it a challenging argument.
Anyway, thanks for the provocation!
Perhaps "non-duality" was too vague (I was borrowing B. G. Dempsey's statement from his dialogue with J. Vervaeke) and something like "relational polarity" would be more appropriate for this kind of personalist ontology.
No, a second axial turn would not come from the political sphere as some new sort of legislation. Politics is way downstream of culture, imo. I'm more and more convinced that there is no political solution to the major social and ecological problems of our time. Of course, given how glued most people are to their screens and obsessed with celebrities, etc., culture can be manipulated and astro-turfed to some degree. But it always bursts free of any such attempts to corral it. I do think it makes sense to advocate for new forms of meaning, even if the transformation can only take root in adequately ripened souls. History does evince periods of rapid cultural awakening.
Gebser was aware of anthroposophy and if I recall correctly says in a footnote to EPO that it remains beyond the scope of his study. I would have to think more about possible differences between Barfield's final participation and Gebser's integral structure. I can't think of any major incompatibilities off the top of my head.
I do think there is something precious and unique about Jesus as a historical person. I also think the Christ that took up residence in Jesus was resurrected as a universal Spirit who lives in each and all of us.
One foundational source maybe Steiners “the mission of evil“ Where he touches on many of the current, thanking you so wonderfully illustrate and synthesize.
As a (reluctant) atheist I must say this is a brilliant, brilliant essay. I will need to read it again to better understand, but a couple of observations: you say -
"I like the idea of God as learning process and the living out of that, but I worry then, if we just say that God is beyond the horizon, we end up with a kind of God as the Jungian unconscious..."
But earlier you say God is love. Would it not follow that whatever is done out of love, whether love of our job our passion, love of another, our family, our community is to be in communion with God? Is not God both real and present wherever we find love?
Also, have you read Bobby Azarian 'The Romance of Reality'? A lot of your ideas above connect with the science of complexity outlined in the book. Anyway thanks for a great essay, lots to reflect on.
Love in the bible is agape. It differs strongly from eros, philos (brotherly love) or even the modern romantic sense. None of those three conceptions, or any others, would be universal enough for it.
I don't think this is a real dosto quote but this sorta exemplifies the universality of it: "To love someone means to see them as God intended them."
A similar analogue would be "to love someone is to see them as a brother/sibling intends them". Which with all positive intentions can still be empty or unsatisfying. A few more: "to love someone means to see them as woman intends them", "to love someone is to see them as some lust intends them." Even an ambiguous concept of nature can't give us enough hope.
Thanks for the comment Shawn. Actually when I think of love I think of what it inspires within us: the willingness to sacrifice for the other. Whether that be our work or passion or our love for another. As an atheist (lol) I shouldn't be saying this, but God's love for humanity inspired Him to sacrifice His Son on the cross for all humanity. In this sense, love that does not inspire sacrifice is not really love.
I mean fair enough but I'd say sacrifice depends on what someone defines love as. With agape love, and sacrifice, pulls us to God. It's hard to define God by "love of God" even if it represents the full relationship between us and God.
As a reluctant atheist it is kind of hard to have this kind of conversation. I would not define God as a thing or being, or something or someone to love. I would define God as love. As such the greater the love, the greater the sacrifice the closer to God one would be.
Well I'm not sure if you're a materialist but there's always hope (for unity) beyond what any material thing can do. Idk if I'm preaching to the choir on that but I feel like that's a rejoinder there.
Nope, I am not a materialist - it is why I describe myself as a reluctant atheist. I am here reading because I find religious thought to contain far more depth (and meaning) than reductive materialism favored by many atheists.
Amazing reflections. Lots of food for thought. :) Reached out about scheduling our next convo.
https://substack.com/@stevenberger/note/p-138730828?r=1nm0v2