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Explore the origins and purpose of humanity, cosmology and the need for a new creation story in the modern world. From connecting with the universe's dynamic force to envisioning our destiny, join the quest for deeper understanding.
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The New Story In Search of a FunctionalCosmology
Our Beginning You have comefrom the energy and the power thas has brought the universeintobeing the beginning of the Universe is alsoyourbeginning. You were born from the fire thatcreated the stars thatfire is alive in you B.Swimme
what is cosmology? Cosmologyaims at articulating the story of the universesothat humans can enter fullyinto the web of relationshipswithin the universe. A çosmology helps us to understand our relationship to the Earth, Cosmos, world.
The need for a New Story of Creation “It is all a question of story. We are in trouble because we do not have a good story. We are in between two stories. The old story, the account of how the world came to be and how we fit into it, is no longer affective. Our traditional story of the universe sustained us for a long period of time. We knew our place in creation and the circle of life.
We need a new story • We need a new story that will provide a context for our lives. • We need a story; about how things came to be, how they came to be as they are now and how the future can be given direction.
THE BIBLICAL CREATION STORY • The creation story in Genesis Chapter 1, tells how the world was made in seven consecutive (Gen 1: 2-4a) days. The chapter tells how humankind arrived on the scene (Gen 1:26-31). • This account of how our world came to be is no longer adequate or effective in the light of modern science.
It is all a matter of Cosmology How do we see ourselves In the world we live in. What do we see when we look at the world around us? Hildegard of Bingen: Cosmic Human
The world of today is controlled by its cosmology “The present Ecological crisis has everything to do with the cosmology that underpins our view on the world. Once we are aware of this, we will understand where the destruction of the Earth comes form. “A radical reassessment of the human situation is needed, especially concerning those values that give life some satisfactory meaning”. (T.Berry)
THE WORLDVIEW THAT HAS DIRECTED US The universeincludes the human but is largerthan the human.Because we have notunderstoodthis,we causedsomuchdevastation on earth.
Moving forward to a New Story “We need to connectwith the Dynamic Force behind the Universe andhowthroughitallcameintobeing. It is thatsame power – thataftersomanyages- has made usaware of our place in the universe. If we open ourselves to that power, thatWisdomandthatprocess we can look with new hope to the future of the human.” Thomas Berry in “The New Story” in Dream of the Earth
The quest of humans of all cultures and all ages Where do we come from? Where are we now? What are we to do? How are we to live our lives today? What is our destiny? What does the future hold for us?
Origin In the Beginning was the Dream The Dream was with God The Dream was God…. Through the Dream allthings came to be. Origin Diana Lynne Anderson
A New Creation Story has evolved in the Scientific Community • The New Story that has been developed by Thomas Berry and Brian Swimme in the light of modern scientific knowledge, has provided us with a credible and acceptable story. • This story is the context within which all other stories of origin find their fulfilment.
We must begin wereeverythingbeginsbegins This New Story is the greatest change in human consciousnesssince the rise of human civilization
A Story in FourPhases: The Galactic story The Earth story The Life story The Human story
There is no moment of transition from the material to the spiritual. All was there at once.
SEEING EARTH FROM SPACE At the beginning of the 21st century we are beginning to see the Earth in its context of the universe. Because of space travel, we have been able to stand apart from the Earth and see it, at least in photographs, as a whole. We have become used to a new picture of the Earth, as a single, beautiful, blue-green planet shared by all living creatures. .
A Theologythatlistens to Science • Will see God as creatively at work in andthrough the wholeprocess of the emergentuniverse as describedbycontemporarycosmology. • It willsee God as empowering the emergentuniverseandevery aspect of itfromwithin. • God creates in such a way thatallpotentialities of the universeemergefrom the primeval events
We are born of the universe God creates human beings As emergentcreatures: We are born of the universe, constituted of the hydrogenatomsthatemerged in the early 13.7 billionyearsago.
DeepIncarnation The universefromitsbeginning had a Christdimension: “allthingswere made throughhimand without him was notanything made that was made”. John 1, 3
In Jesus of Nazareth God becomes a vital part of an ecosystem; interconnected systems that support life on Earth.
DeepIncarnation • Incarnation is notrestricted to humans; it is the wholeinterconnectedworld. Also the biologicalworld of living creatures. The Word made flesh is the wholeworld of interrelatedorganisms. • In becomingflesh God embracedallcreatures in the interconnected web of life. D.Edwards
Christian Community • Christian Community canbeseen as integralwith the larger story of the universe, of Earth, of life, and of the human community. • The ultimate community is the wholeuniversetogether. • The integraluniverseconstitues the sacred community par excellence andneeds to berecognized as such in Christian thought. Th.Berry
To Conclude Allthat God created was already in Gods presence before the worldbegan, before the beginning of time. Hildegard of Bingen ( 1098 – 1179)