Greetings Rohan and Greg. I don't think Borg would have any problems with the sort of extension of the natural that you are referring to. In fact I think he would whole heartedly agree with you.
What Borg calls "Supernatural Theism" is the belief that God is a supernatural entity or being that is external of the world but who sometimes intervenes to make the occasional correction or perform the odd miracle (like rain) upon request if it happens to be in line with what (He) has planned. Regrettably, this is the sort of God our church language still acknowledges and addresses. Grace & Peace Allan ----- Original Message ----- From: "Greg Crawford" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "'insights-l'" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Friday, August 13, 2004 12:12 PM Subject: RE: Praying for Rain > >I would suggest that the questions you ask are all related to the death and > >dying of "supernatural theism" (Marcos Borg's terminology) > > I also have problems with the supernatural/natural distinction. First, because > we do not yet know the extent of the "natural". I have an interesting book by > John Downer entitled, "Supernatural". However, it is not about the occult, but > the amazing ability of animals and plants: such things as navigation of birds by > the stars or magnetic fields, subsonic communication, chemical communication (by > widely separated plants), etc. How do we know we can definitely designate > something as supernatural when we don't know the extent of the natural. > > Second, as we learned in High School, everything, including the biological, > ultimately breaks down to physics. (Or was my physics teacher just having us > on?) Thus the natural is that which obeys the laws of physics. However, there > are points even within our universe where the laws of physics break down, namely > black holes. There are probably large black holes at the centre of many galaxies > (including our own) and smaller black holes scattered throughout the universe. > These points in space are actually outside of space, so where is the boundary > with the natural? If God is outside time-space also we are going to have > difficulty characterising the interaction. > > To put the issue another way, is the natural/supernatural distinction an > obsolete way of looking at existence? > > - Greg > > > ------------------------------------------------------ > - You are subscribed to the mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] > - To unsubscribe, email [EMAIL PROTECTED] and put in the message body 'unsubscribe insights-l' (ell, not one (1)) > See: http://nsw.uca.org.au/insights-l-information.htm > ------------------------------------------------------ > ------------------------------------------------------ - You are subscribed to the mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] - To unsubscribe, email [EMAIL PROTECTED] and put in the message body 'unsubscribe insights-l' (ell, not one (1)) See: http://nsw.uca.org.au/insights-l-information.htm ------------------------------------------------------
