Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

The following is a review of a book by Mark I. Wallace, Fragments of the Spirit, in which Wallace offers a post-metaphysical reading of the Holy Spirit.

Fragments of the Spirit: Nature, Violence, and the Renewal of Creation.

“This is a courageous and important book. Courageous because the author, eschewing any pretense of detached academic objectivity, engages in a theologically risky and ethically demanding investigation of the cosmic significance of the Holy Spirit. Its importance lies in its capacity to balance the deconstructive and constructive dimensions of this theological project. On the one hand, he deconstructs, with admirable philosophical precision, a tradition of thinking about the Holy Spirit that, within the current intellectual and cultural climate, is no longer tenable. On the other hand, he employs a hermeneutically sophisticated reading of the Bible and a variety of other sources, to construct a vision of the Holy Spirit not as a disembodied spiritual force, detached, even aloof from the living world, but rather as the very life of the world as we know it. The result is a creative and constructive theological retrieval of the Holy Spirit in terms that are intelligible within the context of contemporary postmodern discourse and which holds out the promise of helping us address our most troubling ecological and social crises. Wallace describes his orienting thesis in these terms: 'that the Spirit is the power of life-giving breath (ruah) within the cosmos who continually works to transform and renew all forms of life - both human and non-human.' Noting that the Nicene Creed named the spirit as 'the Lord, the Giver of Life,' he sets out to 'contemporize this ancient appellation by reenvisioning the Holy Spirit as God's invigorating presence within the society of all living beings.' In articulating what he calls a 'life-centered model of the Spirit,' he aims to expand our understanding of the Spirit beyond its intratrinitarian role, and in the life of the individual believer, and to retrieve a sense of the Spirit's cosmic role - as the power of healing and renewal within creation.

In pursuing this 'ecological pneumatology,' Wallace avoids the language and tradition of metaphysical philosophy which, he argues, has bequeathed to us intellectually untenable and ethically and spiritually unhelpful notions of the Spirit as a metaphysical entity or principle of consciousness. Instead, he pursues a postmetaphysical, rhetorical approach to the Spirit, where the focus is not on articulating apparently timeless and stable philosophical formulations but on 'recovering and constructing imaginative discourses about the Spirit that are transformative for earth-identified communities who have risked following the Spirit's inner promptings.' Drawing primarily on the Bible (which he reads, under the influence of Paul Ricoeur, as a polyphonous, rhetorically diverse and symbolically suggestive text) rather than philosophical discourse for his understanding of the Spirit, Wallace arrives at a notion of Spirit as 'a healing and subversive life-form.' In this view, Spirit is understood as participating in and enabling the very life of the world; the earth's waters and winds and birds and fires are seen 'not merely as symbols of the Spirit, but rather as sharing in her very being as the Spirit is enfleshed and embodied through natural organisms and processes.'

Ironically, but not inconsistently, Wallace arrives at his polyphonous, rhetorically diverse and biblically rooted understanding of Spirit only by way of a long philosophical investigation. Indeed, the first half of the book, which he labels 'methodological overtures,' is comprised of a series of searching analyses of contemporary philosophy and philosophical theology. Drawing upon and interacting with figures such as Rorty, Levinas, Wittgenstein, Derrida, and Kierkegaard, Wallace asks whether, in the face of increasingly formidable challenges to the very intelligibility of theological discourse, we can still argue for a coherent and compelling understanding of the Holy Spirit. He thinks we can, but only by addressing ourselves seriously to three interrelated tasks. First, we need to locate theology in general and the theology of the Holy Spirit in particular within the context of postmodern discourse. Second, we need to pry theology loose from its longstanding affinity with metaphysics and instead embrace an antifoundational, rhetorical approach. Third, we need to eschew an essentialist understanding of truth (rooted in the old metaphysics) and instead develop what he calls a 'performative' notion of truth.

