I wanted to share some thoughts that have been swirling around in my head about ideologies and thought systems that may have relevance to the conversation on theology. This stuff is fairly ethereal and I am not an expert in mathematics, modern philosophy or formal logic*, so I may butcher definitions. Bear with me.
So the other day I was talking with an old friend of mine who I had just recently gotten back into touch with. He’s a computer scientist and was describing to me what (to me) seemed like a very esoteric but useful system of mathematical theory (homotopic type theory, where you visualize sets of things as “paths” on an imaginary map and measure them by how they overlap and connect to each other). In laying out the principles of this theory, he used an approach that felt to me much more grounded in logic than in math equations per se, going principle by principle until he had more or less built up the concept in my mind.
I described to my friend how his process of laying out an ideology felt very familiar to me. It sounded like the way some people talk about theology, laying out core principles and trying to build on them in a “systematic” way. Sometimes this works and produces a theological system that’s elegant and beautiful. Sometimes it produces a system full of contradictions. Sometimes it produces a system that has all the right moving parts but it’s hard to imagine why anyone would find it appealing or helpful. What intrigued me was the differences in approach between doing this in theology and doing this in math or other fields.
I began to try and think about whether theology is more like math or more like science. There’s a great video by Youtuber Vsauce about numbers beyond infinity.** In it, he briefly discusses how in science, your assumptions are based on assumptions about how the world works, and must be modified to most closely match the observable physical universe. In math, by contrast, all that needs to happen is that your assumptions are logically consistent and that they don’t contradict themselves. Math can “create” systems that cannot exist in the physical universe but which still work from a mathematical standpoint because they are consistent.
We use “calculus” to sometimes refer to not just the math system, but metaphorically to a way of thinking that is built on math-like prepositional logic (“If A=B” etc). A question comes to my mind: is theology a “calculus” or a science? And why does it matter?
When I talked to my computer science friend about my theological studies, I framed it as a kind of calculus. I talked about how in the absence of an empirical mode to “verify” our understanding of God within the physical universe, theology must be more of a math than a science. I admitted that as a result of this phenomenon, I often evaluate theologies less by whether they are “true,” but by whether they help people live more well-adjusted lives, as well as how well they mesh with my understanding of God. On an objective level, I think probably most of our ideas about God and none of our ideas about God are true. This is not to say I’m a relativist, just that the Creator of the universe is going to by nature be so far beyond our comprehension that we will necessarily get things wrong. I don’t see this as a problem because we can still cultivate a loving relationship with God. On the other hand, the work of the Christian mystics, as well as the existence of a Bible with at least some historically verifiable events suggests that there are “science” elements of faith. The disciple is, in a sense, both a kardionaut and a field researcher, exploring the depths of their heart and the heart of God, as well as discerning how God is active in the world. Math also doesn’t know what to do with paradoxes, but the Gospel and faith delight in paradoxes. There is so much about the both/and. Truth and grace. God and human. Already and not yet. Foolish wisdom and wise foolishness. In that sense, theology is more like the science which observes light as both a particle and a wave. It’s also more like art. The student of theology can make radical moves with their “colors” on the canvas, mixing and combining palettes in unexpected ways to approach a portrait of the great Subject, God. Like a poet, they write and revise words in an attempt to come closer and closer to the image of God, an image which can be approximated but never fully captured except in the person of Christ.
I think when people judge other people’s faith (especially within the same broad religious tradition), they’re operating under the assumption that theology is a science and the other person is doing it wrong. In a pluralist society, I wonder if the truth of the Gospel might be communicated more effectively if we allowed the pure light of God’s love to be filtered through the lens of people’s experience. Corrections may need to be made along the way, but if we think of the pursuit of God knowledge as more of a calculus by which we come to a way of life and discipleship that encourages our own unique flourishing under God, and less as a set of highly specific truth claims that must be defended at all costs, we might be better off.
On the other hand, it’s possible to lean too far into this thought pattern and to ignore both the witness of the Gospel and the ways in which God does tangibly “show up” in our lives. When academic theologians construct thought systems which read prettily off the page but which do not account for God’s capacity to surprise and challenge us, then we need to remember that God does promise to show up in our lives, to be attentive to the “science” of the heart.
*Nor, by the patristic/matristic definition am I truly a “theologian” (one who is able to speak about God from intimate direct experience a la St John or St Gregory Palamas), but I am at least a student of theology. **Link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SrU9YDoXE88
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