A Pastor and a Philosopher Walk into a Bar

Unpacking Open and Relational Theology: Interview with Tom Oord

• Randy Knie & Kyle Whitaker • Season 5 • Episode 12

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Tom Oord is back! This time, we're discussing his "main thing": open and relational theology. We explore what it means and its significance in reshaping our understanding of God, love, prayer, and more. Tom answers our questions graciously, and we try to convince Randy that he's wrong.

How is open and relational theology different from classical theism? What does it imply about prayer or freedom or evil and suffering? What does love have to do with it? Is it all just a bit too easy?

As always, Tom is a great sport and a hoot to talk to. We hope you find this conversation valuable.

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Randy:

I'm Randy, the pastor, half of the podcast, and my friend Kyle's a philosopher. This podcast hosts conversations at the intersection of philosophy, theology and spirituality.

Kyle:

We also invite experts to join us, making public a space that we've often enjoyed off-air, around the proverbial table with a good drink in the back corner of a dark pub.

Randy:

Thanks for joining us and welcome to A Pastor and a Philosopher. Walk into a Bar.

Randy:

Since we've been podcasting, which is several years now, which feels really weird, to say. Brett, we have been toying with the idea of talking about open theism. Open theism is something that kind of drew you and I together, kyle, because in another life, where we first met each other, we were both really into open theism and all things, greg Boyd, and so we kind of settled on that. But since then I've kind of got a little bit less cheery and optimistic about open theism in general. You've kind of stuck with it. And so we were like, look, we should have a conversation about this. We never have. But our friend, thomas J Ord deals extensively. He is an open theist and probably one of the most foremost open theists in America, I would say really. And he wrote a book called Open and Relational Theology, an Introduction to Life-Changing Ideas, and he wanted to have a conversation about it. And so far be it from us to say no to Tom Ord about talking about open and relational theology.

Kyle:

Totally yeah, and it was really good. So both of the books that we've talked to him about so we previously discussed his book on omnipotence and now we're discussing this one and they're both very accessible. They're pitched at a very introductory kind of popular audience. For people who have grown up in a certain kind of theological context, who have been given certain views of God, they're probably not doing them. A whole lot of psychological, good, emotional health is not something one of the fruits of those kinds of theologies, and so he's giving an alternative here, an alternative way of thinking about God, and this one is far reaching, it's far broader than the last conversation we had, because it touches everything just about in church, history and theological history and your own experience with God. In some way it will be impacted by the ideas in this book and he proposes it as a healthier alternative.

Kyle:

It's not just an alternative. It's a this won't do the same kind of damage to you as that other view of God has probably done, and so it's a really far reaching conversation. It's an interesting conversation. We didn't get to nearly the things that we wanted to get to, which is, I think, just going to be the way it is talking to Tom, but that just means he'll keep coming on and it'll keep being fun but that just means he'll keep coming on and it'll keep being fun.

Randy:

Yeah, and I want to say for those of you who, um, actually do occasionally read the books that we, that we read and talk, talk through. This book is not for those of you who, when kyle and our guests use big words, you understand them and you're like hanging with them.

Randy:

Don't read this book this book is for those of you who are like me, who feel like you're starting to like slip underwater a little bit as the big philosophical and, you know, some of the theological words come out and you feel like you're a little bit with the conversation but not quite there. This might be for you If you're just thinking I want to hold on to Jesus, I want to hold on to the Christian faith. It's been a foundation and an anchor for me, but there's some questions that I just can't get around. I think this book is for you. This book kind of scratches the itch. It begins scratching the itch of some of these questions and some of these things that we are just kind of feel like they're a thorn in my side when it comes to faith, when it comes to continuing down this journey, I would say, this good journey of following Jesus. This book's for you, I would say. Would you agree, Kyle?

Kyle:

Yeah, yeah, totally.

Randy:

And.

Kyle:

Tom's always a great sport as well.

Randy:

With my objections, he rolls with them, and I try to be kind with them in this one, so he's just a hoot to talk to. Thomas J Ord. Thank you for joining us again. Welcome back to A Pastor and a Philosopher Walking to a Bar.

Tom:

I'm looking forward to our conversation.

Randy:

Yeah, so we spoke about your book on amipotence. Did I get that right Did?

Tom:

I say that yes, ooh, yes, impressive.

Randy:

All right. So omnipotence and also a theological term that you kind of invented and by kind of I mean you did and also kind of shatting all over a very, very mainstream doctrine of omnipotence. So if you're interested listeners in that interview and that book and that whole situation, go back and listen to our first of now. This is the third interview with Thomas Sheard, but, tom, we're here talking about your book, open and Relational Theology an Introduction to Life-Changing Ideas, and Kyle and I have been hoping to talk about open theology since we started this podcast, really probably about four years ago, and haven't gotten around to it.

Randy:

So here we are talking about not just open theology and open theism, but open and relational theology. So can you tell us what you've been up to? We saw you at Theology Beer Camp, but it seems like you're in all the places all the time. You're kind of omnipresent as it were what have? You been up to Tom.

Tom:

Oh, you know I do a variety of different things, direct a couple of doctoral programs, so I'm meeting with my doctoral students from time to time. In November, though, since you mentioned the Amipotence book, there was a session at the American Academy of Religion on the Amipotence book. A couple of critics, a couple of supporters and a great conversation, so that was a lot of fun.

Randy:

Nice, awesome. Why don't we just dive right in?

Kyle:

huh, great, let's do it, and I don't know if you remember one of the times we spoke we joked that we were going to have to convert Randy back to open and relational theology. We'll see how far we get this time, because I think, you used to own the label Randy. Now you don't anymore.

Randy:

Well, for the record, when I owned the Open Theist label, it didn't go along with open and relational. That's a newer development in my world. I was kind of a disciple of Greg Boyd, to let you know where I was coming from Tom, but the relational part of it I absolutely love and have no issues with the open part of it minor issues, but we can pretend that I have major issues with it if it makes the podcast episode a little bit better, yeah, make it more interesting.

Kyle:

Tom real quick. So you use the phrase open in relational theology. Obviously, open theism is what it was called when I was reading about it in college. Why the distinction? Is that an important difference for you? Obviously that's the relational aspect, and that's big.

Tom:

Yeah, I was hanging out with lots of people in the process theology camp and people who call themselves open theists and a bunch of people call themselves relational theists, and they had real differences and fights amongst themselves but they had so much in common. I thought, why don't we have like a big embracing label, open and relational, that can include all those people? And then, you know, we can fight about our differences, sure, but we have a lot in common and we can sort of proclaim the commonalities which pertain to the openness of the future and a relational God, relational universe. And so I like the big tent approach.

Randy:

Yeah Cool.

Kyle:

So name some people that our listeners might recognize Well.

Tom:

Greg Boyd would be open and relational On the process side. People like John Cobb, catherine Keller, jay McDaniel, trip Fuller. Openness folks like John Sanders, greg Boyd, karen Winslow, david Basin, bill Hasker, relational people there's a whole bunch of those, but it just varies and there's some people who don't make any of those labels their first designation and they might call themselves a feminist or a post-colonial person or an Arminian or whatever.

Randy:

I'd personally rather leave the process part out of it, because this book is about open relational theology. The process part would open us up to a whole nother conversation Is that?

Kyle:

fair, kyle, you okay with that? That's a huge, huge can of worms and since that's not like a thing that you own, I think we can easily skirt it for this conversation. We will have to talk about it eventually, yeah.

