Creation in progress and process – a simplified history
Perhaps a new revelatory
experience is taking place,
an experience wherein human
consciousness awakens to the
grandeur and sacred quality of
the Earth process.
Humanity has seldom participated
in such a vision since shamanic times,
but in such a renewal lies
our hope for the future for
ourselves and for the entire planet
on which we live.
Thomas Berry
Jesus arrived at a moment, a very recent moment, in the process of evolution that began 13.7 billion years ago with the Big Bang. Evolution is a work in progress within the dimensions of space and time.
Everything that exists has evolved from the matter that came into being at the Big Bang 13.7 billion years ago.
All matter that exists today in the universe is of the same essence, the same substance as came into being at that moment.
Our bodies are formed from the evolution of that matter.
We share the same essence: we are made of the same substance.
Planet Earth is about 3.8 billion years old.
Organic life on earth evolved about 2 billion years ago.
Our human ancestors began to evolve about 7 million years ago.
Homo sapiens evolved in Africa about 200,000 years ago.
Human self-conscious evolved between 200,000 and 40,000 years ago.
Homo sapiens migrated from Africa about 60,000 years ago.
Our hunter-gatherer ancestors evolved into farmers about 12,000 years ago.
Human civilisations began to evolve 6,000 years ago.
Jesus was born at a particular moment in the evolutionary process of creation manifest in the universe that we are still exploring, still discovering. He arrived at a particular moment in the evolution of human civilisations, religious systems and beliefs and in a particular context – the Hebrew religion in Palestine in Roman occupied territory.
What Jesus initiated in his life and teaching is a work in progress. Jesus died leaving no systematic, written or oral set of teachings. The Gospels and Epistles and the Book of Revelation were all written by people in the decades after his death.
Jesus left no organisational structure, just intimations of roles and responsibilities. The earliest witness narratives were written at least forty years after his death, constructed from memories and oral narratives that evolved into edited texts that form the basis of the Synoptic Gospels. The New Testament texts indicate that women were key witnesses in Jesus’ life and death – but show that men soon became dominant in the formation of Christian life, teaching and practice.
The Christian Church, being a human institution, has always been a conflicted body, advocating for and being prejudiced against different categories of people, categories that achieve prominence and dominance in particular periods of evolutionary time and according to the progress of human society, cultures and civilisations. Christianity is but one among several ‘major’ contemporary religions: Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism.
Christianity is divided into multiple denominations. Major conflicts of faith and belief exist in each denomination and in each religious system. From my perspective in the Church of England, divisions are prominent both locally in England and internationally in the Anglican Communion.
It’s questionable as to how much in the content of each contemporary manifestation of Christianity Jesus would recognise the wisdom and practice manifested in his own life.
Today’s conflicts
The contemporary major conflicts in the Christian Church revolve around gender and sexuality. Gender and sexuality are the matters deemed to be essential to faith and doctrine according to conservative, reactionary movements in Christianity today. They are not matters fundamental to the Christian faith according to the experience and beliefs, teaching and wisdom of Jesus. Jesus did not advocate the development of prejudiced and abusive attitudes to any group or category of people. Many of his parables encouraged the development of the exact opposite.
The dualism that developed, between sacred and divine and in the development of the idea of and belief in Jesus as the Son of God, and later, the formulation of a Trinitarian belief.
The creedal statements of belief that express the fundamentals of Christian faith were not formulated by Jesus. They were formulated, primarily by his male followers and by those who became Christians in the succeeding decades and centuries.
Jesus was processing his life of human experience and emotions and relationships with exactly the same resources as you and I process our lives and experience. One difference between us (not the difference between divine and human nature) is that our experience, if we are Christians, is processed through the constructs of theology and faith that evolved following Jesus’ death and have been evolving ever since. We are programmed in a way Jesus wasn’t.
You might like to think of Jesus as being programmed by Mary and Joseph, by his extended family and the community in Nazareth, by the synagogue and local rabbis, and by the formulations and texts of the Jewish scriptures. One remarkable difference between us and Jesus might be the remarkable freedom he gave to himself to reinterpret and challenge his inherited texts. Those who through two Christian millennia have interpreted and challenged Christian texts are doing exactly what Jesus did. There were those who were critical of Jesus and hostile to what he was doing and those who were inspired and enthused and praised what he was doing.
Christianity was and is and always will be a work in progress. Every human life is a work in progress.
If there is a second thing that is uniquely different about Jesus compared with you and me, it is his capacity to be deeply, almost entirely, conscious of the value of human lives and life on earth.
A Changing Attitude England Event: towards life in all its fullness
This is the first of a series of blogs I plan to post in January and February leading up to the event being organised by Changing Attitude England on 2nd March 2024 at St Andrew’s, Short Street in Waterloo, 10.00 to 16.00.
The event has been developed from a conversation between five of us on afternoon in September. I have found it impossible to write an A5 length description of the event. As a result, I’ve spent the last two weeks writing reams of notes and now, compiling them into a logical order. I hope the blogs indicate what the content of the day will be. If you would like to join us in the conversation, please email your name to me ccmcoward@aol.com and I’ll communicate with you as practical details emerge.