A Slice of Theology Space

I was in conversation with a web developer and the topic came up of the “good ole days” when a website consisted of HTML code that described actual 2 dimensional pages. Linked to other two dimensional pages. In those days the content of the page (titles, articles, images, videos, links, forms, etc.) was all interwoven with the HTML code that described how it would be displayed. Form and content were intermingled. 

Now that has all changed. The mantra of the website developer today is to keep form and content completely separate. Content lives in a multidimensional space as large and complex as the entire internet. Indeed it includes all the content of the internet as well as new content constantly being created.

Now form, the “webpage" that you see is a dynamic two dimensional representation of a fraction of the available content. Two dimensional because it has to be shown on a screen. Soon, indeed already if you have the equipment, the form will be in three dimensions. The task of the web programmer is to write the software that reaches into the infinite pool of content, finds what you want, and then presents it on your screen in a coherent manner. The software that drives the website is creating the connections between the different types and objects of content so that you see (hopefully) what you want or need to see. Or that someone wants you to see. 

And yes, it changes constantly. Your so-called “Facebook” page isn’t a thing. It's a kaleidoscope view of constantly changing content constantly rearranged in order to sell you products. 

It would help if Christians realized that what Christian theologians call doctrine is actually the same as a webpage. It is a two dimensional representation of the multidimensional space full of theological ideas. It is a two dimensional representation of the infinitely complex multi-dimensional Mind of God.

And theology is a program that finds and presents a finite number of ideas from that complex space in a coherent relationship that (hopefully) Christians can understand and make use of. 

This is why there can be so many different theologies. Each offers a different logic by which the theological ideas that make up God’s Mind are brought into relationship and presented as doctrine. Calvinist theology is governed by a logic that places all theological ideas in relationship to each other based on God’s absolute sovereignty. Armenian theology is governed by the logic that places all theological ideas in relationship to each other based on God’s command that humans be free to choose their actions and destiny. Liberation theology is governed by a logic that places all theological ideas in relationship to one another based on on God’s preferential option for the poor. 

(If you want to see this at work simply read over both classical and modern creeds while asking: what is the logic that governs this presentation of basic Christian beliefs? You'll see more than one logic, and hence more than one creed.)

None of these theologies can, or should try to, claim to represent the whole of God’s Mind. At best they bring into view a relatively small number of theological ideas in only one of countless patterns of logical relationships.  

Nor can these theologies, nor should they, claim to represent even the totality of theological ideas found in scripture. One reason theologians have argued for centuries about scripture is that their different doctrinal representations of scripture depend on different logics; different programs for determining which parts of scripture they will display and the connections between them. 

Nor, by the way, do any of these theological programs represent the logic of scripture itself in presenting the mind of God. Scripture is governed by of a number of different theological programs; theological logics that determine both what we read and how we read it. The reader’s experience of scripture on any given reading is likely to be governed by only one of these programs, but this doesn’t mean that other readers will not be attuned to other programs. 

Because theology always presents only a partial view of all theological ideas, in a framework governed by a single program of relationships, its doctrines are always inadequate to represent the Mind of God. 

This doesn’t mean that a particular doctrine must acknowledge the possibility of being wrong. Both the logic and the ideas presented by doctrine can be tested and shown to be true. Truth remains the standard for all theological claims, for all doctrine. Indeed theology may claim to be guided by God’s self-revelation. But no theology, and no doctrine can claim to be complete. 

There will always be another logical representation of God’s Mind as rigorously logical and factual with an equally valid claim to be guided by God’s self-revelation. 

The forms created by the human mind will never capture fully, or even in great part, content when the content is Reality as known by God. But then this is the witness of scripture itself.  

What remains, of course, is for theologians to adopt some of the humility of website programmers and admit that this is the case; content always exceeds the ability of form to make it present. Or to quote Thomas Aquinas, greatest of theologians because he knew this of himself: “All my work is straw.”