Randy:

For this conversation. Let's keep that can of worms closed. Tell me, tom, why you I mean you've really put a lot of chips into the open and relational world. Tell us why, what about it? And just introduce for our listeners who aren't sure exactly what open and relational theology is. Maybe we had a debate or heard a debate between John Piper and Greg Boyd back in the day between open theism and determinism or whatever Boyd back in the day, between open theism and determinism or whatever, but we're still not maybe fully sure and the open and relational part sounds kind of weird and hippie-ish. Tell us what open and relational theology is, tom.

Tom:

Well, the open and open and relational is what most people think of in terms of open theism that God is moving through time with us into a future that's not only not yet determined or decided, but even God can't foreknow with absolute certainty. So it has this real sense of an engaged God moment by moment in time rather than out of time, to use the popular language, and a God who's not only influencing us but being influenced by us. And those two big ideas fit really nicely with the notion of human freedom I call it genuine but limited freedom so that people don't think I think we're free to do absolutely anything and an emphasis upon love, not only God's love for us, but that we are called to love one another. A lot of the obstacles to thinking about God as loving pertain to God's relationship to us wrath, hell, the problem of evil, classical notions of immutability and passability, god being unchanging or unaffected, and the opening, relational community. In various ways not everybody's on the same page here they rethink those classic doctrines.

Randy:

Yeah, Yep, and you just skirted a bunch which your book goes into in more detail. It is kind of a taster, a sampler book, I would say right, when you're kind of inviting people to think about these things with you in really compelling ways, I think.

Randy:

And go into a really wide spectrum of effects of open in relational theology, and I think the best part not the best part, but you just spoke to this and I want to clarify this for our listeners is the ideas that go into and the doctrines that are held by classical theism are really, really problematic, and not just in one area or a couple, but there's so many, you know, threads that you could just follow down the line that wind up in really problematic spaces.

Randy:

If we truly believe that humans are free spaces, if we truly believe that humans are free agents, if we truly believe that God is loving, if we truly believe that God is God in control. There's all these kind of tentacles that sprout out from classical theism, some of which are beautiful and good and you have no issues with it from what I can tell and some of which are very, very problematic, and not just you have issues with, but almost all of us. If we think about the way we relate to one another as humans, the way we relate to the world around us and the way we think that God could or should operate, become really problematic. Is that correct?

Tom:

Yeah, you know I'm in the midst of writing a systematic theology and one of the early chapters. I do what most systematic theologians do I do a quick look at the arguments for God's existence and the arguments against God's existence and I realized when looking through the arguments against God's existence that all of the major ones hinge upon a view of God's sovereignty that I don't adopt. That I don't think is true. Almost the major ones, like the problem of evil or the problem of divine hiddenness, or questions of evolution or questions of revelation, why doesn't God give us an inerrant scripture or give me a crystal clear message that God exists? All those kinds of really important objections to belief in God can be overcome if we think God is loving but not omnipotent. So it matters.

Kyle:

Yeah. So what would you say is the crux of open and relational theology for you? Because there's several different ways someone could come to it. So. So when I decided I was probably an open theist back in the day, it had to do.

Kyle:

Most of this is very nerdy, but it mostly had to do with, like, the metaphysics of time believe it or not and then like a little bit less about God directly, although that had some interesting implications for your theology, right, but you could come to it because you're very concerned about the problem of evil, for example, and you might think that none of the classical theodicies are effective and in fact, at the end of the day, you just have to conclude that if God is not going to be responsible for evil, then God's going to have to be in a position where God simply can't do anything about it, and that might lead you into some kind of open theist, open relational view. You could also think that human freedom is very important and you can't think of any other way to explain it other than you know something about the basic nature of the world being open, including contingency. There's other ways you come to it too. So, like, what is the crux of it for you. What like moved you to this position.

Tom:

Yeah, I would say there were several issues and those have changed over time. So, like when I was really young, it was the free will versus determinism, you know God's grace, and whether or not we're truly free. That was huge for me. Later on it was science and religion issues. I just didn't think the classical view of God meshed well with the contemporary science and major theories, not just evolution but other things as well. But I think today and the problem of evil I got to throw that one in there that's important.

Tom:

I think today the kind of overriding reason I'm an open and relational theologian are the issues of love. I think if God is truly loving and God's love in some way is analogous to our love, is like our love in some way, then God must be not only giving but also receiving. Relational God must be present to us and affected and empathizing with us, and that's an open and relational theme. God must not be controlling, because love isn't controlling. You know, I can just go on and on. All these kind of features of what I think is an ideal doctrine of divine love mesh with an open and relational perspective, and they were in the past. I was intuiting these kinds of notions of God is loving, but the theology I was given didn't work well with my intuitions.

Randy:

And by it didn't work well. You mean like if you would try to stand up for the God that you were, you believed in or were given, and then went to a person who didn't believe and was a little bit, a little skeptical, it didn't stand up to it, as in a person would say how in the world is that God loving?

Tom:

right or how in the world.

Randy:

Do you have any real choice in the matter of your life? Right, like there's a million, not a million, there's an unbelievable amount of objections to classical theism. When you just hold it up to the light of logic and reason, I would say right.

Tom:

Yeah, yeah, and it reaches its tentacles in so many directions. I was an avid evangelist and I would say God's a loving God. It says right here in the Bible, and somebody on the street oftentimes homeless people, know the Bible better than most other people They'd say yeah, but what about that God in the Old Testament? Who did this or did that? That's not loving. And I would really want to say, you know, maybe bashing baby's heads against the rocks, like it says in Psalms, maybe that's loving from God perspective, but that can't be right. My intuitions tell me that's not right.

Tom:

And so I was battling with the doctrine of scripture that seemed to be opposed to what just seemed commonsensical. You know, bashing baby's heads is just not a loving thing to do. Or, you know, I wanted to preach the good news of God's love and generosity of salvation for everyone. But then people would tell me there's this thing called hell that God is going to send people to, and I couldn't imagine how a loving God would send someone there for eternity. And so I had these conflicts that open. A relational thinking helped me work through.

Kyle:

So some of our listeners might be thinking but you, why go that far if those are your concerns? Right, because it's not that hard to be a quote-unquote classical theist and think that God is loving, that God does not condone bashing babies against rocks, all the things you just rattled off. You can take quote-unquote progressive for lack of a better word positions on those things and still be firmly ensconced within classical theism. There's a long tradition of mystics and a side to you know, christian theology that is very compatible with views that we would feel more comfortable with about those issues. That is still within the bounds of historic orthodoxy, so to speak. That isn't quote unquote open and relational. That doesn't, for example, think that God is a omnipotent, or that doesn't think that God is in process of evolution or that doesn't think that all the things that are distinctive of open and relational thinkers. You don't have to go that far to deal with the kind of stuff you were just naming there deal with the kind of stuff you were just naming there.

Kyle:

So where do you think classical theism classical in the sense of maybe we should define our terms here but, like when I tell my students what classical theism is it's this view of God that is shared for most of the history of the major thinkers of the Abrahamic religion. So it's not just Christian, it's also Islamic and it's also Jewish, and there's lots of disagreements between all those thinkers, obviously, but you do kind of get this convergence of views about what a God would be, particularly a thing that could create the world and that could inspire the Abrahamic religions, and there's lots of room within that for all of these kinds of conversations. So where do you think that kind of view of God hits a boundary where you actually have to cross it and say no? In the US, one guy named Paul Tillich.

