THE CONTEMPLATIVE STANCE - a philosophical critique

The Tetradic Fugues of a Radically Orthodox Epistemological Architectonic – an exploratory heuristic

Epistemological Posture – a nonfoundational perspectivalism situated in a fallibilistic, triadic semiotic realism

Epistemic Rubrics

Semiotic Aspects

normative

descriptive

interpretive

evaluative

Conceptual Dispositions

semiotic

theoretic

heuristic

dogmatic

Conceptual Categories

qui (who)

Conceptual Distinctions

epistemic indeterminacy – methodological constraints

epistemic a priori and a posteriori

ontological vagueness – modal

ontological necessity and contingency

semantical vagueness – excluded middle and noncontradiction

semantical analytic (explicative) and synthetic (ampliative)

Elements of Actionable Norms

truth-conducive and truth-indicative arguments

epistemic warrant and epistemic parity

philosophical methods and philosophical systems

equiplausibility principle and Pascal’s wager

Hermeneutical Approaches – epistemically indeterminate and semantically and ontologically vague phenomenological approaches

Anthropological Outlook – existential orientations and humanistic imperatives as Lonergan’s conversions; minimalistic realisms: semiotic, aesthetical, moral and metaphysical; Kung’s nowhere anchored and paradoxical trust in uncertain reality; practical nihilism of strong and weak agnosticisms, nontheisms and speculative atheism

Natural Theology – abduction of the Ens Necessarium; weak realisms: semiotic, aesthetical, moral and metaphysical; Kung’s justified fundamental trust in uncertain reality; deism, theisms

community

creed

cult

code

Theology of Nature – pansemioentheism, a pneumatological theology of nature

Laws of Nature

necessitarian

regularist

antirealist

Emergent Regularities

protodynamics

thermodynamics

morphodynamics

teleodynamics

eschatodynamics

Aspects of Thirdness

Apologetics – theological perspectives, a theological perspectivalism; robust realisms

rational and presuppositional

evidential

existential

trans-evaluative

Anthropological Outlook – existential orientations as theological imperatives (theosis)

community as orthocommunio

creed as orthodoxy

cult as orthopathos

code as orthopraxis

Applications – philosophies of science, mind and religion; theologies of nature; formative spiritualities

The Tetradic Fugues of a Radically Orthodox Epistemological Architectonic – an exploratory heuristic

reintroducing enchantment or what G. K. Chesterton called the thrilling romance of orthodoxy

Precis

Epistemological Posture – a nonfoundational perspectivalism situated in a fallibilistic, triadic semiotic realism

EPISTEMOLOGY AS VALUE-REALIZATION

We can think about human activities in terms of value-realizations. Each value-realization seems to consist of several other value-realizations. Each of these, while distinct , is indispensable and integrally-related to the others. What makes them distinct are their unique goals along with their distinct strategies and tactics for achieving those goals. To put it another way, we could say that they each employ different methods or rules or logics. So, we can say that they are intellectually-related even if not strictly logically-related.

For example: 1) One value we could pursue is to get the answer to such questions as Is that a fact? Is that what I think it is? What is that? 2) These questions are different from such concerns as What's it to me? What do I care? Do I want that? 3) And those questions are different from such inquiries as How can I get some of that? What's the best way to get that?

That first category involves descriptive value-realizations with methods like empirical observation and measurement, falsification, logical demonstration and hypothetico-deductive reasoning and it provides our descriptive premises. The second category reveals our evaluative posits. The third category involves normative things like best practices and provides us prescriptive premises.

There is a fourth category which involves our interpretive concerns and which answers the question How do we tie all of this together? It provides the framework for the methods we will choose and the justifications we will employ in support of our evaluative and normative goals.

Without resolving all of the interpretive questions left begging, we can observe that our normative pursuits mediate between our descriptive and interpretive endeavors to effect our evaluative concerns. And this is to recognize that once we know what something is and whether or not we care about it and want it, then we turn to our best practices, hopefully, to see how to optimally obtain it. At this point, what we have done, formally, is to have coupled a prescriptive premise --- that is either self- evident (so called) or agreed upon by social convention as a valid premise --- to a descriptive premise and then we have syllogistically reasoned our way to a valid normative conclusion, which, if also sound, will allow us to realize our evaluative goal.

