The way many professional theologians conceive of God, however, does not align with love as I have defined it, as we experience it, or as described in much of sacred scripture. Keith Ward\u2019s concept of God is different; it aligns with love so understood.<\/p>\n\n\n
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<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\nGod Must Love<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Unlike the voluntarist God of some theologies, Keith believes God must love. God cannot freely choose evil.[2]<\/a> In fact, divine freedom is \u201cnecessarily conditioned\u201d by love.[3]<\/a> To put this in my own terms, Keith believes love comes logically prior in the divine nature to will.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We should reject theologies aligned with ancient Greek philosophical notions of a static God, says Keith. Such theologies consider God a timeless substance rather than a dynamic person. They present God as simple, immutable, and impassible too, which fails to align with the dominant biblical portrayal of God or with the personal piety of believers.[4]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Keith agrees with the majority portrayal of God in the Christian scripture, which portrays God as \u201ca dynamic, creative, and relational reality.\u201d[5]<\/a> This dynamic God changes but is not in all ways immutable. \u201cA general biblical account of God,\u201d says Keith, \u201cis more sympathetic to the view that God changes in some respects than to the view that God is completely changeless.\u201d[6]<\/a> A changing God \u201ccapable of new creative actions is more supreme than are being that cannot be other than it is.\u201d[7]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Keith Ward is what I call an \u201copen and relational theologian,\u201d because he believes God essentially experiences time analogous to how creatures experience it. God\u2019s experience is temporal, but the divine nature does not change. Keith rejects the classic view of divine simplicity because it undermines the personal and relational aspects of God. God does not have a preordained plan that is worked out in a predetermined and precise way.[8]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n A relational God suffers with and knows creatures experientially. God\u2019s \u201cconcern for the well-being of creatures implies knowledge of their condition,\u201d Keith says. And it implies \u201cpity if it involves suffering, revulsion if it involves the willful causing of suffering, and action to relieve that suffering where it is possible.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n A God who simply contemplates suffering \u201cis not truly love,\u201d says Keith. \u201cThe one who truly loves will do something to help.\u201d[9]<\/a> God is passible, because \u201caffected by the beauties and sufferings of the created world.\u201d[10]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Love compelled God to create the universe. \u201cOne who believes in the existence of God,\u201d argues Keith, \u201cwill believe that there is an actual case of supreme goodness that has created the world for the sake of good.\u201d[11]<\/a> And God had a particular aim in creating: \u201cthat autonomous persons can come into existence,\u201d says Keith. These creaturely persons would be able to \u201cshape their own lives freely and creatively, and can find their fulfillment in being united to the divine in love.\u201d[12]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n In a certain sense, says Keith, God needs creation. \u201cIf God\u2019s love is agape love, love of the other and the imperfect, then that love could not exist without a creation containing possibly imperfect creatures.\u201d This does not mean that the universe created God, however. \u201cCreation in no way brings God into being,\u201d Keith says, \u201cand it depends wholly upon God in order to exist.\u201d[13]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n A good number of Christian theologians affirm divine love as necessary among members of the social trinity. But Keith thinks \u201cthe idea of God as a sort of society is a bad idea.\u201d[14]<\/a> Christians should not think God is comprised of three persons, each with distinct centers of consciousness, distinct freedoms, distinct responsibilities, distinct wills, and distinct relations between one another. <\/p>\n\n\n\n This formulation of the Trinity is more tritheistic than monotheistic. Keith believes God is one; God has one mind and will.\u00a0I’ve reviewed Keith’s book on the Trinity here<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The loving Creator experientially loves and relates with the created world.[15]<\/a> God\u2019s love is ad <\/em>extra. \u201cIf God is a relational being characterized by love,\u201d Keith reasons, \u201cthat relation must be to non-divine persons, and not a sort of secret self-love.\u201d[16]<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\n We can talk about divine love as in some sense trinitarian, Keith says, if we identify a \u201cthreefold form of divine love – as creating finite persons, relating in love to them, and uniting them to the divine life.\u201d This activity \u201cis the manifestation of the supreme goodness of God as creative, self-giving, and universally inclusive love.