Syncretistic Catholicism

Another Minority Report

another minority report

Syncretistic Catholicism where any Anglican, Episcopal, Roman & Orthodox

consensus informs core beliefs & divergences are received as valid theological
opinions

More on my Subjunctive Apokatastasis &

Indicative Apokatastenai

Ordinally, the reality of our intrinsic desire for God (the existence or thatness
of our immanent inclination toward God) is able to be fulfilled in accordance
with our primary nature as divine images.

Cardinally, the depths to which such a desire can be experienced can only be
known a posteriori to revelation and are able to be fulfilled in accordance with
our secondary natures as divine likenesses.

It is in the gratuity of creation that such intrinsic desires are established (e.g.
as eros) and in the gratuity of grace that their depths are enlarged (e.g. as
agape).

Creation establishes our intrinsic desire for Christ by & in Whom we are
constitutively & mutually indwelled. Through Grace, we’ll then synergistically
self-appropriate both how & how much we’ll express (via our secondary
natures) what we are (per our primary natures).

Grace progressively awakens ever increasing levels of desire, which can be

variously fulfilled by all manner & degrees of divine manifestation
(presencing), both mediated & immediate, transitory & everlasting, and so on.

We aren’t gifted new faculties (e.g. superadditum) by or for an immediate

divine presence, only the new data of each revelatory experience. Such
experiences don’t establish – but, only awaken & enlarge – such beatific
capacities. That is, they don’t establish that or what we are. They don’t outfit
us facultatively as with novel capabilities. They synergistically foster how &
how much we appropriate our being. They increase our capacities.

This dynamic doesn’t speak to a natural – supernatural dichotomy; it’s all

supernatural.

We make no claims upon the Divine beneficence for any degree of fulfillment
of desires that would be beyond that degree of desire as has already been
awakened in us by Grace. Eternally, we can thus variously manifest God’s
glory & variously enjoy divine beatitude, all of us fully satisfied, none of us
stung by everlasting remorse. By “variously” we refer to both kinds & degrees
of manifestation, glory & beatitude.

Might all, vis a vis apokatastasis, be granted a beatific vision or immediate

presencing? I certainly don’t believe that potential is ever foreclosed upon,
even post-mortem.

Might all, vis a vis apokatastenai, be restored via purgative graces to our
original beatitude as unblemished images of God? It is fitting.

What might be the greater good realized by our historical earthly sojourns
beyond any putative protological existence? Perhaps it was all sub-
eschatological from the get-go & ordered toward a co-creative, adequately
(not absolutely) self-determinative soul-crafting, whereby we synergistically
fashion our unique kinds & degrees of intimacy with God, each other & the
cosmos.

Might some have been predestined & so efficaciously graced to higher

degrees of intimacy per various divine predilections? I don’t find that notion at
all repugnant to my conceptions of divine beneficence.

This is all to acknowledge that it doesn’t seem at all coherent to suggest that
any post-mortem existence short of a beatific vision would be tantamount to
an eternal conscious torment. Whether in the lights of experience or of faith or
of glory, all supernatural realities, persons can experience total fulfillment per
whatever degree of divine intimacy as has theretofore already been awakened
in them (synergistically & efficaciously).

Note Regarding Various Levels of Psychological Satisfaction –

We can deny any concrete natura pura even while affirming fully satisfying
states of happiness — short of the beatific vision. After all, no saint in the
unitive way & still enjoying the light of faith (not vision) would describe herself
in hell? Neither would we who remain on our earthly sojourns, variously on
purgative & illuminative ways.

Gelpi is right about grace as transmuted experience rather than thematic. At

the same time, I believe that our concrete experience is always, in various
ways & to different extents, being transmuted by grace (this over against any
“super|natural” distinction).

Mutually constituted with Christ, our knowledge of God will progress as we

synergistically self-appropriate who we are. We do this through all manner of
co-self-determinations, where each of us decides how we’ll authentically
become our own unique likeness to Christ.
Our knowledge & love of God can progress through the lights of desire & faith,
reason & belief, vision & glory – quasiexperimentally & experimentally. Each
of these means can, potentially, gift a distinct state of (or capacity for) a
positive happiness. Each such state of happiness can be fully satisfying.
That’s because it will be proportionate only to that degree of knowledge and
love of God, which has already been awakened in us. That’s to recognize that,
because we are otherwise ignorant of any further degrees of unity (of which
we’re already capable per our intrinsic divine potencies), we’ll experience no
frustration of such unawakened desires.

AMENDMENT & ADDENDUM

I should’ve been more clear. What I am not seeing as necessary for post-
mortem beatitude are certain aspects of the beatific vision as described per a
neo-Thomist scholasticism. Those inapt descriptions include not only certain
objects of the beatific vision but their anthropological hows. I’m not going to
flesh those out.

As it is, the secondary beatitudes that I do affirm are generally considered

objects of a vision beatific, even if “secondary.” So, I overstate my claim. I am
in indicative universalist.

Furthermore, those beatitudes I affirm, taken together with my affirmation of

the universal restoration of humanity’s divine image, roughly map
conceptually to Nyssen’s account (with which I am fully onboard).

Bottomline, after reading Hans Boersma’s _Seeing God_ and happily

accepting his modifications of Aquinas, I am here to amend & addend what
I’ve written. It won’t fix my intramural squabble with all of my Roman Catholic
co-religionists, but it’ll better reflect my true position.

I suppose the implications of my stance, in the broader context of everything

else I have written herein, are that one could be happy forever on Nyssen’s
terms & not unhappy even if certain visio criteria of a neo-Thomist
scholasticism aren’t met.

Specifically, per Milbank, Boersma “properly modifies Aquinas by insisting

that the final vision will be one achieved ESSENTIALLY and not accidentally in
the resurrected body. [emphasis mine]

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John Sobert Sylvest January 27, 2024 Uncategorized

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