What we are engaging is an exploratory heuristic that combines insights that I gleaned from Don Gelpi regarding Charles Sanders Peirce and also from Robert Cummings Neville. Gelpi describes one Peircean rubric this way: The normative sciences mediate between phenomenology and metaphysics. Neville's axiology is heavily informed by human value pursuits. These insights are combined, herein, into this epistemic rubric: the normative mediates between the descriptive and interpretive to effect the evaluative.

These are very broad categories. The normative sciences include logic, aesthetics and ethics, for example. If we wanted to narrow these conceptions, for any particular application of the rubric, we could say, for example, that the prudential mediates between the empirical and metarational to effect this or that value-realization. It could be further narrowed to describe the prudential in terms of either the practical or moral. What we are doing is providing an exploratory heuristic or metatechnica to help us talk about such problems as are being discussed here, or to talk about such things as the putative fact-value dichotomy or even the hard problem of consciousness. Such a heuristic provides placeholders for patterns that most can recognize and many can use, no matter what interpretive stance they bring to the conversation. By referring to the different logics of these categories, we are of course recognizing distinctly different value commitments as well as the axioms we employ in their pursuits but also am observing that there is a mix of propositional and nonpropositional, rational and nonrational, inferential and noninferential approaches in play.

One way to look at it is that, while these categories involve distinctly different value commitments, employ radically different axioms and engage both our rational and nonrational faculties, each category necessarily presupposes the others; each is methodologically autonomous but all are inextricably intertwined, triadically, in the same way that abductive, inductive and deductive inferences presuppose each other, in the same way that the modal categories of possible, actual and necessary/probable imply each other.

Conceptual Dispositions

Humankind, as a community of inquiry, a community of value-realizers, articulates its descriptive, evaluative, normative and interpretive claims and stances with categories and concepts that are variously semiotic, theoretic, heuristic or dogmatic. These categories and concepts can be classed, broadly speaking, according to whether or not any given assembly of value realizers has negotiated their meaning. Negotiated terms are thus considered theoretic. Those still-in-negotiation are heuristic, acting as placeholders. Non-negotiated terms, not shared by the community-at-large or held only by a restricted assembly of value realizers, are dogmatic. Semiotic terms are non-negotiable because they include such as First Principles and self-evident values on which meaningful communication, itself, depends.

The proper integration of the various aspects and perspectives of human value-realization, as measured by the appropriate emphases to be placed on each in relation to the others, can best be discerned in the language employed by humankind’s different communities of value-realization, as it reveals each community’s collective assessment of its various, relevant conceptualizations by virtue of any given concept’s expressive status as semiotic, theoretic, heuristic or dogmatic. This is because, presumably, such epistemic status will reveal the amount of value that the community has been able to cash out for any given concept per that community’s established evaluative criteria, corresponding, roughly, to the old scholastic notations of possible, plausible, probable, certain, uncertain, improbable, implausible and impossible.

This Scotistic perspective resonates with Jack Haught’s aesthetic teleology and von Balthasaar’s notion that truth and goodness are imperiled in a culture that loses its sense of beauty. It seems to me that if, with Scotus, we do not take the Incarnation to be a response to some felix culpa but a cosmogenic inevitability, we might reimagine our felix culpa to otherwise reside in our radical finitude.

Because we are finite, we experience an epistemic-ontic divide, which is to recognize that ours is an ecological rationality that is inescapably value-driven, which is to further suggest that we must go beyond the empirical and logical aspects of our intellect to heed our evaluative aspects --- not only to thrive, but --- to survive. In Scotistic terms, then, the descriptive, normative, interpretive and evaluative aspects of our ecological rationality are formal distinctions of an otherwise singular human reality, which is the value-realization. Such a value-realization for a finite being requires a harmonic balancing of the perspectives, which I will prescribe below in terms of a fallibilistic, nonfoundational perspectivalism. The pursuit of such harmony is also normed by our deeply-felt aesthetic sensibilities.