The second half of the book, 'Toward a Life-Centered Theology of the Spirit,' builds upon these methodological overtures to construct an exciting, theologically coherent and ecologically significant understanding of Spirit. Here, Wallace engages three main questions. First, drawing on Rene Girard's understanding of mimetic desire and violence, he asks whether the Holy Spirit can be understood as the power that unmasks and defangs our tendency toward mimetic desire (and therefore toward destructive violence against the other) and leads those who listen to her to instead enter into relationship with and take responsibility for the welfare of the other (which, implicitly at least, includes nature). Second, he asks whether we are prepared 'to shift the weight of theological emphasis away from understanding the Spirit either theocentrically or anthropocentrically' and move toward an 'explicitly biocentric model of the Spirit in nature?' Third, Wallace asks whether we can arrive at a coherent and credible understanding of Spirit without confronting the reality of evil which seems to call into question the notion of the Spirit as cosmic healer and sustainer of all life forms on the planet. His honest and probing attention to these difficult questions results in a vision of the Spirit that is both convincing and encouraging.

It is intriguing to note how often this unabashedly theological study intersects with the language and concerns of spirituality. This is perhaps not surprising, given the subject matter of the book. Still, the extent to which the author makes use of the language of spirituality reflects the growing sense among systematic theologians that the theological enterprise must be rooted in the life of the Spirit. In the present case, this means not only striving toward a heartfelt appropriation of the Spirit in one's personal life, nor merely cultivating a deeper awareness of the Spirit's presence within the life of the triune God. It means waking up to the Spirit who is the very life of the world and committing oneself to participate in the Spirit's healing and renewing work.” ~ DOUGLAS BURTON-CHRISTIE

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

Fascinating. I'd like to have a better idea of what he means by a performative notion of truth and how he deals with the reality of evil. But I guess I will just have to read the book.

Thanks,

Nicole

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

Hi, Nicole, that's one of the themes that we've been exploring in this pod.  Here's a brief Wikipedia definition:

Attributed to P. F. Strawson is the performative theory of truth which holds that to say “'Snow is white' is true” is to perform the speech act of signaling one's agreement with the claim that snow is white (much like nodding one's head in agreement). The idea that some statements are more actions than communicative statements is not as odd as it may seem. Consider, for example, that when the bride says “I do” at the appropriate time in a wedding, she is performing the act of taking this man to be her lawful wedded husband. She is not describing herself as taking this man, but actually doing so (perhaps the most thorough analysis of such “perlocutionary” statements is J. L. Austin, ”How to Do Things With Words”[32]).

Strawson holds that a similar analysis is applicable to all speech acts, not only to special perlocutionary ones: “To say a statement is true is not to make a statement about a statement, but rather to perform the act of agreeing with, accepting, or endorsing a statement. When one says 'It's true that it's raining,' one asserts no more than 'It's raining.' The function of [the statement] 'It's true that…' is to agree with, accept, or endorse the statement that 'it's raining.'”

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

Thank you! That's very clear.

You wouldn't happen to know more about my other question?

Nicole

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

:-)  No, for that, I need to read the book as well!  But it's an important question, so I am interested to see what he has to say.

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

I found a related essay by Wallace in the Google book preview.

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

Thank you! This is exactly the sort of thing I was looking for.

Nicole

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

Bruce, In much less theological terms than it sounds that Wallace uses, I have seen the trinity as the “God in” (Wallace's “Ruah”?), “God with”, and “God to” (God beyond, toward which we are pulled teleologically, that we are going “to”). 

The “God in” was also seen as the beginning of the spiritual journey. Even though we may have been around awhile (like me, I'm 53) and thinking about sprirituality and being receptive to it and applying it,  there is always that fresh awakening from a “fountain flowing deep and wide” (a bible school song I remember from the early years of my spiritual journey) that bubbles up into consciousness every now and then as a new insight (in-coming-out-sight). If it comes out quickly, it may not have words or conceptual frames, and may be what Ken Wilber calls a “state”, not yet assimilated into one's life enough to go to a higher stage of spiritual understanding and living. In the intial stages of being woven into your life, it would seem to be “God with” you on that level where you currently are, and then “God to” as you move up a level due to the internalizing and assimilating, and being “ye transformed”. 

