> From: "Howard J. Van Till" <hvantill@novagate.com>
> To: george murphy <gmurphy@raex.com>, "D. F. Siemens, Jr."
> <dfsiemensjr@juno.com>
> Subject: Re: What does the creation lack?
> Date: Sat, Oct 27, 2001, 3:06 PM
>
> George, in response to Dave:
>
> > Perhaps one thing you're missing is that use of the term "Providence"
> > in describing Howard's view may be misleading. He has expressed some
> > approval of the process theology views of Griffin, which differ significantly
> > from traditional doctrines of providence in which God is omnipotent. In
> > process thought God is "lures" the world toward the goals God intends, but
> > one can't say that "all [is] within the will of the Almighty. Everything
> > works, and works out, as God intends."
> > But probably Howard will want to speak for himself on this.
>
> Correct. From the process theology perspective, God is "supreme in power"
> but not omnipotent. Not all that happens is within God's will. God's
> persuasive action cannot override or supersede the action of creatures to
> force a particular outcome.
Not all that happens is within God's will. But this does _not_ imply
that God is not omnipotent. Every traditional theist would agree that
sin is not within God's will. We have to distinguish between God's
directive (absolute, even coercive) will and his permissive will. He
wishes each human and angel to obey him, but he does not force them,
having given them the possibility of certain free-will decisions.
Process theology is wrong in denying God's omnipotence. It is also wrong
not to distinguish between actions of non-free-will creatures (which God
_can_ override, supersede, direct at will) and those of free-will
creatures (which God does not _want_ to override in each case). The
question whether God can do logically impossible things is probably
ill-posed: he created a rationally consistent world, and he won't
contradict himself.
> That does not eliminate the idea of God's acting in a way that has the needs
> of God's creatures in mind, but it does modify it. I'm still evaluating the
> process theology perspective; it is strong on a concept of divine action
> that does not entail the standard problems of theodicy but other features do
> indeed need to be considered.
>
> Howard Van Till
The question of theodicy has to be approached with the consideration of
free will.
Peter
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