Search Results (15)

In this study, I analyze how reflections on the “one” appear in different cultures. Thoughts on the “one” in several worldviews show similarities but also dissimilarities that should not be neglected. More specifically, I juxtapose Arthur Green’s neo-mystic “oneness” with Anantanand Rambachan’s Hindu view on the one and the many and with Thich Nhat Hanh’s insights on inter-being and on “one” and “many” as mere mental constructs. I clarify what each of these three thinkers means by “one” in, respectively, their Jewish, Hindu and Buddhist thoughts. Full article

This article offers a theistically conscious biocentric environmental ethic that builds upon the scaffolding of Aldo Leopold’s land ethic with a synthesis of biocentric individualism, deep ecology, and Vaiṣṇava theology. The practical benefit of this proposed ethic is immediately recognized when viewed in light of innovation in biomimicry. Leopold set a fourfold standard for environmental ethics that included (1) acknowledging the evolution of consciousness needed to give rise to ecological conscience, (2) surpassing anthropocentric economic interests in ecological decision making, (3) cultivating individual responsibility and care for the land, and (4) offering a unified mental picture of the land to which individuals can relate. We defend his original work, from later interpretations where the communal aspect of the whole overshadows the uniqueness of the different parts. Transitioning from mitigating overemphasis on the value of the collective, we turn to biocentric individualism, which despite overvaluing the individual, identifies the practical necessity of a qualified moral decision-maker in discerning individual value within the web of nature. Deep ecology articulates self-realization as the qualification that this moral agent must possess. A theistically conscious biocentric environmental ethic balances the role of the individual and the collective by recognizing their irreducible interdependence as a simultaneous unity-in-diversity. This principle of dynamic oneness is introduced in deep ecology and fully matures in Vaiṣṇava theology. Individuals have particular functional value based on their unique role within the Organic Whole, and genuinely self-realized decision-makers can assess these values appropriately enough to discern how human civilization can flourish through harmonizing with nature. In many ways, this is the basis for biomimicry, a field where thoughtful people observe nature’s problem-solving and adapt those same strategies and design principles to humanity’s challenges. The development of biomimicry affirms the central thrust of the proposed environmental ethic, which can reciprocally inspire further biomimetic progress. Full article

This paper re-examines consciousness through Nietzsche, Wittgenstein, and contemporary neo-materialism, arguing that traditional views overstate its importance and that retreating to the subconscious is inadequate. Using a moth infestation metaphor, it highlights the interconnectedness of sentient and non-sentient beings and advocates for recognizing our shared existence. Nietzsche’s perspectivism shows that human will arises from interdependent life forces, while Wittgenstein’s “form of life” illustrates that meaning comes from shared practices. In one reading of the form of life, religion can be seen as different forms of life. This paper concludes that theology must rethink its focus on human consciousness post the “anthropological turn”, avoiding dualistic body–soul separations. By embracing a holistic view of interconnectedness, we can enrich our understanding of human existence and foster compassionate engagement with diverse life forms, promoting a more integrated and empathetic approach to living. Full article

The complex interwoven crises of climate disruption and biodiversity loss demand not only rapid technological innovation for sustainable development but also major shifts in consumption and behaviour, implying a need for responses rooted in ethical values and a reorientation of attitudes towards the more-than-human world. In this context, given the global significance of faith communities and institutions as motivators and moral authorities, it is important that faith leaders state the challenges for sustainable development and suggest pathways forward to protect the environment and people that live in it. Building on his landmark encyclical of 2015, Laudato Si’, Pope Francis issued Laudate Deum, an apostolic exhortation on the climate crisis, and followed this up with a message to COP 28 for leaders to show leadership in facing up to the climate challenge. We argue that the interventions of Pope Francis point to the crucial importance of an approach to sustainable development that can integrate faith perspectives on social and ecological ethics with the knowledge generated by the natural sciences and by environmental systems science. The interdependence revealed by the emerging scientific understanding of human, animal, and ecosystem life implies the bioethics of care and stewardship, which have the potential to bring people together across religious and disciplinary divides. Unlike other analyses, we argue that it is important to understand how life was created if we are to care for it effectively and sustainably. We also put forward the case for more sustainable land use and the production of more sustainable foods. This article is written from the perspective of the Catholic Church, including its approach to moral theology, but we argue that the implications of the analysis are relevant to all faith communities and religious institutions seeking to promote sustainable development. Full article

