11/27/2022 – Chapter 12 Group Discussion: “The Epistemology of Holiness”
Definition of “epistemology” from the “American Heritage” Dictionary, 5th Edition:
“1. The branch of philosophy that examines the nature of knowledge, the presuppositions and foundations, and its extent and validity.
2. The theory of cognition, that branch of logic which undertakes to explain how knowledge is possible. Probably first used by Ferrier.
3. The theory or science of the method or grounds of knowledge.”
On pg. 67, Kreeft introduces us by way of De Caussade’s quote: “Our faith is never more alive than when what we experience through our senses [apparently] contradicts it. He goes on at the bottom of the paragraph: “By our senses we can see only the actions of the creature, but faith sees the creator acting in all things.(pg 34)”. The loopback to pg. # 34 is critical so I will share an excerpt starting in the 2nd paragraph:
“Here’s how it works: The trusting look at God overcomes the main obstacle to holiness, which is selfishness. Most selfishness comes from fear of losing or missing good for yourself, something happyfying. Only faith (trust) casts out fear.
… The bad self-love is simply ‘my will be done’ instead of “Thy will be done.’ How can we overcome that rabbit, that habitual egostism, that between our will and God’s By believing Romans 8:28: by believing that ‘trust and obey’ will infallibly bring us to joy because God is omnibenevolent (He wills our greater joy) and Omnipotent (He is able to ‘work’ all things together for that end, since all things are His things, His creation), and omniscient (He never makes mistakes about what really leads us to our greatest joy).
(Jimmy note: Borrowing again from Tim Keller, “Jesus the King”, we are invited to the eternal dance of the Triune God: Father, Sons and Holy Spirit who have been circling around each other in perfect ‘agape’ love for an eternity. How can that not lead us to our greatest joy! Is that not sublimely unfathomable? Did not Jesus say: “What does a man gain if he gains the whole world, and loses his soul in the process?”)
So let’s explore this question, each of us:
Do we accept Kreeft’s presupposition that “God deliberately hides from our senses and usually also from our feelings in order to strengthen our faith”? What a paradox! Thoughts?
Further on page #68, how about this one: “The duties of each moment are shadows which hide the action of the divine will (p. 21). Duties — the driest and dullest and dustiest and least “sexy” of all moral categories — are our divine guru’s training in preparation for the mystical ecstasy for which we are all designed. Duties are disguises of spiritual foreplay. What an outrageous notion, no?
But let’s go further, and for this I am going to connect with the concluding two paragraphs:
“We should apply what we know about the power of romantic love to the goal of holiness. We should see holiness as ‘sexy. For human sexuality, too, is part of the image of God (Genesis 2:7 says that!) and is spiritual as well as physical, unlike animal sex. It is unexcuable that when we want to be holy and when we look around for the most effective and powerful analogies and examples from which to learn, we ignore the most powerful passion in the world. But the saints and the mystics have not ignored it, it has been the favorite analogy, metaphor, and image, ever since the ‘Song of Songs’ was written about twenty-five hundred years ago. (*A – below)
This analogy is the heart of Saint John Paul II’s ‘Theology of the Body’, the Church’s answer to the Sexual Revolution. God’s Church always redeems and uplifts and beautifies what God has created and designed, especially when sinful mankind perverts, degrades, and uglifies it.”
Soli Deo Gloria!
(*A) – See “Three Philosophies of Life” by Peter Kreeft. (Ecclesiastes: Life as Vanity; Job: Life as Suffering; Song of Songs – Life as Love)