Tom:

Paul Tillich was a liberal theologian who didn't believe in hell. He didn't believe in an intervening God. He also didn't think God was personal in the sense of giving and receiving in a love relationship. He said that God's attributes were symbols rather than straightforward descriptions of who God was. And then he does a move that a lot of theologians have done, has talked about God infinitely transcending the finite being, which places God in a kind of place that can't be comprehended.

Tom:

God becomes incomprehensible and one of the things that open, relational theology does is says you know, we're not going to appeal to mystery left and right, we're not going to put God in this supra, outside of time and space and metaphysical categories. It doesn't mean God's going to be exactly like you and me, but there's going to be some analogies between the personal lover of the universe and us as personal lovers. So that personal side of things is one major source, positive source, I think, in the open and relational community. The second I'll point to David Bentley Hart, who I was recently seeing one of his interviews and he's, you know, he's pretty sure of himself in terms of his theology.

Tom:

But in one of I thought I wanted to give David credit kudos here he just bluntly said I don't have a solution to the problem of evil. And I said good for you, David, because we do in the open and relational community, can't? You might not like it, you might not like the fact that we don't think God is omnipotent, because of whatever implications you think that it might have, but at least we are offering a solution to the number one reason people say they can't believe in God. Now again, david might say the stakes or the what we give up is too high for the rewards we get. I don't think it is. But those are two ways in which an open, relational vision, I think, overcomes real obstacles of two other major theologians of the last 100 years or so.

Randy:

And to be clear and fair, when we talk about open and relational theology and Kyle's kind of framing it as a severe departure from classical theism, I don't know if that's how you're framing it, kyle. I'm sorry if that's a mischaracterization of your words, but just in case there's any kind of misnomers out there, what we're talking about is not, I don't think, aberrant or heretical. We're not talking about like a huge departure of the Christology and like the who and what God is and how God works, like all of that. It's to me it's like well within the camp of orthodoxy. It's just a new way of a different and new way of thinking about God. In some of these ways that might be helpful. That's the way I would put it.

Tom:

I think so too. I don't want to say that open and relational theology is exactly what the Bible says about God, but I do think the general vision of God in open and relational thinking better fits the general vision of God in scripture than the classical God who's immutable, impassable outside of time, yada, yada, yada. Again, I'm not saying it's a one-to-one correspondence between our view and the Bible, but I think we do a better job of handling the major themes. And you know there's going to be some versions of, there's a varieties of open and relational theologies and there's going to be some under that big umbrella that people might think is further from orthodoxy than others. But at least the one I want to try to present tonight I think is in the umbrella of orthodoxy.

Kyle:

And that is not a concern for this podcast just so we're clear there of us.

Tom:

Yeah, no, that's not an objection for this podcast. Just so we're clear.

Randy:

yeah, no, that's one one, you're gonna hear one in one more in particular than the other. But, yes, I would agree with that.

Kyle:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's funny because I'm probably, of the three of us, the one who thinks it's the most unorthodox and also the one who probably cares the least.

Randy:

I would agree with both of those statements. Yes.

Kyle:

So one thing, and I'll let Randy ask some stuff. So you've mentioned a couple of times things that made me think about anthropomorphism, which I'll define here Thinking of God through the lens of what human nature is like, order to image or to conceive of or to theologize about a divine being, a creator, anything like that. We have to in some sense think of it analogously or metaphorically to our own experience. Maybe we can't get outside of that, maybe that's the only option that we have.

Kyle:

But anthropomorphism has been a significant sticking point in theology, to put it very mildly, and there's a couple of times. Obviously there's like an extremely naive way to do this, and you dismiss those in your book as you should. I won't name any names, but there are traditions that do this very explicitly, and they probably shouldn't, because that kind of extremely naive God has a body and it probably has a penis, and that doesn't stand up to scrutiny. But there are forms of anthropomorphism that you seem to flirt with, if not embrace to some extent, in your book, and so I just want you to talk a little bit about that and then afterward I'm going to have a larger question about method.

Kyle:

Kyle, can you give us an example of how Tom leansans heavily into anthropomorphism I wouldn't say heavily okay, but so at love is a maybe the best example. Great, and this is not a critique. Okay, this is a genuine question of you, because it's something I'm still thinking through too. I'm one of those people who thinks that there's no getting out of the anthropomorphic bucket so to speak, we're, we're in that boat.

Kyle:

We are human beings. I'm also a kantian in many ways and so like, okay, we, we have the forms of intuition that we got and we got to do the best we can, okay. So, um, this is not a critique, but like, if I'm going to think about love and I'm going to try to define love and then I'm going to try to apply that to god, I don't know how to do it other than thinking about human relationships that I think about as loving. And there's lots of human relationships that we use that word for and some of them I think are worthy of the term and some of them I don't. And in other places I recognize genuine, reasonable disagreement about it, where I might not be able to as easily see a certain kind of relationship as loving as another human being could. And so there's this spectrum of potential human experiences of love, and if I'm going to think of God as loving, god is love. I don't even know how to coherent sentence if I can't compare it to something that humans have experienced.

Kyle:

So I want you to say why anthropomorphism is okay. If it is, and under what circumstances. And when it's not, like where do you run into that line where we probably shouldn't do that anymore? And when it's?

Tom:

not like where do you run into that line where we probably shouldn't do that anymore? Yeah well, I like to begin the conversation about anthropomorphism by looking at the two extremes, and you've mentioned one of them. We'll call it the Kyle. Whitaker is the same as God extreme.

Kyle:

Yeah, God just happens to turn out with all of my opinions.

Randy:

Exactly, we hope and pray.

Tom:

That's very extreme, and your hair and your background and your biases and you know your size and whatever.

Randy:

The hair is probably maybe right.

Tom:

So you know there's not many people you know who are going to go all the way down that road. You've got some traditions, like the Mormon tradition, that have a God with an actual body, but they still have some other differences between me and that God. At the other extreme is the notion that God has absolutely nothing in common with you and me, not only in terms of body, but in terms of thinking and mind and actions and love. Well, I like to call that absolute apophaticism. There's nothing we can say, think, even dream of that's anything close to what God is like. And you can find major thinkers in the past and the present who will say things that sound an awful lot like that absolute apophatic move. Now, when you talk with them long enough, they'll cheat and they'll bring in some positive statements in the back door, but they usually start with something like that to try to make sure they avoid anthropomorphism.

Tom:

I think my position is going to be between those two extremes and going to be guided by the notion that if I'm going to have any intuitions about what God might be like, I'm bound to use finite words and categories. But when using those finite words and categories, I want to ask myself. Can these particular dimensions, can they place the kind of limits on God that I think will cause real problems when other issues come up? So, for instance, many times in scripture people say they heard God's voice. Well, does that mean that God has literal vocal cords? I don't think so. My Mormon friends would say yes, at least maybe not in every instance, but they think God really has vocal cords. So I'm gonna reject that kind of anthropomorphic move. But I think God can communicate, not not because God has vocal cords. I think God is an entity with causal powers upon creation, including the transfer of information. So in that way I'm going to use more metaphysically straightforward language to talk about God as a communicator, even though I'm going to deny that God has an actual vocal cord. Or we've mentioned love.

Tom:

So let me go to a different one. Here's a good one Acting. I think God is a real agent in the universe, but I think God is a universal agent rather than one with a localized body. So if I go out and hit a baseball, I'm using my body as an agent in one place to exert causation on the ball as it goes through the air. I don't think God can do that. I don't think God can hit a baseball, but I think God is an actor who exerts influence on all entities whatsoever in every universe that exists. So the category, the metaphysical category of acting, I think, is analogous between God and creation. So that's the kind of way I start kind of working through these issues. I don't know that I have a rigid set of guidelines that I can employ in every instance, but that's how I kind of think through the anthropomorphic objections that people raise.