Scotus gifts us with other insights. Going beyond qui (who), quid (what), quando (when), quo (where), quam (how) and quare (why), and even quantus (how much) and quotiens (how often), in our search for the ever-elusive quia (because), Scotus especially invites us to also consider the significance of quale (what kind) and quod (that) and maybe most especially of haec (this). Because of his quid-quale distinction, we learn that we can divorce our semantics from our ontology and affirm, for example, a univocity of being. Because of his concept of haecceity, or thisness, we learn that, as Peirce would later take it, we can make nondescriptive references like quod, for example Wittgenstein’s THAT things are, which is the mystical. This opens the door to engage in a robust phenomenology even as we prescind from any particular metaphysics as we recognize that it is one thing to successfully describe or explain a reality and quite another to successfully reference and model a reality. We can talk intelligibly about realities that lie beyond our full comprehension by at least apprehending them, in part.

Evaluatively, haecceity opens us to the reality of individual significance, which affirms the precious value to be realized in each otherwise inimitable creature and moment, which then especially affirms the dignity of each human, and this all has tremendous normative impetus. If in our competing accounts of primal reality we reach a Scottish verdict, establishing, at best, an empirical and logical epistemic parity, then, as a result of this radical finitude, normatively, applying the equiplausibility principle, we might choose to be guided by beauty and goodness rather than caving in to a practical nihilism, and this felix culpa of ours will require of us a radical kenosis, a self-emptying of memory, understanding and will in surrender to hope, faith and love, the greatest of these being love. And this is to recognize that, if we must move beyond our best truth-conducive aspirations and operations and theories of truth to rely on our best truth-indicative approaches, both aesthetical and moral, as the Fab Four said: All you need is love. And that is as true for John, Paul, George and Ringo as it was for Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

Conceptual Distinctions

PROCESSES

INFORMAL LOGIC

Argumentation might be examined from three different perspectives: the logical perspective, regarding its product; the rhetorical perspective, regarding natural persuasion; and the dialectical perspective, regarding the processes of argumentation. Our specific focus is on the logical perspective and the establishment of probative weight and epistemic warrant. What are the criteria for assigning these scholastic notations: possible, plausible, probable, certain, uncertain, improbable, implausible and impossible?

To be clear, then, we are not discussing formal logic, which is indefeasible, monotonic and deductive, the assertions of which must be surrendered if not proven. Rather, we are dealing with informal logic, again, as employed in everyday common sense, scientific hypotheses and legal argumentation. It is provisional, defeasible and nonmonotonic and can be classed as either inductive inference, such as the statistical syllogism, or presumptive inference, which is known by its reversals of the obligation to prove (presumption must be given up if disproved).

The 1) inductive inference is weaker than 2) deductive inference (strong inference) and probability is employed to help us gauge the frequency with which the argument will hold true. 3) Presumptive inference is weaker still, made up of both a) abductive inference, which employs probability values in its minor premises, such as an inference to the best explanation, and of b) plausible inference, the weakest of all, which employs confidence values and is normed by the equiplausibility principle, for example. For our purposes, the equiplausibility principle norms our provisional closures and actions by placing before us the decision to choose that which is the most life-giving and relationship-enhancing, amplifying beauty, goodness and unity in our ongoing pursuit of truth. For example, given the equiplausible notions that there is, in the dim light, either a snake or a rope on our parlor floor, we shall treat the thing as a snake. Given the equiplausible notions that this uncertain reality is a glorious contingency or a grand design, we shall respond eucharistically, with profound thanksgiving to Our Benefactor, and like Pip, in Great Expectations, set off in search. Confer Robert Cummings Neville in AMERICAN JOURNAL OF THEOLOGY & PHILOSOPHY Vol. 18 NO.3 September 1997 REPLY TO SERIOUS CRITICS 281:

