Customer Reviews

Natural Grace: Dialogues on creation, darkness, and the soul in spirituality and science

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Matthew Fox (born 1940) is a theologian and bestselling advocate of "Creation Spirituality." He became a Catholic priest of the Dominican order, but was removed in 1992, and has subsequently become an Episcopalian priest. He has published an autobiography, Confessions: The Making of a Post-Denominational Priest. Rupert Sheldrake (born 1942) is an English biochemist and plant physiologist, perhaps best-known for his theory of "morphic resonance" that was proposed in his book A New Science of Life. They have also jointly written the book The Physics of Angels: Exploring the Realm Where Science and Spirit Meet.

They state in the Preface, "We both share an interest in going beyond the current limitations of institutional science and mechanistic religion, as we both believe that as a new millennium dawns, a new vision is needed which brings together science, spirituality, and a sense of the sacred... The dialogues in this book are preliminary explorations into this new territory... These dialogues emerged as we spoke together in public and private settings..."

Here are some representative quotations from the book:

MF: "Back in the late sixties we said that God is dead, meaning of course that we had killed God. Now we're saying that the planet is dead, meaning of course that we're busy killing it. And I propose that worship is dead."
MF: "But I told hiim that the Universe is 15 billion years old and soon the human community has to make a decision: 150 years of human tradition or 15 billion years of Creation's tradition."
MF: "theologically what I'm talking about is that it's time to start praying with the Godhead instead of just with God."
MF: "That's what myth is---it's a language for that which is too great to fit into mere factual compartments."

This book is a dialogue between a mystic and a scientist. From time to time one or the other get a bit esoteric, but the back and forth makes for surprising insights and provocations to further thinking by the reader. I would especially recommend this as a book to discuss in a group. The dialogue between readers of different backgrounds complements the dialogue within the book.

I've read this book twice and have underlined a lot of it. I've recently shared it with friends and have discussed some of the concepts the authors describe so well. The idea of the body is in the soul, the soul as field, the connectivity through grace...these are powerful, transforming thoughts. Thank you Matthew for another fine book.

This book is a dialog between the defrocked Catholic Matthew Fox and scienctist(of morphic resonance fame) Rupert Sheldrake. In it they discuss both science, religion and spirituality(mostly Echart and Hildegard) and how they intersect at points as I understand it.

Do they do a good job? yes and no. Yes in that both are sincere in their efforts. Sheldrake stands out as the better of the two intellectually. No in that Fox falls down in several areas.

1. He commits a serious epistemological error by confusings metaphysical levels of the spirit and soul with material levels of existence. For Fox A = C this is a big no no. Angels are not atomic paritcles and the soul is not the body. Reification is plain wrong.

2. He bases the bulk of his newly created theology on selected portions of Eckhart, Hildegard and Rumi. This is dangerous, since these were mystics of a high order their writings were never meant to be read as one reads a newspaper or literally as Fox wants to do. Also none the people he mentioned were rebels like himself. These mystics worked within the religous framework of the time. To try to create an exoteric framework from esoteric writings which is what Fox has done is fraught with problems, especially when you are not their equal.

This is my biggest problem with Fox. Instead of trying to show the reader the differences between science and religion he's trying to peddle his new religion of creation spirituality. Which is gnosis without gnosis in disguise.

3. As for Fox's understanding of Catholic or Christian religion in general, he has blinders on. Especially when he comments on the great Cathedrals of Europe. He fails to understand or evem see their symbolism, instead he find's solace in their crypts of all places - this is neurotic. This man loves being in the dark and would like to see all new churchs built underground. His attitude is positively Manichean in nature.

Sheldrake also confuses the readers with his understanding of science in general. Science deal with the quantitative and measurable aspects of materialism. It cannot deal with qualities nor with metaphysics. To use science to justify religion is sloppy thinking and equivalent to building a house on shifting sands.

So my rating is:
** stars
-1 star for lack of a index and specific sources for the quotes Fox used.
-1 star for sloppy epistemology and for Fox trying peddle his new religion instead.
-1 star for using on the back cover "institutionalized science and mechanistic religion" it should mechanistic science and institutionalized religion. Religion may be dull at times but never a machine

The book fails in trying to bring together the strands of science, religion or spirituality. Which nobody has ever really done well. Read E.F. Schumachers "Guide for the Perplexed" which is a must and then Hossein Nasr "Man and Nature". Another good one is Huston Smith's "Postmodern Mind". For a real study on spirituality get Evelyn Underhill's "Mysticism" she's a beautiful writer and very well studied on this topic.

Well, ran into some deep space in this one. This cosmic equation seems to have some real balence. But as you know love is all there really is> Author write me. Enoch