This study investigates the theological and philosophical interplay between Rosemary Radford Ruether’s ecofeminist theology and Neo-Confucian cosmology in the context of Korean Protestant Christianity. By exploring intolerant interpretations of the Christian creation story, it critiques the anthropocentric domination of nature and proposes a reformed ecological spirituality. The research integrates Ruether’s covenantal and sacramental traditions, arguing for the significance of “relational consciousness” as a framework for eco-spiritual formation. Drawing from Ruether’s examination of creation myths and Neo-Confucian perspectives, this study asserts the necessity in reshaping Christian theology to embrace human interdependence with nature and the cosmos. It proposes that Korean Christians, influenced by Calvinist theology, must move beyond human dominion over nature to a role of co-creator and nurturer of the ecosystem, advocating for an eco-theological renewal that centers on relational consciousness for spiritual formation. Full article

The biological aspect of human embodiment frequently constitutes the primary basis for personal assessment, with an emphasis on rationality, free choice, material well-being, and happiness as fundamental attributes of worth. This perspective is also evident in cultural practices of body modification, which reflect societal standards and identity expression. The promotion of standards of bodily appearance that are often considered unrealistic within contemporary culture has the effect of creating a social environment in which those who do not conform to these standards are rejected and stigmatized. This can include individuals with disabilities, the elderly, or those with chronic illnesses and different bodily appearances. In the majority of cases, the so-called ‘body capital’ culture views the disabled body through the lens of a person’s physical appearance, which is, to a certain extent, associated with a biological dysfunction or reflects a kind of physical disability or vulnerable corporeality. This paper seeks to examine perspectives on the body through the lenses of major discourses surrounding disability, biblical anthropology, and disability theology. These perspectives advocate for the intrinsic dignity and value of the disabled body, challenging contemporary norms and projections upon the body, by underscoring the biographical, interdependent, and spiritual dimensions of human embodiment. This approach stands as an alternative to the reductionist view of the body, which prioritizes physical attributes over a comprehensive understanding of complete personhood. Full article

Xie Fuya (N. Z. Zia, 1892–1991), a major Chinese Christian thinker, has contributed much to the development of Sino-theology. However, his work has yet to receive the recognition it deserves. As a thinker who is well-versed in both Chinese and Western philosophies while dedicating himself to the exploration of the philosophy of religion, Xie presents a dual feature in his writings. On the one hand, his work engages in a dialogical discourse between Eastern and Western philosophies. On the other hand, his writings represent an ambitious attempt to interpret traditional Chinese philosophical tenets within the context of Christian theology, transverse from the level of human nature to the level of ontological existence, representing an innovative model of contemplation in the field of Sino-theology. This contribution is of immense value to the development of Chinese philosophical thought. For this reason, this article attempts to illustrate, through Xie’s writings in various stages of his life, his relentless effort to promote the integration of Eastern and Western philosophies within the framework of Chinese thought. His most notable accomplishment in this East–West confluence effort is his unique assumption of God’s attributions as both zhonghe (literally “middle harmony”, connoted as interdependency by Xie) and bianyi (change). Full article