Kyle:

Yeah, that's helpful and it's good that you're writing a systematic theology. It gives you an excellent opportunity to work through this.

Randy:

It seems like the kind of thing.

Kyle:

A guy who's doing that needs to have an answer to.

Randy:

So let me ask real quick of both of you how would you feel with? Um? This is now well thought out, but um, god is not a human. But we could say god was a human in in christ right and almost not. The scriptures, the new testament in particular, kind of want us to think. It seems like that if you want to know what god's like, you look at jesus. If you want to know what God's like, you look at Jesus. If you want to know what God, you know how God relates to humans, you look at Jesus. If you want to know what God, you know all the things Hebrews 1, john 1, colossians 1, all the high Christology spots in scripture. So is that an anthropomorphism or is that just saying God has revealed God's self in Jesus, in the person of Christ, as fully and richly as we will have? Where does that sit within this conversation, guys?

Tom:

Yeah, it's hard because I at least and I'm guessing you guys are with me on this I want to say a lot of things about God that I don't want to say about Jesus. I think God's omnipresent, don't think Jesus was. I think God knows everything that's knowable. I think Jesus is pretty ignorant. Jesus didn't know about evolution, I'll bet. I think there's lots of things that I want to say about God that I don't want to say about Jesus to Nazarene. However, I'm quite impressed with the things Jesus said and did. That I think might tell us the truth about God's loving nature. So I'm just fine saying this particular individual best reveals God's love better than anybody else, and that's why he's at the center of the Christian tradition. But I don't want to put well, I don't want to make God corporeal or have a body just because Jesus of Nazareth had a body. So those are the kind of things I try to wrestle through.

Randy:

Good you comfortable with all that, Kyle.

Kyle:

I think so. Yeah, I would just say in response to your question that it's difficult to formulate a coherent Christian notion of Jesus as divine if you take that absolute anthropomorphic stance. So if I say Jesus is God, there's a prior idea that I'm using there of what the referent of the term God is, and it can't just be Jesus. Otherwise I'm saying Jesus is Jesus and that's meaningless. That's what we call it tautology and philosophy. So there's something else going on there, and however we've defined that thing such that we can recognize Jesus as being its referent, we already have some kind of prior concept. And the question then becomes where did that concept derive from?

Tom:

Or how do we define it? Or?

Kyle:

how do we build a method such that it has the content we want it to have, or it has the content it ought to have for the kind of thing that it is in our theorizing, without it sneaking in content that we don't want it to have?

Randy:

Yeah.

Kyle:

Like physical bodies and maleness and long hair and stuff like that, Yep or capriciousness or you know, all the stuff that the Greeks had in their deities. We don't want that stuff. We want to think that ours is more sophisticated, that it gets at something real, that we have evidence for it, that it's the. It's the inference to some, or it's the conclusion of many inferences, that we think are reasonable to draw, so I think one.

Tom:

Oh, sorry.

Kyle:

No, go ahead, because I'm going to slightly change the subject.

Tom:

Good, Okay, I'll just say one quick thing. I think a really common view among Christians is to say that Jesus is God, but that Jesus set aside a bunch of divine attributes temporarily while Jesus was on earth. And there's a lot of problems with that view, but it's a very common one.

Tom:

If we go that route and we say the human man Jesus set aside divine attributes, then we can't also say that human man Jesus tells us the truth about all the divine attributes because we don't see him revealed in that guy tells us the truth about all the divine attributes because we don't see him revealed in that guy. So, uh, this is a a claim that I think has some problems, but it's a very common one amongst christians and born in many ways out of philippines too.

Randy:

And yeah, um, let's move on. Kyle, sorry to dick, take us that deep. Yeah, no worries.

Kyle:

I was going to just ask and honestly, probably we should just bracket this and talk about it at a later date. But like I'm always interested in people's approach to method because I'm a philosopher, we like to think about method, but particularly theological method, and I know that's a whole can of worms. But like you're writing a systematic theology, so if anybody's thinking about this, it's you. So, like, what is the right way to approach thinking about what God is, such that we might conclude that something like open and relational theology is the best contender amongst all the other options? I'm an agnostic, and part of the reason for it is I can't think of one. I can't think of good reasons to rule out certain kinds of methods over others with respect to that question.

Kyle:

So we don't have to dive into that right now, but if you have anything, you want to say.

Tom:

I'll say a couple of words. One of the things I'll say is that, Kyle, I've put my methodology at the end of the book.

Kyle:

So that tells you how important I think it is. Volume three I'm going to have to wait. How many years.

Tom:

Yep, the end of the volume three. But a couple of quick things. I think the opening relational camp draws from a variety of sources, and I think the opening relational camp draws from a variety of sources and depending on the person they might put more weight on one source over another. But what they share in common is, I think we're all fallibilists, so none of us think there's one inerrant source, be it a person, a book or whatever, a church. So we're all fallibilists and I think we all have a particular emphasis upon lived experience and the reasoning from experience. Not that other traditions don't, but I think we oftentimes say no, I'm not going to believe that, because it doesn't make any sense or that can't be true, because no one actually lives that way. So those kinds of things probably raise up a little higher in the source list than in other theological approaches.

Kyle:

Yeah, that's really helpful, thanks. Speaks to my Pentecostal background pretty strongly.

Randy:

All right, randy, take it away. That's right. You don't have to convert me to relational. I'm there so I don't know 25 years ago, when these arguments were new to me and novel to me. One of the big reasons and data points I heard from Open Theism why you want to adopt this way of thinking about God is because of what it does to prayer, right? Because if we think and believe that the future is already determined by God, what in the world are we doing when we pray? And especially if we think that our prayers affect something because that obviously is it can't work together. If the future is fixed, then prayer is meaningless for influencing and shaping the future by influencing God, right? Am I okay so far, tom?

Tom:

Yep, yep. Okay, that's a common argument, and that's not like a controversial or heterodox conclusion.

Kyle:

That's like Aquinas thought that. So, just so our listeners are clear. Long tradition of significant theologians thinking prayer is not efficacious.

Randy:

It's doing something else in the world, but it ain't changing anything, and so, with open theism, you say, well, the future can't be settled, because the future literally doesn't exist until we create it. Like right now we're creating it. As we talk, speak, have this conversation, billions of people, whatever. To me, though, that started as a data point of like, oh yeah, actually I'm going to put that in the column of open theism, but it's moved to the point where I just think why do we need it? Helps with the idea if we're trying to convince one another that prayer actually matters and that what we ask God for God actually considers, and maybe we'll change things in response to our prayers. It's helpful just in that question, in that camp of does prayer matter? Does prayer work? Is prayer efficacious? But I don't know if that's a good enough reason to say maybe the future is settled, and I'm sure you would say, well, that's not our whole argument, obviously, but to me it kind of has felt like we got this problem with prayer. So let's have our explanation and our idea of time and the future and reality match up in a way that makes our prayer more efficacious, useful, effective or whatever, and to me that's just not worth doing.

Randy:

For me, I'd rather hold prayer as mystery and say I don't know if our prayer actually does anything. I believe deep down, somehow it does on occasion. I don't know how it works, but I feel deep within me and I feel like I've seen in my life way more non-answered prayers, but some answered prayers, some prayer that seems like something changed, something intervened in order to change the outcome. I'm okay with just leaving it there and saying but I don't know and I don't think we'll ever know, and I think prayer is more for us than it is for other people the future, changing reality, whatever. So to me that's just become an argument or a data point. That just to me doesn't matter, because I'd rather hold prayer. For me, prayer is more mysterious, mystical, and it does something to me.