\u201d[17]<\/a> \u201cIf God is agape love,\u201d says Keith, \u201cthis is love of what is truly other than God, not just love of the divine beauty and self.\u201d[18]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n God\u2019s \u201cplan\u201d for creation is not a detailed blueprint of all that will occur. God does not entirely determine or even foreknow what the future of the universe will be. But \u201cGod wills that creatures cooperate in the work to create new expressions of love and goodness,\u201d says Keith, \u201cand that plan can take many forms.\u201d[19]<\/a> The love plan Keith says God entertains is neither unilaterally determining nor willy nilly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Creaturely love is derived from divine love. We \u201cmust learn to love,\u201d says Keith, \u201cby learning to share in the divine love.\u201d[20]<\/a> This learning provides creaturely persons with their purpose. \u201cThe highest business of life is to live well in a just and compassionate society,\u201d Keith says, \u201cand to see that living well consists in seeking the true, the good, and beautiful for its own sake.\u201d It involves \u201crealizing as fully as possible our positive human potentialities, and then working for a society and a world in which that is a real possibility for all without exception.\u201d[21]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Loving creatures hope to experience even greater love after death. \u201cFor those who believe themselves to experience something of a God of love,\u201d says Keith, \u201cthe hope of paradise is the hope of closer knowledge and love of God.\u201d[22]<\/a> But this closer knowledge and love does not come through divine fiat. God wills that persons \u201cattain their end by their own efforts, in cooperation with the divine\u2026\u201d And \u201cif finite persons are to love and realize themselves in God, there must be more to finite consciousness than the often painful and always inadequate sense of union with the divine that is apparent in ordinary lives.\u201d[23]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n This \u201cmore\u201d is what many theists call \u201cheaven.\u201d Even \u201cthe hope of heaven,\u201d says Keith, \u201cis entailed by belief in a God of love.\u201d[24]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Keith Ward\u2019s theistic metaphysics provides a far more adequate account of love, creaturely and divine, than alternatives. Rather than a materialist metaphysics that denies essential elements of love, such as value, freedom, experience, agency, morality, and more, Keith\u2019s idealistic metaphysics not only accounts for these elements but emphasizes them. Rather than a theistic metaphysics that claims God is impassible, timeless, simple, and in all ways immutable, Keith\u2019s theistic metaphysics portrays dynamic love as the activity of a dynamic God in giving-and-receiving relations with creatures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Keith Ward\u2019s philosophical vision aligns with a robust account of love.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [1]<\/a> Keith Ward, Christ and Cosmos<\/em>, 86.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [2]<\/a> Ibid., 167.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [3]<\/a> Ibid., 165.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [4]<\/a> Keith expresses this throughout his book Sharing in the Divine Nature<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [5]<\/a> Ibid., 72.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [6]<\/a> Ibid., 61.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [7]<\/a> Ibid., 73.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [8]<\/a> Ward, Sharing in the Divine Nature<\/em>, 77-78.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [9]<\/a> Ibid., 47.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [10]<\/a> Ibid., 49.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [11]<\/a> Ward, Morality, Autonomy, and God<\/em>, 208.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [12]<\/a> Ward, Christ and Cosmos<\/em>, 231.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [13]<\/a> Ward, Sharing in the Divine Nature, <\/em>74.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [14]<\/a> Ward, Christ and Cosmos<\/em>, x.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [15]<\/a> Ibid., 72.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [16]<\/a> Ibid., 182.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [17]<\/a> Christ and Cosmos<\/em>, 62.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [18]<\/a> Ward, Sharing in the Divine Nature, <\/em>77.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [19]<\/a> Ibid., 77-78.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [20]<\/a> Ward, Morality, Autonomy, and God<\/em>, 202.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [21]<\/a> Ibid., 215.<\/p>\n\n\n\n [22]<\/a> Ibid., 207.<\/p>\n\n\n\nOpen and Relational God<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
God’s Creative Love<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Trinity?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
God and the Future<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Love after Death<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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