I also see a match between the God in, the God with, and the God to, with what I call the 3 A s of learning (anything, including spirituality). God in = Access, God with = Application, God to = Assimilation (once thoroughly assimilated into all of one's life on a given plane, then the whole self naturally or automatically floats up to a higher stage). In all three forms (or “meta-manifestations”?)  Mind is more real than the material forms it inhabits, and is constantly lifting us up toward the purer state of reality that we call “God”. 
  Interesting to think about what Ken and another author recently (in the past few months, or in the past year) interviewed at IL called “up creation”. In that a creature manifested may actually help wake up the “slumbering” (German Idealism term/concept) mind of God which sleeps in the form of matter. Wallace's ruah may be breathing more and more life into the dead matter that we take as “reality”, and, in so doing, may be gradually helping God to dream this dream (that we call reality) in a more lucid fashion, like lucid dreaming in which more waking and intentionality is brought into the slumbering. 
  Another possible match of ideas is the “life-centered” approach/idea of Wallace. A few years ago, I facilitated a men's spiritual group in prison, and framed it as being a “life-centered, spiritually-oriented, support group”. Amazing to see how much the terminology matches that of Wallace. 
  Just throwing out these past ideas to see if it matches Wallace' ideas at all. I will have to read and re-read the more theological or accademic terms above to examine the congruence or lack of Wallace's and my own guesses. 
Darrell

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

Hi, Darrell, are you familiar with Almaas' discussion of the “3 journeys”?  The journey to presence, with presence, and in presence?  (You can read a brief summary here; or here, about midway through the essay.)  Your distinctions seem to correspond with this, so I thought you might be interested in looking at it, if you aren't familiar with it.

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

Hi Balder, No, I had not read or heard about that. Same terms, but coming at it a bit differently. My terms are from the ego perspective of the first journey. From there, the Essence is beyond - something we are pulled toward. So, my God-to function would actually match up with his “in” function, because he/she seems to be describing it from the “arrived” state of presence, rather from the not-yet-arrived state to which my made-up terms apply. “To” would turn to “in” during a higher stage of spiritual development - Almaas' third journey. My “God-in” means a preview (like Stephen Covey's habit of “begin with the end in mind” - just so happens, I believe, that the end is literally “in” deep in, inside, the mind, at its energy core). This “end” can, via states, sometimes bypass stages and move a person as though an ego-dystonic force/being was moving them toward righteous or excellent actions. It is like Rolo May's idea of Diamonic - a wave of genius that takes you to a better outcome than occurs with non-genius. “Genie”-ous (like the genie in the bottle) and diamonic are linguistically related, according to May, and demonic is a limited and distorted version of diamonic (If I recall his points correctly). The essential characteristic of the diamonic is to move a person like a wave moves a person. This reminds me of Wilber's description of spiritual/mystical “states”. And a state seems like a wave that would come over (or through) you, not yet internalized or assimilated into the material, manifested, aspects of self. 
    My “God-in” is a seed of Almaas' third journey. This seed of potential (like Chopra's “pure potentiality” and Zukof's “Seed of the Soul”?)  rests in a “self” that is still in Almaas' first journey. 
    Almaas's concepts match my made-up “3-R”scheme of faith stages of “Rulership”, then “Relationship”, and, finally, “Relating”. Almaas's “in” is my “relating” stage. His/her “with” was my Relationship stage, and his/her “to” is my “Rulership” stage. 
    Just some different words that different thinkers thought up to describe the same thing. Or at least that is what it looks like to me. 

Darrell

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

Hi Balder, so this is where you hang out!  This is an excellent post; one of the things that have stood out for me is: In the present case, this means not only striving toward a heartfelt appropriation of the Spirit in one's personal life, nor merely cultivating a deeper awareness of the Spirit's presence within the life of the triune God. It means waking up to the Spirit who is the very life of the world and committing oneself to participate in the Spirit's healing and renewing workI find it difficult to separate the triune God from Spirit; I suppose Christie is basically saying the same thing by stating that “Spirit is the very life of the world” – without life and relationship one would not realize Spirit.  It is also said that “when two or more are gathered in my name, I Am there” - this seems like an odd statement considering God cannot “not be” and I have always understood this in terms of Spirit.  The relationship between humanity.  Spirit is the exuberance and inspiration behind the spoken word, Spirit is also energy within the relationship of Other, one that is a direct infusion on one’s own being.  My understanding is that without Other one would not experience this Radiance.Any thoughts on this?