Kyle:

Tell me your thoughts on what I just said Before you answer, can I piggyback on this for one second really quickly, because I think it has to do with our theological method conversation? Actually, because I have noticed when I read open and relational people, open theistic people not across the board, but it's a thing that I've noticed. I noticed it in this book. There's an element of it. Sometimes it feels a little ad hoc, in the sense of we have all these problems and we're going to come up with like the perfect theory that satisfies all of them, and especially when we're like a little bit proselytizing it, which your book is aimed at, people who are, you know, already have theological hangups and they're looking for something. So more power to you. But like there is a little bit of this that I've, since I think that Randy is getting out of where we have the perfect solution for that and we've theorized it just so you know. What do you think about that? Is that unfair?

Tom:

I'm sure I'm guilty of that Cause I think opening relational theology is the best model of God on offer, and I'm, you know, talking about it an awful lot.

Randy:

Why wouldn't you, why would you be writing books if you weren't convinced of it?

Tom:

I'd like to think you're an authentic human being, right? I'm not going to, randy, though try to change your mind about the prayer issue. I want to point to two issues that I think are related to the prayer issue but actually might have more purchase on you. You might think is more significant. The first one is the question of whether or not Randy's life makes any difference to God. See, I think that's at the heart of the prayer question, not whether or not we're going to convince God to do something different than God might have otherwise did.

Tom:

I think the heart of the question is does anything we do have any effect on God in the future? And if God is the ultimate reality and God's will is done, but God is above time, it doesn't seem like our lives have any true significance. However, in an open and relational framework in which we're having an effect on God and what our actions do really do make a difference and God is affected by us, then our lives can have real significance and meaning, I think in a way that the classical theist can't say a little more philosophical. You've probably thought about it, but an open theist like me will say if the future is settled, then it's hard to see how our notions of freedom make any sense If God knows the future with absolute certainty. God seems to only be able to do that if that future is complete, settled and fixed. But a complete, settled and fixed future doesn't seem to have options for us to freely choose, so that's more of a theoretical thing.

Tom:

But I think for many people who work through that question and come out the other side and open theist, they feel like this great freeing, a sense of freedom that you know, yeah, now these intuitions I have, that I make choices. That actually tells me the truth about the way things really are. I really do make free choices and my free choices affect the God of the universe. How awesome is that, um, so what do you think of that, randy?

Randy:

I like it. Hmm, yes, I like it and at the same time and I don't want to have a conversation where I'm like, but I said, you know. However, I mean, the prayer part is like a data point within your book.

Randy:

And it's that part in particular to me feels a little bit—and this is a question that I had later that basically Kyle just asked—but that's one layer of discomfort. I make sense right, like I do think our theology should be sensible and logical and not, like you know, water equals gas. That's a bad, terrible analogy, but you hear what I'm saying. It's like you can't tell someone we're free agents and then say but God determines everything. Like those two things don't work together. So in that sense I do really appreciate open and relational theology because it does help make sense of a lot of things that seem nonsensical within the classical theism. However, it feels almost a little bit too convenient. It feels a little bit too much like scroll down your Rolodex, ask any question you want, and I've got an answer for you from open and relational theology, because we thought of that too. It kind of feels like a commercial.

Kyle:

This might be like a psychological thing we need to unpack, because both of us at some point in our past were like enamored a little bit with like apologetic approaches to theology. I know I was. I think Randy probably was a little bit too, and that's something we've had to outgrow. So anything that feels a little too self-assured or a little too confident or a little too easy explanation for too many things makes our hackles go up.

Randy:

So we might be putting that on you a little bit. I love it. Yeah, just a little bit, and I'm sorry, tom, I'm sorry.

Tom:

No, that's okay, this won't assuage your concerns entirely, but maybe I should have started by saying I don't know that anything I'm saying today is certainly correct. I mean, I'm putting out proposals I think make the best sense, so it's not like I'm pulling them out of my butt tonight, just winging it.

Tom:

But on the other hand, I'm one of these people who doesn't think I can know any of the most important things in life with certainty. So these are proposals, these are speculative moves, so if they come across as a little too neat and clean, sorry about that.

Randy:

No, no, not at all, and I appreciate you. No, no, not at all. And I appreciate you Like I think these are the questions that people are wrestling with, as you said in your book, and you highlighted all these questions that people have in hypothetical conversations, and some of them probably real, because you hear from a lot of people who have a lot of issues with our classical historical idea of God, and I love that we have people like you, tom, who are trying to get further closer to the bottom of some of these arguments and conversations throughout history, and I think that's really, really important. I love it. It's just like Kyle said when it feels like there's too many answers, then all of a sudden it feels a little bit like okay, just mathematics-wise, this seems like too much.

Kyle:

It seems unlikely that we've. One time I was at a talk given by Richard Swinburne, who is a open theist of a different sort, and made a joke. The room thought it was a joke. He apparently did not that someone once asked him because he's also well known for doing a lot of statistical modeling. When, when God's existence is involved and he's like somebody once asked me, what are the odds that I would have been born with all the correct opinions, and the room laughed and he's like but there you have it.

Kyle:

And he moved on because he's also like notoriously never changed his mind about anything. That's awful, yeah.

Tom:

Let me I do think, though, there might be one more comment here. There might be, I think every theology, if it's consistent, if it's rationally consistent, is probably going to have to make some adjustments in traditional ways of thinking. That will make some people nervous, like, for instance, with my view. I'm very clear that God is not omnipotent, but part of what I give up is a guaranteed divine victory through omnipotence at the eschaton unguenting divine victory through omnipotence at the eschaton so, um, you know, and that's something big to give up, it is, it's big to give.

Tom:

I mean it's too big for lots and lots of books yeah it's right, yeah, it's right yeah I still think there's the hope of that universal reconciliation, but it can't come through omnipotence. If my views are consistent, and so I don't think that. So saying that, I guess, is my way of saying it. I might say I've got the answer to this, that and the other, but I admit there are some things I'm going to rethink radically and they're going to make some people nervous.

Randy:

And some of your, some of your current conclusions open up other questions.

Tom:

It sounds like you're willing to accept that Sure sure yeah.

Kyle:

Yeah, this is one of the things I'd also like to point out to my students, or did back in the day when I was able to teach philosophy, and it goes for theology just as well, like the practice of studying these kinds of things. One of the great things it does for you is seeing how, when you push on one part of a web of system or a web of beliefs or a theory, how it moves the other parts. Like everything costs something, right, there's no free lunch here. So I think considering open relational theology specifically is a wonderful exercise in that, because it's like okay, here's the thing I really hate about the classical conception of God. What if I just give it up? And it's not an easy answer because it's there for a reason. Those people were super smart. It's not an easy answer because it's there for a reason those people were super smart.

Kyle:

So if we're going to remove that piece, another piece is going to have to shift as well.

Tom:

And they had certain assumptions that I might not share. Yeah, I was going to add one caveat, and that is if you push on one place, something over here changes. If you're a person who wants a rationally consistent theology I think most of the world is in that place I'm there, I want a rationally consistent theology. I think most of the world isn't in that place. I'm there, I want a rationally consistent. But one of my good friends who likes to say he's a Kalminian, an Arminian, a Calvinist, and I just say no, you're an idiot, you're just misinformed. You don't have a consistent theology.

Kyle:

I grant the theoretical possibility, but I seriously doubt your ability to pull it off.