I think rather that the question is how we respond to the ground of being that creates the natural world with such indifference, and here Corrington and I are not together. He says that sadness has the last word and that the proper response is lamentation. So his philosophy is a brilliant naturalistic theory that laments the fact that the mother who ejects us is cold indifferent effulgence. My response was forged in the grief of the death in infancy of our first daughter, which occurred a few short weeks before I had to deal with the copy editing of God the Creator. There was a passage toward the end of that book where I originally had quoted with approval the line from Job: "The Lord gives and the Lord takes away; blessed be the name of the Lord." My wife and I had loved our daughter with a love whose limits had not been reached, and she was
taken away. Could I leave that line in? The result of much soul-searching was to leave it in as the mark of my response to the Giver and Taker. What it meant was that I could still adore the creator of a world whose forces of disease are blind to the purposes and passions of the human economy. The Dao is simply like that. That was in 1966, and nearly everything I have written since then has aimed to search out the ways, hows, and whys of that world, and the loveliness of its creator whose ways are not our own. Eternity and Time's Flow is my most explicit treatment of the shortness of life and other kinds of sadness. It's looking into the abyss no matter how you cut it. The issue is whether to rage like an abandoned orphan or melt in bliss at the loveliness of
that power.

See Douglas Walton’s Argument from Appearance: A New Argumentation Scheme

in Logique et Analyse, 195, 2006, 319-340, which is available here:

METHODS

Our overall thrust is geared toward the search for enhanced modeling power of reality, toward trying to better define and attain epistemic virtue, toward a reconsideration of the "best practices" to be employed in our normative sciences of logic, aesthetics and ethics. It is a search for a Goldilocks epistemology, which is to say, one that has neither too much hubris nor an excessive humility.

When it comes to humankind's descriptive enterprises, which are inherently normative, when we encounter paradox, we sort through different scenarios and try our best to determine its origins. To the extent we cannot determine whether any given knowledge advance is being thwarted by, on one hand, methodological constraints, or on the other, some type of in-principle occulting, the proper bias is to assume the former and eschew the latter. This is simply a pragmatic approach wherein methods will generally precede systems. Our methods will necessarily assume such things as common sense notions of causation, reality's intelligibility, certain first principles like identity, noncontradiction and excluded middle, such principles alternately holding or folding in a semantical vagueness that flows naturally from the ontological vagueness and epistemic indeterminacy we ordinarily encounter in reality. Ontological vagueness means we change our modal ontology from the possible, actual and necessary to the possible, actual and probable. Epistemic indeterminacy is when we don't know if we are constrained methodologically or ontologically (the in-principle occulting I mentioned above). Epistemically, we can draw distinctions between the a priori and a posteriori. Ontologically, we can draw modal distinctions between the necessary and the contingent. Semantically, we draw distinctions between the analytic (explicative) and synthetic (ampliative). While the knowable and unknowable might be valid categories, this distinction is problematical and invites yet another between the provable and the knowable. For example, with Godel we might accept that we cannot prove the truth of the axioms of our systems, in theory, but this does not imply that we might not otherwise be able to see their truth, for all practical purposes.

So, while the postmodern critique deserved a response, the proper response, in our view, was the move from a naive realism to a critical realism or even a pragmatic fallibilism. Even if reality writ large remains incomprehensible, it is also still apprehensible, which is to say intelligible, lending itself to varying degrees of modeling power. Anyone who wants to enhance this modeling power must accept the onus of cashing out their novel methods in practical value-realizations.

The most succinct summary of the difference between the pragmatists and the traditionalists of other schools, in our view, would be that the pragmatists' agenda would generally seek to replace the philosophizing of sociology with the sociologizing of philosophy. Below is a list of how we conceive the pragmatists' agenda in a conversation with the other schools of philosophy. If we honor a pneumatological hermeneutic, we will seek truth, beauty, goodness and unity wherever they may be found, which will always be in pilgrim churches and fallible, finite individuals. We must not make fetishes out of our own perspectives but should engage other perspectives recognizing the traces of the Holy Spirit’s creative work in all others, of course realized in varying degrees. The history of philosophy, unlike other sciences (Kuhn notwithstanding), has been marked less by the standing on others’ shoulders from preceding generations and more by the successive generations standing on their ancestor’s necks (McInerny), with overly pejorative rhetoric and often even incivil discourse. Going forward, striking a more irenic pose, let us endeavor, instead, to employ others’ perspectives moreso as an assist and less so as a foil.

