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Text: English, French (translation)
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5.0 out of 5 stars
VARIOUS ESSAYS BY THE AUTHOR OF THE "PHENOMENON OF MAN",
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This review is from: Human Energy (Harvest Book) (Paperback)
Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881-1955) was a French theologian, Jesuit priest, and paleontologist/geologist who took part in the discovery of Peking Man, and was later unjustly accused by Stephen Jay Gould of participating in the Peking Man fraud (see Gould's book The Panda's Thumb: More Reflections in Natural History, and see Charles Blinderman's book The Piltdown Inquest for a refutation). Teilhard was forbidden to publish his writings during his lifetime, the 1950 encyclical 'Humani Generis' condemned several of his opinions, and in 1962, the Holy Office issued a 'Monitum' or warning that his books contained ambiguities' and 'serious errors,' that offended Catholic doctrine. But more recently, Pope John Paul II cited Teilhard approvingly, as has Benedict XVI.Like Teilhard's masterwork The Phenomenon of Man, this book was published posthumously. This book, like its companion volume, Activation of Energy: Enlightening Reflections on Spiritual Energy, contains essays on a variety of subjects. Here are some representative quotations from the book: "From this point of view man is nothing but the point of emergence in nature, at which this deep cosmic evolution culminates and declares itself. From this point onwards man ceases to be a spark fallen by chance on earth and coming from another place. He is the flame of a general fermentation of the universe which breaks out suddenly on the earth." "In a concrete sense there is not matter and spirit. All that exists is matter becoming spirit." "This animated covering of our planet may with advantage be called the biosphere---or more precisely (if we are only considering its thinking fringe) the noosphere." "(T)he phenomenon of spirit therefore ultimately represents the certain and definite appearance of a cosmic quantum of consciousness: that is to say in fact ... a quantum of personality." "By the energy of man I here mean the always increasing portion of cosmic energy at present undergoing the recognizable influence of the centres of human activity." "(B)y hominization the universe has attained a higher level on which its physico-moral powers gradually take the form of a fundamental affinity, binding the individuals to one another and to what we have called the 'Omega point.'... What name should we give to an influence of this sort? Only one is possible: love." "(T)he historian of religions, once he decides to measure the march of Christianity not only by the numerical expansion of the faithful but by the qualitative evolution of an act of love finds himself tracing the curve of an undoubted progress." "I can vouch for one thing: that for a Christian working in the field of research, scientific activities take on marvellous significance once he reverses the mechanistic point of view and places the principle of movement, which the nineteenth century believed it had discovered at the antipodes to God, in an upper pole of creative attraction."
5.0 out of 5 stars
Crucial work from Teilhard,
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This review is from: Human Energy (Harvest Book) (Paperback)
In this work, Teilhard, using his distinctively beautiful, aethetically-pleasing writing style, takes us on another journey into human evolution. Very useful in establishing a connection between God/ Christ/ Spirit and the development of human compassion and love. Very useful in explaining Christian mysticism and pantheistic harmony. But perhaps most useful in showing how the Triune God reaches out into the world to transform us and develop our sense of love and compassion.
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