Tom:

Let's find out theoretical possibility, but I seriously doubt your ability to pull it off?

Randy:

Let's find out. Yeah, so, tom, let's just kind of give our listeners an example who haven't read the book I know some of our listeners have, but many haven't and just give them a little example of how you kind of dump on classical notions of theology a little bit. You dedicate almost, maybe almost, or an entire chapter to kind of dumping on Augustine, which I'm here for. To be honest with you, I think more of us need to dump on Augustine and no offense, god bless you, augustine, but I got some issues with your theology as well. Give us a little bit like love and Augustine and the idea. Just give us a little bit of like. This notion of divine love that we've been given might be a little bit incomplete and actually nonsensical and illogical. Can you just take our listeners into that world a little bit?

Tom:

Yeah, first, let me begin by saying we all know that love has many different meanings in our everyday life, and it's true in Scripture as well, but in the tradition. So love has a diversity of meanings. One prominent and I would argue, by far the most dominant meaning of love in Scripture is something to the effect of doing what's good for others or promoting their well-being, blessedness, abundant life. It's acting for the good of others. Augustine thinks that love is about desire, which is another way we use love in our everyday world. I love pizza, you know, I love the Kansas City Chiefs. That's a kind of seeing value in something and desiring it. But because Augustine thinks of love as desire, he then puts that on to God and says okay, what does God's love look like? Well, you'd think that God's love would be desiring.

Tom:

But Augustine says hold on a second. God doesn't want to desire anything that's less than perfectly desirable. So therefore, god must love God's self. God can't love us in the sense of desiring us, because we're not the most valuable. Only God is, in the end loves, only God's self. And to be worse, we are supposed to set our desires on what is perfectly desirable. So we ought to love God, but loving neighbor? Well, they're not perfectly desirable. Maybe we can love God through our neighbor, but we can't love our neighbor as for their own sake, because they're not the ultimate of value. And so you have this really twisted way of thinking about love. At least the ways that don't mesh with things like for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, or love one another as I have loved you. You got this really strange way of thinking about love based upon an assumption of love as desire, rather than acting for the good or the well-being of others.

Randy:

When I think of Christian's idea of love, I think of it's problematic. To be honest with you, it's kind of it's part of the reason why it took me a long time to come over to the affirming camp, because when I talk about love I'm talking about something in specific as a Christian right, but it's my, I would say, and I don't think this is super controversial, not with the three of us. But a Christian concept of love can be and I want to say, a Western, evangelical, protestant conception of love might be way, way, way too thin and inadequate to even put the idea of love, or let alone agape love, which you go into a little bit in your book as well, what I'm saying here. Would you say that I'm being too hard on Western Protestant Christians, or would you say we've been given a concept of love that is kind of thin, cheap and doesn't really kind of encompass what we're talking about, what we're supposed to be talking about when we talk about agape, self-sacrificial, others-oriented, unconditional love. Does what I just said make sense? I hope it does.

Tom:

I think so. I would say love in scripture takes a lot of different forms. I have a academic book called thorough form love where I not only look at agape but philea and the meaning of eros even though the word eros is in the scripture and the hebrew words ahava and hesed and others. Anyway, love takes many forms in scripture. I think what you're pointing to as an inadequate notion of love today, I would at least say, is usually portrayed as easy goes, anything kind of goes. If I'm going to love someone, I'm not going to hold them accountable to the good, but I'm just going to let things slide.

Tom:

And that kind of love, I think, is real problems. Because, as I see it, love aims for well-being and that means that sometimes, to use your language, it has to be self-sacrificial Not all the time, but sometimes. Sometimes it's really hard, other times it's pretty easy. I can act for the well-being of my grandchildren pretty easily when they're cute and cuddly, but when they're throwing a temper tantrum, then I got to use a different kind of love. It's still love because I care for their well-being, but it's a love that makes me put aside my negative emotions toward them and do what I think is best for them, and so if love is a kind of anything goes way of thinking, which is for many people in the West, then I'm opposed to that. I think we have to define love in ways that act for well-being more clearly.

Randy:

What I'm getting at is we can go both sides of it, like in your grandparent analogy. There's there's many Christians who historically and currently, would say what they would call love, what many people should call abuse. Right.

Tom:

Yeah.

Randy:

Yeah, there's one. That's one extreme. But then the other is saying I love you or not? Even the other extreme. It's just, both are extremes. I love you or not, even the other extreme. It's just, both are extremes. I love you and that's why I'm cutting you out of our family. Because for me to love you as a kid who just told, or a 15-year-old who just told me you're gay, for me to be the most loving parent in the world means that I'm going to have to kick you out of our house, I'm going to have to cut you out of our family. I'm going to have to treat you like a sinner, like you're not in the church, because that's what I've been told love looks like. And what I'm trying to say is maybe we've been given a very, very shallow, ugly picture of what love looks like, because maybe it goes all the way back to Augustine. That's kind of what I was picking up on, what I've already felt a little bit, and I felt like you gave me a little permission in your book. Tell me about that.

Tom:

Yeah, yeah, I can see what you're saying. The example you give, I think, has a lot to do with people who think that love means obeying what they think God commands. So they go to the Bible. They think homosexuality, queer, lgbt, transgender that's sinful. The Bible says so. Since God is a God of love and wants me to love, I need to obey that. Therefore, I'm kicking my kid out of the house. Most of those people aren't asking the question what's really fundamentally good for the kids' psychological and mental and emotional well-being? They're not asking the questions of well-being. Most of them are asking the questions of what does it mean to be obedient to the God who? I think Scripture says queer things are wrong. That's a different part of the Christian tradition than Augustine are wrong. That's a different part of the Christian tradition than Augustine. That's a tradition of well. You find it more in fundamentalism and Lutheranism and some parts of Lutheranism. So this shit.

Randy:

what I would call a shallow idea or picture of love, you would say, is probably not rooted in Augustine, it's probably rooted somewhere else with somebody else, yeah, okay, yeah sorry about that whole 10 minute little sidetrack. Um it makes me.

Kyle:

It makes me want to talk to you more about love in a separate conversation probably well, you know what let's do.

Tom:

let me send you guys copies of my book pluriform love, which is a more academic thing, and and I get into all the biblical stuff and the Greek philosophy and all that, and we can go after that. What do you think of that idea?

Kyle:

I would love that. Yeah, Because one of the things that's always struck me about agape, and like the kind of love that Jesus seems to have practiced, is the particularity of it. This has come up on our podcast before recently and like it's easy that that version of fundamentalist love is easy to knock over. But there are more sophisticated forms of it and it's not hard to think of utilitarian justifications, for example, for that kind of behavior where I am interested in the wellbeing, just not the wellbeing of that individual, because the wellbeing of the collective is more important and that's what this kind of rule you know, the rule the Bible here is just to stand in for a certain kind of rule. That kind of rule guarantees the well-being of the collective. It's a rule, utilitarianism that's at work in that kind of justification.

Kyle:

So if we're going to say love is other than that, then we're I think we're suggesting that divine love has to be particular, and I'm very interested in the justification for that, because it seems true to me. And yet, methodologically again, why? Would we prioritize that over some kind of collective.

Tom:

Let me be nerdy just for a second here. It could be that God cares about the well-being of the whole, the common good, but because God's intimately related to each entity and by nature by necessity acts for the good of the individual, that God has both spheres in mind and can't make a decision that excludes the good of the individual for the good of the whole, but could call the individual to self-sacrifice for the good of the whole, but can't impose that on the individual.