To wit:

Honor philosophy by distinguishing it from science, not by its a priori character, not by suggesting that academic disciplines are divided (horizontally) by nature’s carvable joints, but with the realization that such borders are drawn, rather, according to levels of abstraction (vertically) --- See Rorty, Putnam, and the Pragmatist View of Epistemology and Metaphysics by Teed Rockwell at http://users.sfo.com/~mcmf/rorty.html

With Dionysius, we might recognize the apophatic character of all literal predications of God.

With the Medievals, we might recognize the very weakly analogical, which is to say, metaphorical, nature of all kataphatic predications of God.

With the Skeptics, we must recognize that even the most rigorously formulated god-concepts cannot compel assent inasmuch as they, at most, demonstrate the reasonableness of some faith formulations (which is not insignificant), at best, yield a Scottish verdict --- not proven, when subjected to the rigors of philosophical scrutiny.

With Lombard, we can leverage our fundamental trust and radicalize it into an unapologetic and unqualified commitment to truth, beauty, goodness and unity, desisting, however, from any notion that we can absolutize our access to same as we convert our existential orientations toward these self-evident and intrinsically rewarding values into robustly, even if inchoate, theological imperatives.

With Scotus, we can recognize our limitations in articulating any truly coherent principles that might demonstrably foreclose on all of our philosophical problems of beginning, whether of infinite regress, causal disjunctions, tautological self-reference and circularity; rather, we can only employ philosophy in the elucidation of our concepts, such as, for example, in Peirce’s abduction of the Ens Necessarium and Occam’s association of necessity with the divine order. This pansemioentheist stance positively resonates with Franciscan sensibilities and creation-sensitivities, especially with the radically incarnational perspective that took God’s involvement with the cosmos as an eternally preordained given notwithstanding the popular and classical felix culpa theories. The soteriological efficacies remain, in any case.

With Erasmus, we can affirm a minimalist deontology, following Adler’s explication of Aristotle’s ethics.

With Locke, we can affirm the probabilistic elements of any assent, such as those involved in the preambles of faith, which establish, at least, epistemic parity with other interpretive systems vis a vis primal conditions, providing some epistemic virtue as must necessarily precede other normative justifications of assent, however strong or weak.

With Hume, we can recognize the problems that inhere in our informal logic and inference.

With Kant, we might gain an appreciation of the putative immanentist and transcendentalist natures of divine interactivity, but we best temper any overly optimistic theological anthropology with the recognition that, as radically social animals, optimal realization of human values requires the successful institutionalization of Lonerganian conversions.

With Hegel, we can form an inchoate panentheistic vision.

With Freud, Marx, Feuerbach and Nietzsche, we gain an invaluable assist in our efforts to dispatch, as per Emerson, the half-gods, that God might then arrive.

With Kierkegaard, we can better recognize the radical nature of our trust.

With Newman, we can recognize, in our grammars of assent, the cumulative nature of otherwise independent probabilities, reminiscent of Peirce’s description of a rather strong cable made from otherwise intertwined weak strands, or filaments of belief, all consistent with a nonfoundational, fallibilistic approach.

With James, then, we’ll assert our will to believe (however firmly or tentatively) or assent (however strongly or weakly) based on those concerns that are vital and ultimate (Tillich) and existentially forced upon us.

With Dewey, we will sociologize philosophy rather than merely philosophize sociology.

With Peirce, we will cash out the value of our conceptions considering only such options as are epistemically and normatively live (James) and dutifully ordered toward such human value-realizations (Neville) as best foster human authenticity (Lonergan) as measured in terms of intellectual, affective, moral, sociopolitical and religious conversions (Gelpi’s Lonerganian account). With Peirce, we might recognize the distinction between philosophical argumentation (discursive and dialectical analyses, both inductive and deductive) and the philosophical argument, itself (the product of abduction).

