Quantum Theology

The Rev. Joy MacCormick

18 July 2017

Quantum Theology

 

I am no physicist!
The more I try to understand
the more confused, bewildered, I become.
Yet what mind can scarce begin to comprehend
is recognised as truth
some part of me has always known.

Once, science sprouted from theology;
now physics seeks to dialogue with faith –
reveals the power of consciousness, of prayer,
to be the same creative energy
that drives the cosmos.
Humans call it “holy”.

For is not “God” a naming
of that unbounded power –
transcendent source of everything that is;
binding together and sustaining,
through its energy,
every subatomic particle?

How easy to forget
that words are not, themselves, reality;
are merely symbols representing thought,
enabling sharing, and promoting exploration.
“God” or “Alaha”* “Energy” or “Matrix”
All point to Unity – for those with eyes to see.

* “In Aramaic, the name Alaha refers to the Divine.  It means
variously: Sacred Unity, Oneness, the All, the Ultimate
Power/Potential, the One with no opposite” (Neil Douglas-Klotz, “The Hidden Gospel”)

“What is truth?” asked Pilate of Jesus.   (John 18:38)

It is difficult, and often frightening, to let go of what has been received as truth.  Living at a time when accepted scientific truth is being overturned by the discoveries of quantum physicists means facing the need to do just this - to be open to the possibility that the laws of physics as we have known them are no longer binding; that everything in the world, and indeed the cosmos, is connected to everything else; that there may be many more than four dimensions and even parallel realities; that humans have the power, through conscious awareness, to create all the changes they choose; that this is accomplished through feelings and beliefs rather than thoughts and words.   (Jesus declared “Whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.”  Mark 11:24)

New understandings of how the cosmos operates mean new understandings about God.  It has been said that institutions are guardians of received truth and resistant to new understandings.  (Galileo was persecuted by the Inquisition for declaring that the earth was not the centre of the universe but moved round the sun, and not until 1991 did the Church acknowledge that he was correct!)  To what extent is resistance still a feature of the Church?

You will know the truth and the truth will make you free” (John 8:32) promised the one who also said “See, I am making all things new.”  (Rev. 21:5)  In Romans 12:2 we read “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds . . . .”

 

How resistant am I to new understandings – 
                                           particularly those relating to God?
FROM  what might I need to be made free?
FOR  what might I need to be made free?
Do I want/am I willing to be made free?
Ask God to help you discern the answers to the above questions.

© Joy MacCormick  
Image Creative Commons