Randy:

So, tom, our time is winding down and we have literally like half of our outline still to go. Would you be okay, would you be comfortable with doing a little bit of a lightning round and being on the hot seat? We're going to ask you some questions that deserve way more than 60 second answers, but we're asking you to give us 60 second answers. Can you do that?

Tom:

I'll give it my best shot.

Kyle:

All right. I think we have to put a rule on ourselves that we can't object or respond for further clarification.

Randy:

That's fair, you take those. This will never work.

Tom:

This is going to be carte blanche here. I'll start every answer with and Kyle believes what I'm about to say.

Kyle:

He and Kyle believes what I'm about to say.

Tom:

He agrees with this. Randy knows I'm right about this.

Kyle:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, okay, number one, you ready. Yep Is creation ex nihilo. Why or why not?

Tom:

No, it's not ex nihilo. I think God everlastingly creates out of that which God previously created and there is no absolute beginning previously created and there was no absolute beginning. Kratu ex nihilo is not in scripture and was introduced by Gnostics and is a major problem in the Christian and Jewish and Muslim traditions.

Randy:

Man, I'm so excited to just keep moving and drive all our listeners nuts.

Kyle:

I'm holding it in. I'm holding it in.

Randy:

And our co-host. Keep it going, Kyle.

Kyle:

Number two what is omnipresence? You have a big problem with omnipotence, but you like omnipresence. In my mind they are very similar. What is omnipresence?

Tom:

Omnipresence, as I see it, is just God being directly present to every creature and entity in the entire universe without being that creature. So it's not pantheism. I think of omnipotence, at least as classically understood, as one of three possibilities Either God controls every entity, or God could control and occasionally does, or God can do anything. So I see omnipresence and omnipotence as distinct.

Kyle:

So since you mentioned pantheism, that'll, that'll be my next one. Okay, you, you have a whole I think it's a whole chapter in the book. It's been a while since I finished it. On panentheism yeah, it's at least a big focus we. I wanted to talk about that at length. We're not going to have time, so so distinguish for our listeners pantheism, panentheism, classical theism, other kinds of theism, if you want, and tell us why you think panentheism is the way to go.

Tom:

First of all, there's a variety of meanings of panentheism. I'm going to tell you which one I think is the best, but you might hear some other alternatives from other people. Pantheism is the idea that everything that is is God. There's no difference between God and creation. Classical theism has not only wanted to make sure there's a difference between God and creation, but also has says that God is impassable, unaffected, not directly relationally affected, by what goes on. Panentheism says that all of creation is in God, not in the sense of being in a bucket, but being in God's experience, Just like I'm in your experience right now as a listener or viewer. I'm affecting you. But panentheism says not only humans affect God, but everything that exists affect God's experience.

Randy:

And the way I've heard panentheism, which I would consider myself in that camp. I've heard it said that God is in all things Rather than all things being in God. God is in all things than all things being in God. God is in all things. Is there a functional difference there?

Tom:

Difference between God being in all things and all things being in God.

Randy:

Correct. Is it just the same way of saying the same, different way of saying the same thing?

Tom:

They're saying different things. Okay, yeah, to say that God is in all things is to say that God affects all creation, influences all creation at all times. To say all things are in gods is saying everything affects god. A lot of classical theists are going to say god affects all of creation, but they're not going to say creation affects god in the sense of influencing got you, god, thank you.

Randy:

Here's one from me, um, and, and this is, I want to couch all my like objections with like, but I love you, tom. But, here's an objection as I was reading through the book. You do really great service to logical and reasoned arguments, but I don't feel like there's a lot of scripture in your arguments and in your takes. Why not? Why don't you like there's?

Kyle:

a lot of scripture in your arguments and in your takes. Why not?

Randy:

Why don't you like the Bible, Tom? Yeah, that's it.

Kyle:

I think that's a quippy version of it.

Tom:

Yeah, I decided on that particular book I wasn't going to be heavy handed with scripture, because I thought my audience was probably not an audience that was going to be proof texting left and right, okay, and so I stayed away from scripture this Pluriform Love Book that I mentioned. There's a lot of scripture in there, so I think I can make a good case for my theology with scripture, but I didn't think that was the best strategy for this book.

Randy:

For the record, I do too, and I think most, or if not almost all, of your arguments are extremely scriptural. You just don't cite. You know all the different spots and in some ways I'm thinking, and some of us appreciate it. I'm just imagining my Theo bro, friends and family. Who would have? All these objections based on the unbiblical nature of it, and I want to say it is biblical, it's just not overtly biblical, yeah.

Kyle:

You spoiled him with that chapter in your Omnipotence book. That was all Bible, that.

Randy:

I skipped.

Kyle:

That's right. Do you want to ask a version of your atonement question, or is that too much? Yeah, yeah.

Randy:

So in your book in Open and Relational Theology and Introduction to Life-Changing Ideas, you have a chapter on atonement, and thankfully so, because there's a lot of problems with our understandings of the atonement and theories of the atonement. However, I felt like you didn't really detail what an open and relational theological understanding of the atonement is or would be. It seemed like maybe you kind of would favor a moral influence theory of atonement that says it's not. The problem wasn't that any sin wasn't holding us back or that there wasn't this chasm, but it's actually God trying to influence and shape and transform who we are and what it means to be human in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus perhaps. But I was kind of left lacking for what is an open and relational idea of the atonement.

Tom:

Yeah, there's no one single open and relational idea of the atonement and in this particular book I didn't lay out my own personal view because I'm still working my view out. Maybe the systematic theology will be what gets me over the final hump. I've got these certain assumptions that I know I believe, but I need to put them together in such a way that I have a clear label and clear biblical justification. I don't think I have to have all scripture to support my view, but I want to have sort of. These are my key passages and I'm still working on that.

Randy:

Okay.

Kyle:

All right, last one from me. You talk about relentless love in the book. Tell us what that means, and then I'll have a quick follow-up.

Tom:

Relentless love is my view of the afterlife. I'm not a classical universalist and I like Karl Barth or David Bentley Hart who thinks that God has the kind of omnipotent power to guarantee everyone goes to the good place. I'm not a person who believes in the traditional idea of heaven and hell hell as eternal conscious torment and I'm not an annihilationist, because I think that view says that God gives up on people. Relentless love says that moment by moment in this life and in the afterlife I happen to believe in subjective experience beyond bodily death that moment by moment God invites us to love and when we respond well to that we enjoy the positive consequences that come from love. When we respond negatively to God's invitation to love at any moment, god doesn't punish us, hit us, send us to hell, but there are natural negative consequences that come. And relentless love holds out the hope that, because God never gives up, universal reconciliation is possible.

Randy:

Kyle, do you mind if I follow up real quick, because my question is going to leave my mind. Yours is on ironclad, I'm sure of it. You said you made the statement that you believe in subjective experience after death. Is that those words correct? Yeah, what makes you believe that, tom?

Tom:

Near-death experiences, out-of-body experiences, are my main evidence for this. So I don't know if you've read the near-death experience literature sometimes you know NDEs, all that sort of stuff that gives me hope. It's also very common amongst many religions to think of the afterlife. I mean, obviously all the religions could be wrong, but so I think there's some religious justification for it. But I don't know for sure, I'm speculating.

Kyle:

Okay, so back to the relentless love thing. If God never stops pursuing someone who has said no in number of times, is God honoring that person's choice?

Tom:

Yes, by nature, by necessity.

Kyle:

That's one of those things philosophers like to say in lieu of giving an actual answer.