The ecological crisis is a sign of the times, demanding adequate understanding, appropriate interpretation, and pastoral action in light of the Christian faith. Scholarly discourse on the ecological crisis continues to inspire partnership and collaborative actions in Africa. Sometimes, these efforts have yielded significant results, though amid uncharted territories. Scholars appeal for humans to embrace a mutually enhancing relationship with creation to build a common home for all creatures. A suitable and sustainable ecological vision that supports a communitarian approach to resolving the ecological crisis is Thomas Berry’s cosmology. Berry’s cosmological vision reclaims a creation theology that fosters a mutual relationship between humans and other creatures. Humans are beings in communion and beings in relationships created by God and thus from a common origin and moving toward a common destiny. This cosmological presupposition of Berry aligns with the ecological vision of Pope Francis in his encyclical Laudato Si’. The Pope calls humanity to a new cosmic relationship that would foster interdependency of the ecosystem and respect the intrinsic value of every creature. Given the unprecedented ecological challenges, humans have a unique role as intelligent beings toward other creatures, for future generations and the common good of the earth. This human responsibility toward the earth can be realized through an ecological ethics that fosters interdependence, interconnection, and mutuality in the human–earth relationship. Berry’s insights and Catholic ecological teachings merit consideration for African Catholicism. Full article

In K.E. Løgstrup’s (1905–1981) theology, the point of intersection between phenomenology and systematic theology is our life experiences. In this article, Løgstrup’s way of combining phenomenology and theology is explored from the 1930s to the 1970s. The idea that life is not an amorphous abyss, but God’s creation runs like a connecting thread throughout Løgstrup’s oeuvre. This idea negating a nihilistic understanding of life requires a phenomenology of the social world that explores both the ethical and the metaphysical implications of our life experiences. Human beings are interdependent animals, and in this interdependency, an anonymous and unavoidable ethical demand makes itself present, saying that you have to take care of the life you have in your hands. Sovereign expressions of life are phenomena that support the ethical demand and the idea of creation. In the 1970s, Løgstrup broadened the perspective and explored how the universe is present in our life experiences through our bodily existence and our senses. Even so, there is not an unbroken way from these metaphysical considerations to theology. Christian Faith is based on God’s revelation in Jesus Christ. Life experiences are just the horizon against which it is possible to understand what the Christian message is. Systematic theology connects phenomenology on the one hand and the proclamation of the Gospel on the other hand. Full article

Formed alongside the arrival of the first Korean immigrants in Hawaii in 1903, the Korean American Protestant Church has played a significant role in the social, political, and religious lives of Koreans in the United States. However today, membership is declining and the newer generations represent a smaller part of the movement leading the Korean American Protestant Church to review and reform its current respective practices of ministry in terms of language, teaching, preaching, worship, and theological orientation. This article focuses on the critical issues that the Korean American Protestant Church is facing and examines the current common practice of Korean American worship. Additionally, this article proposes theological and liturgical suggestions that could be utilized to help realize the goal of Korean American intergenerational worship. These suggestions are formed against the background of five notable characteristics of the Trinity—flexibility (innovation), communication (sharing and empathy), interconnection, ubiquity, and holistic artistry—which are essential to achieving intergenerational worship and its design. As a sample liturgy, worship combined with a meal invites children and young adults, born and raised in the United States, to participate in leadership roles with first-generation adults, which directly correlates with the aforementioned characteristics. As such, in essence, liturgies like these will lead worshippers to experience the embodied theology of intergenerational worship, based on a practical and theological concept of interdependence and awareness. Full article

As theological education has moved increasingly to online and hybrid settings (both by choice and by pandemic necessity), practical theologians committed to teaching ecological theological education must navigate a paradox. How do we teach about interconnectivity and interdependence between the human and other-than-human inhabitants of a particular place when our classrooms are in disembodied digital spaces? This article examines a case study of a pedagogical tool developed by the author called the “Who Is My Neighbor” Mapping Exercise that enables students to explore and articulate how they conceptualize themselves and their faith communities embedded within their larger ecological contexts. This paper assesses the use of the mapping exercise in four different course contexts: three online and one hybrid online–immersion course. The author provides an overview of each of the four course contexts in which the tool was used, includes descriptions of how students engaged the tool, and assesses its effectiveness. The author uses three types of criteria for assessment of the pedagogical exercise: student feedback, level of competence demonstrated in student assignments (sermons, worship services, teaching events), and personal observations, particularly around the differences between online and onsite contexts. The author suggests that the mapping exercise is a tool that can be used by others teaching practical theology to help students understand their relationships within Creation and their communities, critically engage environmental justice issues, and apply what they learn to their ministry contexts. Full article