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

Hi, Annie, welcome to the IPS forum!  Yep, this is where I hang out a lot of the time… :-)

I'm glad you enjoyed the essay.  Reading your questions, I thought of an essay by Beatrice Bruteau that I thought you might enjoy:  Eucharistic Ecology.  Here's an excerpt…

~*~

There would have been no need to say “Absolute” if we had not first said “relative.” But by the time we discover ourselves, we have already said “relative,” so we must persevere and say “Absolute.” That is, because we find ourselves in sin and sorrow, we must go the apophatic way to the other pole, to the Transcendent. It is only when we have found our root there, that we can realize that it is that very Reality Itself which is present in, even as, all this.

This return to the world, to the relative, to the finite, is what I am calling the resurrection of the body in its trans figured state. Ascending to the Absolute and descending from the Absolute are both the same as remaining in the Absolute (cf. John 3:13).
 
The Eucharistic Planet

The resurrection of the body means that the Real Presence of the Absolute is realized in the world in all its ordinariness. The world of mountains and rivers, of bread and wine, of friends and enemies, is all held and displayed in the universal monstrance, the Showing, the phenomenalization of the Absolute. This is, as far as I can see, what the Mysteries, in their various mythic forms and traditions, are trying to tell us.

Can we recognize the presence of the Absolute in the ordinariness of the world? Do we know what is going on when bread is broken for supper? I want to see all our interconnectedness as .expressions of the agape, the karuna, the hesed, the jen–of the Absolute. I want to perceive Earth as a Eucharistic Planet, a Good Gift planet, which is structured as mutual feeding, as intimate self-sharing. It is a great Process, a circulation of living energies, in which the Real Presence of the Absolute is descerned. Never holding still, continually passing away from moment to moment, it is the shining face of the Eternal. It is living as an integral Body, as the Glory Body of the Real.

In this Risen Body, or Glory Body, or Manifestation of the Real, compassion overflows as what Chogyam Trungpa calls “environmental generosity.”[1] Since the Absolute, radiating itself in the myriad things, has no need to prefer one to another, compassion is revealed as “the ultimate attitude of wealth.”2 Abundant life is available for all because there is no desire to hoard. The various aspects of the universe can give themselves freely to one another because they have no need to preserve themselves, to save themselves for themselves. This is eucharistic ecology, and it is the ideal of all spiritual traditions. The Life of the Whole continues because all parties give themselves to it by giving themselves to each other. The dynamic interconnections in turn sustain all participants.
This view of the world, which I am here calling the Eucharistic Planet, a view of the world as the Real Presence of the Divine, of the Absolute, a view of the world as a single living Body, in which the various members freely give themselves as food to one an-other–this view of reality has been around a long time. It has surfaced in almost every culture in one form or another. A number of ancient traditions described the unity of the world as the living body of a single divine person. Purusha in the Vedic tradition, Osiris in the Egyptian, the 18,000-year-old god of Chinese myth whose head became the sun and moon, his blood the rivers and seas, his hair the plants, his limbs the mountains, his voice the thunder, his sweat the rain, his breath the wind–and there are similar accounts in the other ancient tales–all these deities gave their flesh to be the life of the world. The Cosmic Theandric Person[3] is a well-nigh universal image of the organic unity in which we all share.

A sense of the Eucharistic Planet, of the Real Presence of the Divine in the world, is something we need now for the protection of the planet. It may be that biblical religion has encouraged Western civilization to take unfair advantage of the natural environment under the belief that it was given to humanity by God for purposes of human exploitation and has no rights of its own. It may be that we need to tell ourselves a new story about how we fit into the general scene and what it's all about. I don't dispute that. But I would like to emphasize that on the basis of the Gospel we can say something quite constructive and very exciting that will give us the new story and a vision of the wholeness of the planet.

The core of the story, as I see it, is the communitarian life taught by and instituted by Jesus. It is based on a vision of being that differs from the one we usually assume. Instead of taking as the norm of Reality those things that are outside one another, he takes as standard and paradigm those who are in one another. His prayer, his vision, is “that they may all be one; even as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be in us … that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and thou in me, that they may become perfectly one” (John 17:21-22). This is the heart of what Jesus is about, I believe. And I don't think that we should regard it as something on an always receding horizon, a merely guiding ideal, something unreal to be striven for but never actually achieved. On the contrary, I think he meant that this is how Reality is fundamentally constructed: this is how it is, and we are to wake up and know it, realize it.

