The Shape of Theological Humanism
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means “truthful explaining” of divine appearances, then theology sides with critique and becomes the prosecutor of religion as many Theology today is largely divided between these two incompatible poles on a spectrum of possibilities. a/theologies contend.
impasse, one that is appropriate to our context of endangerment to life. One conceives God in and through the idea and norm of “the integrity of life.” On the way to that proposal we want to review three metaphorical clusters Theological humanism proposes a way of thinking beyond the current
which organize much theological thinking in the Western Christian tradi-tion: God as heavenly deity, God as light of the world, and God as not God. These metaphors function in theology much like the images of human existence isolated before in the legacy of humanism (garden, school, theatre).
The first two metaphors are expressions of Christian theism. The third cluster nations of religious and critical consciousness within these clusters.the criticism of these metaphors, we seek to reclaim insights about the pres-is the form of post-theistic theology. We can find oscillating combi- (^7) Beyond
ence, claim, and transcendence of the integrity of life in human existence.God as Heavenly Deity
With the metaphorical cluster of God as heavenly deity, theology takes the form of biblical interpretation. It came to be known as revealed theology. The metaphor that God is a heavenly deity, a divine person above and beyond the world he created and in whose image human beings were made,
derives directly from the biblical narrative. Within this cluster, theology begins with rnatural agent, a God. In its reception over time this form of theology incorpo-rates increasing eligious consciousness, but responding to the divine as a super-amounts of critical consciousness.
Creed – exhibits picture-thinking (narrative form:One of the early examples of Christian theology – the Apostles’ I believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of the heavens and earth; and in Vorstellungensdenken, as Hegel called it) in
Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord; who was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary; suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died and was buried; he descended to hell. On the third day he was raised into heaven, and sits at the right hand of God the Father almighty; from where he will come to judge the living and the dead. I believe in the Holy Spirit; in the