The 2013 J. K. Russell Research Fellowship in
Religion and Science

Dr. Niels Henrik Gregersen

Fellow's Public Forum, Friday, February 8
Research Conference, Saturday, February 9
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Annual J. K. Russell Research Conference
Saturday, February 9, 2013

God, Information and the Sciences of Complexity

Richard S. Dinner Board Room of the GTU (Hewlett Library), 2400 Ridge Road, Berkeley
1:00 to 5:30pm

Information and complexity have become central concepts of our contemporary scientific world-view. In which sense can we speak of information and complexity also as part of the nature of God? It will be argued that traditional Logos Christology already offers important resources for speaking of aspects of information as inherent to divine life. The divine Logos is “in God”, while being both the wellspring of information (the differentiating and structuring capacity in creation) and the incarnational embodiment of creaturely differences (from physical “differences that make a difference” to semantic information). Philosophical theology, however, has often maintained a strong distinction between the divine Logos and the logoi of creation. Accordingly, the inherited idea of divine simplicity has circumvented notions of complexity from being inner features of divine fecundity, creative richness, and capacity for communication.  An argument will be developed for an alternative philosophical theology, inspired by central concerns of Trinitarian theology. To the Father is ascribed the role of the inner fecundity of ‘birthing’ the eternal Son, thus encompassing the overflow of divine essence and love; to the eternal Son is ascribed the role of the differentiating power of information (Logos), while the life-giving and communicative power is ascribed to the Holy Spirit. In this light, the notion of divine simplicity will have to be redefined as the divine self-identity in the midst of temporal flux. For not all that happens in the world of creation is conformal with divine life.

                         
Niels Henrik Gregersen holds his PhD from the University of Copenhagen, Denmark, 1987. Having served at Aarhus University as Assistant Professor in Ethics and Philosophy of Religion 1986-1989, as Associate professor in Systematic Theology 1989-1999 and as Research Professor in Theology & Science 2000-2003, he was in 2004 appointed Professor of Systematic Theology at Copenhagen University. Since 2008 he has also been co-Director of The Centre of Naturalism & Christian Semantics, Copenhagen University.

Gregersen’s primary research fields are contemporary theology and science-and-religion. His list of publications contains more than 600 entries, including 4 books, 2 co-authored books and more than 15 edited or co-edited vols. Publications include Incarnation: On the Scope and Depth of Christology (Fortress Press, forthcoming 2013), Information and the Nature of Reality: From Physics to Metaphysics (Cambridge University Press, 2010), Naturalism and Christian Semantics (Copenhagen University, 2010), The Gift of Grace: The Future of Lutheran Theology (Fortress Press, 2005), From Complexity to Life: On the Emergence of Life and Meaning (Oxford University Press, 2003) and Design and Disorder: Perspectives from Science & Theology (T & T Clark, 2002).

Conference Respondents:
Ron Cole-Turner, Joshua Moritz, Ted Peters, and Oliver Putz

Registration

Register on-line (with your Visa, MasterCard or PayPal account), print a Registration Form to fax or mail
or call 510-848-8152 to register.

Directions and Lodging:

• GTU area Campus Map
• Lodging Options:
  • Berkeley City Club, 2315 Durant Ave, Berkeley, CA 94704 (510) 848-7800
  • Hotel Durant, 2600 Durant Ave, Berkeley, CA 94704 (510) 845-8981
  • The French Hotel, 1538 Shattuck Ave., Berkeley, CA (510) 548-9930 (closest hotel)

Fellow's Public Forum, Friday, February 8, 7:00 PM
Jesus and the Depth of Creation: The Idea of Deep Incarnation

Tucson Room of the Church Divinity School of the Pacific (CDSP), 2451 Ridge Road, Berkeley
(enter via the courtyard on LeConte Avenue )

7:00-9:00pm

There seems to be an ineradicable tension between the grand-scale story of the world of creation, cosmic in scope and pitiless in its operations, and the small-scale story of Jesus as embodying divine empathy. The idea of deep incarnation aims to overcome three pitfalls of contemporary Christology. The one is the liberal solution of seeing Jesus merely as a significant historical figure of the past; the other is the classic Platonist solution of seeing Christ as an exemplar of the divine Logos, who is existing alongside creation and incarnation; the third is the view that the incarnation of God in a human form is a paradox in principle, beyond further explanation. Deep incarnation here argues for the view that by assuming the particular life-story of Jesus the Jew, God’s own Logos or Wisdom conjoins the material conditions of God’s world of creation (“all flesh”), shares and ennobles the fate of all biological life-forms (“grass” and lilies”), and experiences the pains of all sentient creatures (“sparrows and foxes”). In this view, incarnation is the story of God’s reach into the very tissues of material and biological existence. The “flesh” of Jesus Christ is co-extensive with his divinity, not just an isolated human figure of the past but neither an external appendix to divine life.

The Fellow's Forum is free and open to the public. Registration not required.