This paper attempts to reconstruct the ethics of human response-ability as a theological reflection on the current climate catastrophe, seeing humans as moral actors or a moral actor network. In the meantime, I will argue the relationality and interdependence of matter and discourse, nature and society, and humans and non-humans through crosstalk between ecofeminist theologies and new materialism. In doing so, I reinterpret the human subject as a potential for liberation from modern human exceptionalism, acknowledging the subversive power of the concept of the subject. Full article

Spinoza’s Tractatus Theologico-Politicus has been critiqued as contradictory and inconsistent. This is why I believe that the question with regard to Spinoza’s ‘neglected masterpiece’ should be: How to read the Treatise as a coherent philosophical work? I suggest that the reason why the Treatise seems contradictory is because of the complex juxtaposition of its two main foci: the relationship between theology and philosophy, and that of theology and politics. In this paper, I will argue against the claim of contradiction and pursue to demonstrate a close correlation and mutual interdependence of both relations. While the domains of theology and philosophy may be separate, there is no contradiction between the salvation of the ignorant and the salvation of the wise. Similarly, there is no contradiction between the theological part of the Treatise—which focuses on ‘piety’ and the defense of the freedom of ‘internal religion’—and the political part—which focuses on ‘peace’, and claims that the state should have absolute power over ‘external religion’. Full article

Decades ago, feminist theologians emphasized the importance of “naming” in achieving justice. They argued not having a name for something makes it more difficult to understand its influence on our lives. Naming elements of our lived reality (including patriarchy, specific barriers to women’s flourishing, the patterns and values of relationships, and so forth) was seen as key to claiming the power to name ourselves and thereby claiming agency in a world of complex relations and interlocking injustices. Colonialist epistemologies and anthropologies that shape dominant culture in the U.S. prioritize universal over local knowledge, text-based propositions about objects rather than relational knowledge of subjects. While recent science draws attention to the interconnection and interdependence of human persons and our biological environment, there is little value given to local environmental knowledge of plant life. Feminist wisdom implies that this loss of naming for our own environment entails a loss of agency as well as a loss of understanding. Bringing feminist theology into conversation with science and indigenous ways of knowing, this paper argues that we cannot name ourselves if we do not have words for the plants with which we are interconnected on every level from basic sustenance to daily interaction to complex microbiology. Full article

The relationship between business and society is evolving. On the one hand, social, environmental, and long-term economic issues subsumed under the UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development are inspiring intergovernmental organizations, governments, NGOs, NPOs, foundations, and civic society to legislate and regulate corporate behavior toward a greater concern for the wellbeing of groups, regions, or entire societies. On the other, a growing trend toward protectionism, nationalism, and populism may be the consequence or expression of a dissatisfaction with the perceived dissociation of the private sector from society. As a form of self-regulation, corporate responsibility deals with the complex responsibilities businesses have toward society. However, it tends to be hampered by an emphasis on theology and philosophy-based business ethics, which are difficult to integrate into day-to-day business operations or to translate between national or corporate cultures. In this article, we argue that corporate sustainability could be a more useful concept to help improve on how government, the private sector, and academia understand the links between business and society, and how to translate the interdependence between business and society from one culture to another. For this purpose, we empirically analyzed the relevant academic literature on corporate sustainability, using Content Configuration Analysis. Our analyses revealed three conceptual types and nine subtypes of corporate sustainability. Based on their assessment, we suggest conceptual preferences and a definition of corporate sustainability, which fulfil criteria that may render the concept more useful to global political and socioeconomic negotiations among stakeholder groups for the long-term benefit of business and society. Full article