This basic insight, vision, revelation, was developed in the church in terms of two great dogmas, which, however, haven't perhaps been sufficiently appreciated as the structural models that they are. The two great dogmas, from which probably everything can be derived, are the Trinity and the Incarnation. And they are encapsulated in the single sacrament of Holy Communion, the Incarnation of the Trinity. I mean, of course, the mutually feeding, mutually indwelling, community, in which all members give themselves to one another as food, for the sake of life, abundant life.

It only remains to be said explicitly that this community is not limited to human beings but includes all life and the entire cosmos, and we have a religious view that not only enables but demands an ecological morality with regard to both the human community and the total cosmic community. The whole universe is structured and organized in such a way that all members depend on one another; they are all, in fact, dynamic processes constituted precisely by their relations to one another. It is exactly the Trinity that the universe images, which it, in fact, incarnates, embodies, phenomenalizes, shows forth, reveals, glorifies. The universe puts into flesh, into matter, the Trinitarian perichoretic Life–with its differentiation by relation, its self-sharing, its mutual indwelling–by which the nature of God is expressed.

If the Godhead is correctly called Love, then both the internal dynamism of the perichoresis and the external dynamism of the Incarnation are vindications of it. As Thomas Merton's philosopher-friend, Daniel Clark Walsh, told the Trappist monks of Gethsemani, in metaphysics “choice of starting point is all important …. The thing is to begin with St. John: God is Love.”[4] That means that God has to be personal and communitarian (Trinity). It also means that God is going to be externally creative and self-expressive, self-involving (Incarnation). There is an expansiveness, a generosity, in the very nature of Being that reveals itself as the Trinity and as the Trinity's incarnation, the cosmos.

The cosmos, too, is communitarian, a single body of mutually feeding processes– much more like beings that are in one another than like beings that are outside one another. It embodies, in its various finite organizations and processes and its ever more complex growth, the radiant expansive nature of that which it inevitably expresses. It is a Symbiotic Cosmos, and it is the artistic self-expression of the Trinity.

Hee-jin Kim, in his book Dogen Kigen, Mystical Realist, speaking of the Hua-yen school of Buddhist philosophy, says that

the entire universe consists of creative processes in which the multiplicity of things and events interact with and interpenetrate one another without obstruction. Particularities are not obliterated or deficient in any way, yet are unhindered in the perfect harmony of the total.[5]

I think that is the right idea, the idea of the universe as the self-expression, or incarnation, or artwork, of the Trinity. Even among us, the work of the artist carries the reality of the artist in some way. Even when the work is something made outside the artist (as distinguished from, say, singing and dancing), if it is really a work of art, there is no way that the artist can not be present in that work. This reinforces the claim that the model for the universe is a community of beings in one another, rather than a collection of beings outside one another, and that it is not inappropriate to regard the cosmos as an “incarnation” of the Trinity.

The cosmos has all the marks of the Trinity: it is a unity; it is internally differentiated but interpenetrating; and it is dynamic, giving, expanding, radiant. And, as a work of art, the cosmos has another very important character: it does not exist for the sake of something else, something beyond itself; it is not useful, it is not instrumental; it is an end in itself, self-justifying, valuable in its own right and in its very process. This, I think, is foundational for the ecological virtue that is the moral dimension of the Eucharistic Ecology I am proposing. As the Artwork of God, the cosmos has value in itself, and that entitles it to certain rights.

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

This one's for you Annie…

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

Thanks Mark, you made my day!  How is Dora doing?

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

Hi Annie. You made my day too!

Dora seems to be doing well. I've seen her reading a few of the blogs on IL periodically. We're together, but apart too and we're taking it one day at a time.

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

Yes, I don't have much to add to this, she said it beautifully!  Within the Trinitarian relationship we can indeed include all matter and life.

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

As I said, one day at a time. She came home from work and wants to schedule an appt. to sign the divorce papers. So it looks like I'm going to be quite busy the next few days selling off some stuff for moving out.

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

First dibs on the canoe!!

Sorry to hear, Mark.

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

Hi Tom!

Just saw your reply right now as I can't keep up with all of the posts.