Tom:

So I'm going to ask you to unpack it a little bit if you don't mind. How does God do that? Is that what you're saying?

Kyle:

No, how is that honoring the choice of the person? Person well, if god doesn't force the person to say yes to love, then I think, sort of by definition, if I have immense power over you and I ask you 17 billion times to do something and you say no, more and more forcefully every time, is the 17 billion and one time respecting your choice yes, there's two answers.

Tom:

That one is this. One is god can't not respect your choice. So it's by nature god invites you to love and can't force you. So it isn't the case that god's saying you know, 17 billion, I restrain from forcing you, but this next one I'm gonna force you. So it's by nature that God can't. But secondly, what was going to be my second point? Oh, but secondly, if we are relational in the afterlife, then we're not only affected by God, but we're affected by others in our circumstances. So the 17 billionth and 1th time could be different from the 17th billionth time. So the variables can change.

Kyle:

Yeah, okay, I promise not to follow up anymore.

Tom:

It's a great follow-up.

Kyle:

I saw that look in your eyes and I was like this could get fun. Okay, anything more from you, Randy. Is that the end of our lightning round? Is that the end of our lightning round?

Randy:

That's the end of our lightning round. I think that's great. All right, before we're done, do you guys want to try to persuade me to? Go back to open theism, or are we done with that now?

Tom:

With every head bowed and every eye closed, I see that hand.

Randy:

Man, you guys are so good, you should be evangelical pastors for sure, see this is the beautiful thing about not believing in hell.

Tom:

You know like I don't feel the pressure to try to convert you to the right view to save you from eternal damnation, that's yep, yeah, and I don't care anymore whether you're an open deist.

Kyle:

Good, good.

Randy:

Just for the conversation's sake. I don't care either.

Tom:

That's my deal.

Randy:

Like I really enjoy a lot of things about it. I still have common questions like if the future is open and unknowable, then why did Jesus say things like before the rooster crows? Three times today you're going to deny me. Like that's problematic, right, there's things within scripture that if you take at face value, it's problematic for the open theism kind of camp.

Tom:

I admit that Not all open and relational theists will admit that, but I do. I think the majority of biblical passages support open theism, but there are some outliers for sure.

Randy:

Yep, and I will tell you, you saying something like that, tom, makes me want to believe it even more.

Kyle:

I mean, it's almost like the Bible was written by different people for different purposes. I know, weird, it didn't always have the same views of God. Yeah, almost.

Randy:

The future and all those things. Here's my last question, tom, as I was reading through your book and I really appreciate it. I really appreciate open and relational theology. I think it's a perspective that all of us should try to understand and sit with, at the very least right, because I think it's a more beautiful way of understanding God. My question, though, or my thought, as I was reading through your book and you're critiquing ideas that are a couple thousand years old, that should give us pause, which I know that you've had that pause and you do along the way. You take that seriously in tradition and history and all that.

Randy:

However, I wonder how much of what we're talking about here has to do with just human consciousness evolving over time and our religious ideas and concepts evolving over time and becoming truly better and better and maybe perhaps more and more accurate, going, you know, not in a straight line, obviously it's not linear, but perhaps maybe going closer and closer to the truth. It's kind of my idea of the kingdom of God that informs that belief in many ways. However, 2,000 years from now, if this is still all happening, how are people going to assess open and relational theology the way we're kind of critiquing and assessing classical theism. And are we a product of our time? Just as you know, augustine and many of the influential church you know, patristics, were influenced by their time and Greek thought and all the other things. Are they going to look at us and say, oh well, they're just a product of their time, which was uber relational, and fill in the blank? Do you know what I'm getting at here?

Tom:

I think so. I want to avoid two fallacies. The first fallacy says that whatever happened in the past must be the right way to think. Yes, Augustine said it. I believe that that settles it. I think that's a fallacy. Second fallacy I want to avoid is that everything in the present is better than the past. I don't think that's true either. I think we have to have different criteria than whether or not it was always been said or never been said. I think our criteria ought to be does this live well? Does this bring us peace, joy, love, justice? And yes, we're products of our time. We can't escape that. But we need to do the best with the time we're given. To quote Lord of the Rings, we need to put together a way of thinking and living that makes the best sense and promotes a kind of flourishing that I think we all deep down want, even though we may have different ideas about how to achieve it.

Randy:

I think that I'm happy to end there, Kyle.

Kyle:

Me too, especially since he quoted a classical theist there at the end.

Randy:

So I think, it's all good Awesome.

Kyle:

Tom, it's always lovely to talk to you, I love it's all good. Awesome, tom, it's always lovely to talk to you. I love talking to you guys too Next time we're going to pick one topic and we're going to talk only about one thing instead of like all of theology.

Tom:

Well see, that doesn't work in opening relational, because everything interconnected for us.

Randy:

Can I ask you, Tom? This is just self-serving completely.

Tom:

What do we got to do to make it on the back of the next book for crying out loud I didn't know you when that book came out.

Randy:

So sorry, thomas. J Ord, thank you for the work you do in general. Thank you for open and relational theology. This book an introduction to life-changing ideas. I highly recommend it. For anyone who's kind of just doesn't feel like the theology they've been given and the understanding of God and reality just fits perfectly. I highly recommend you pick up this book and just consider some of these thoughts. Again, it's an invitation into more conversation. Where can we find your work, tom? And like, if somebody says I'm really intrigued by the idea of theological studies, where can I do that? Where can we plug them in, tom?

Tom:

Yeah Well, I direct doctoral programs in open and relational theology at Northwind Theological Seminary, but there are also master's courses there and other educational offerings. If you're thinking about an online education, you might check that out. You can check out more about open relational theology at the Center for Open Relational Theology and that URL is the letter C, the number four O-R-T dot com. C for Ort dot com. And I also want to say you know, as I said earlier, I don't want to pretend like I've got all the answers. I'm not absolutely certain about these things, but often when I speak at a conference or a university or a church or a seminary, I will get done and people will walk up to me and they'll say you know, I've always been kind of thinking what you just talked about. I just didn't have the words to articulate it. So I suspect that some of the folks listening to this, if they read this book, they'll have the similar reaction. They'll say you know, that kind of fits my intuitions, but I never heard anyone quite say it like this.

Randy:

Yeah, yeah, and listeners, just so we're clear. We know that we can kind of bring some of these critiques to Tom, because he can stand it, he can hang in there and he's really, really smart. But the truth of the matter is and I think I'm speaking for Kyle this is lovely stuff that you're putting out into the world.

Randy:

This is very, very highly necessary stuff that you're putting out into the world helping people understand the things as we deconstruct our spirituality and try to figure out what any of this means for us and what role we have to play in it. All of it, the things that you're thinking about and putting out into the world, are really important, Tom.

Tom:

Thank you for saying that, randy, I appreciate it.

Randy:

Thanks for listening to A Pastor and a Philosopher Walk into a Bar. We hope you're enjoying these conversations. Help us continue to create compelling content and reach a wider audience by supporting us at patreoncom. Slash a pastor and a philosopher. We can get bonus content, extra perks and a general feeling of being a good person.

Kyle:

Also, please rate and review the show in Apple, spotify or wherever you listen. These help new people discover the show and we may even read your review in a future episode.

Randy:

If anything we said pissed you off, or if you just have a question you'd like us to answer, send us an email at pastorandphilosopher at gmailcom.

Kyle:

Find us on social media at at ppwb podcast, and find transcripts and links to all of our episodes at pastor and philosopher dot buzzsprout dot com. See you next time, cheers.

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Kyle Whitaker

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