Yes, I've got to figure out how best to sell some things to keep me afloat for awhile. I paid my rent, but she wants me out ASAP. I've got $40 bucks in my wallet and $30 in my checking acct. But, my truck is paid for, I have some camping equipment and it almost summertime here in the Pacific Northwest. So, I don't think it will take too much money to get by on. I can take road trips to see friends and do some camping too. My memory has slipped, do you live in the Bay area?

No regrets Tom; I've never been happier nor felt this free in spite of the tension!

Cheers,
Mark

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

Dear Bruce and Anne, I loved that line of thought. It reminded me of a poem I wrote (well, just about everything does, but this seems to really fit the above thoughts and values). See below:
 

Nutrition

Multiple categories of beings, 
various species, age groups, family relation,
are open to the possibility
of receiving nutrients together,
a barnyard at feeding time, 
a Thanksgiving day feast.
 
Some say it’s just cupboard love
that draws them closer. 
“What’s in it for me”, 
not “I’m really in it,
in the fold, of the union”.
And yet the cupboard collects
a diversity of vessels:
cups, saucers, plates, 
chickens, pigs, cows, 
aunts, uncles, cousins -
open to taking in, 
“into” the whole idea of gathering.
 
Perhaps food to put on a plate 
is just an excuse to gather around the table,
to take in the presence of each other,
even if at a sideways glancewhile laying claim to that biscuit, 
snorting, “Keep your hands off of that. Its mine.”

Below the handling and possessiveness, 
deeper in the matter at hand,
rests the bread of being, 
the grain of existence - 
ready to be received, 
spread out at the table, 
laid on the ground
where creatures congregate.  


© 2006 Darrell Moneyhon



I really like the Eucharistic Planet piece. To be in a constant state of breaking bread is a personal goal of mine, but one that I am far, far, far, far, far, from achieving. 

Darrell

                                                                                                   

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

Annie: My understanding is that without Other one would not experience this Radiance.

Right on, Annie!  The implications of that sentence are huge.  Yes, one wants to work through the isolated, small-me sense of separateness that appears at an early stage of being a differentiated-out being, as we are and everything is.  But that “working through” is IMO but learning to walk in a paradox one pole of which is differentiatedness, which to my mind is irreducible.

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

A little something from down under…

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

A blast from the past.  But I don't see the relevance of this song to this discussion.  Is there a reason you thought to post it here?

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

  Cameron Freeman is from Australia. Can we appreciate his blast in the moment?

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

Yes!  :-)

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

I've Seen All Good People…

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

Tom, I liked that: “But that 'working through' is IMO but learning to walk in a paradox, one pole of which is differentiation”.
 We cannot just pretend that differentiation doesn't matter. As long as we are here in a material form, it matters. Perhaps it is because we are choosing to be here, but, even so, we are here and must accept the paradox you mention. But could we frame the paradox as a means to evolve into one-ness in which there is no “self” and no “other”? A sort of “gently striving paradox” which is not a fixed/static material condition, but is a moving vehicle that strives to put itself (as a polarity or as a paradox) out of business, a creative destruction sort of thing?

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

Darrell,
Well stated!  Yes it does matter we are here in a form and structured within a “reality”.  I wonder why I enjoy resisting this paradox, it sure doesn’t seem like it would end in oneness.  It looks to be heading in the opposite direction.  As I say that; I realize that I am probably not convinced of the unity of Heaven and Earth.  Something I am working on!

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

Annie (I have been missing the “i”), I am glad also to find you here. I am still a new kid in town as well. I loved how you treated the concept of Spirit as most essential (beyond the theological mumbo jumbo), and it dawned on me that aspect of the word “spirit”, as in “spirit (essence) of the law”. So, denotively, in terms of the meaning of the word itself, Spirit is the thing to keep our eyes on. But I also loved the connotative meanings you associated with Spirit when you said “Spirit is the exuberance and inspiration behind the spoken word…” I really liked that connotation. 
  Below is a proposition about an aspect of “spirit”, as in the “holy spirit” part of the triune: “God-in” means a preview (like Stephen Covey's habit of “begin with the end in mind” - just so happens, I believe, that the end is literally “in” deep in, inside, the mind, at its energy core). This “end” can, via states, sometimes bypass stages and move a person as though an ego-dystonic force/being was moving them toward righteous or excellent actions.
  This aspect of Spirit is the more traditional aspect of the Holy Spirit, which can move us in ways that appear beyond our stage and understanding, like a guardian angel. Or, perhaps, “channelling”. 
   But I would not let this distinction of “God in”, or “Holy Spirit” get in the way of Spirit as the essence of life. To compartmentalize Spirit would be to destort and to disconnect from it. 
   Perhaps the key to counteract the problem of compartmentalization, would be, as you and Balder were suggesting, to see Spirit all about, in all things, rather than only in “my” or “your” individual soul/self. To see/sense Spirit in a panenthiestic (Mathew Fox) way - all about us, rather than “all about us” -   would seem to be a more Zen-like way of embracing Spirit. 


Darrell

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

Mark,  Did you happen to see this on IL posted today:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mC3InaibVjQ  Sweet and Simple - kinda makes you appreciate the little things!
Looks like a great group here…and y'all talk about the things I love to talk about!
It's nice to be here.

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

Oh, thank you Annie! I just watched it right now and loved it.

Unfortunately, I couldn't embed the above video, but I found one from James Whitmore as he tells the story of Crazy Horse…

…and we love the things you talk about too!

Re: Mark Wallace's Ecological Pneumatology

Balder,
Before this thread is hijacked entirely by chat I wanted to make a couple of observations. I am not sure if I am reading Wallace and Wallace's readers correctly, but I'm left with the impression that he has cut through all the discursive symptoms regarding “     ” and has gotten to the germ of the post metaphysical spirituality project. (The essay you linked to above was more illuminating than the initial book review.)

Any pomo arm chair phenomenologist, or tantric meditator or Qi Gung practitioner or any who consciously relish strenuous work, have apprehended “     ” and most have sought to name that which they sensed within their body, and then go on to interpret that name. A skeptic like Victor Stenger calls it bioenergetics in the context of hard core biochemistry. Wallace interprets it as The Holy Spirit. In a sense Wallace does not really want to name it but instead follow Derrida in refusing to name the gods that have played through his life. I don't know if Wallace's interpretation of the Derrida texts where Derrida interprets the god he doesn't know and cannot name, are correct but it is fun to read.

After I started reading this thread, but before I read the Wallace essay, I was thinking that Wallace was taking a phenomenological apprehension, staking out a vitalist position, and giving it a name. In antiquity the ability of the subject to name the object conveyed some power to control the identity of the object and thus part of the object itself. But in the essay, Wallace, following Derrida, is a little reluctant to do so. Instead we have a vitalist interpretation done in much the same kind of academic style that across the eisle the mechanists and materialists are doing theirs. Here, following Nietzsche, I wanted to suggest that Wallace (as well as the materialists) in dedicating an interpretive essay to the Holy Spirit (or bioenergetics in the case of the latter) was essentially giving her an essay long name in the tradition of antiquated name giving. He was putting her into service in his desire to make the world a better place. (A desire that is not just the monopoly of beauty pageant contestants.) Nietzsche wrote in The Will to Power, “…interpretation is itself a means to become the master of something…” And all in the service of making the world a better place, which we know that not only Wallace on his side and Stenger and Danial Dennett on theirs, and Carrie Prejean on her's, are striving mightily to do. But (leaving Prejean out of the picture…so to speak) none of those essays, books has gotten any closer to shining a definitive light on the phenomenological apprehension of “     ” in the sense of knowing it. In fact the longer the essay or book either in the direction of biochem or toward the left hand of god the longer the slide away from knowing of “     .”

Still we have to consider the value of making the world a better place. The nature of the subject and the desire of the participants in these various debates reminded me of the Last Chapter of The Inner Teachings of Chuang Tzu (Zhuangzi):

“The lord of the south sea was Abrupt; the lord of the north sea was Sudden. From time to time Abrupt and Sudden got together in the territory of Primal Unity, and Primal Unity treated them well.

“Abrupt and Sudden planned to repay Primal Unity's kindness.

“They said, 'People all have seven openings, through which they see, hear, eat and breath; Primal Unity alone has none. Let us make openings for Primal Unity.

“So every day they gouged out a hole. After seven days, Primal Unity died.”