With Wittgenstein, we can gain a self-awareness of our language games and how they implicitly entail normative criteria for justification of beliefs, our everyday beliefs as well as distinctly religious beliefs, again, our informal logic, if you will.

With Haldane, we can recognize that religious faith resembles the unprovable but incorrigible first principles, which make science possible, which establishes a modicum of epistemic parity between scientific descriptions and religious interpretations, while also recognizing that philosophical naturalism is not entailed by methodological naturalism.

With Haack, we might recognize that while philosophy and science are not distinguishable, horizontally, by carvable joints in reality, they do, nonetheless differ in their approach, vertically, by levels of abstraction. And so, with Murphy, we might recognize the differences between science and theology in terms of degrees and not in kind, hence affirming our assertion that one epistemological shoe fits all philosophical feet.

The historical basis for this biographical excursus was drawn from an article by James Swindal of Duquesne University, which is entitled, Faith and Reason, as accessible in the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy at http://www.iep.utm.edu/f/faith-re.htm

We have now demonstrated that the history of philosophy can be viewed in terms of various over- and under-emphases that result in various fetishes or absolutizations. Different aspects of the singular, integral act of value-realization --- descriptive, normative, interpretive and evaluative --- have been treated as autonomous modes of value-realization.

Let us issue a cautionary note here. When we say beyond rationality and speak of the transrational, we are recognizing that, in addition to the empirical, logical, practical and prudential, there are also nonrational and relational aspects to human value-realizations; and it is only because we are finite and fallible that we must necessarily fallback on what are weaker truth-indicative signs (like defeasible inference, symmetry, parsimony and usefulness, for example) and cannot otherwise rely solely on the more robustly truth-conducive operations like empirical observation and logical demonstration. We must first exhaust our best truth-conducive efforts before relying on truth-indicative signs (as fallible tie-breakers); and we must keep all of these modeling power attempts very integrally related even as we respect the autonomy of their different methodologies. In summary, we must distinguish between our theories of truth and our tests of truth.

NORMING ACTIONABLE KNOWLEDGE

One practical upshot of this consideration, in our view, seems to be that epistemology is epistemology is epistemology. There need not be one epistemological scheme for one human value-realization and yet other schemes for other value-realizations. This is not to deny different integrally-related yet otherwise autonomous methodologies with their specific axioms suited for distinct value-commitments. This is to suggest that the different strategies for norming actionable knowledge, belief or assent should not involve the raising and lowering of some mythical epistemic bar, one suitable to the evidentialists, another for different fideists and yet another for so-called reformed epistemologies.

A committed fallibilist doesn’t shorten or lengthen the field of epistemic play, does not move the epistemic goal posts for this type of human endeavor but not another, does not variously place high and low hurdles, or even none at all, around the epistemic track basing such maneuvers on the type of value being pursued. Rather, one runs as far as one can, jumps whatever hurdles are there, high or low, pursuing one’s value-realization goals with singular purpose, taking from reality what it offers today and returning tomorrow to see what it may hold. If one gains knowledge, wonderful, forms a firm belief, great, or can only develop a weak assent, oh well. One simply must act and one simply must norm such action and justify it based on one’s fundamental trust in uncertain reality (Kung), one’s recognition of certain incorrigible first principles and one’s legitimate aspirations to realize the best and the most of humankind’s entire evaluative continuum, which is to say, robustly employing all manner of aesthetic, pragmatic and prudential criteria.

Whatever attitude of trust or assent, whatever act of will or commitment, one might recognize that, while all integrally-related value-pursuits have rational and irrational aspects, out of fidelity to and trust of uncertain reality, itself, human intellectual pursuits must be transrational, which is to say, always and necessarily, going beyond mere rationality but never without it.

While the respective methodologies of these different aspects of value-realization are indeed autonomous, they are otherwise relativized by being intellectually-related even if not strictly logically-related. The same thing has happened with our different hermeneutical approaches --- subjective, objective, intraobjective and intersubjective --- as they have alternately been privileged, one over the next, rather than integrally-related as complementary vantage points, all contributing to each human value-pursuit.

Anthropological Outlook – existential orientations and humanistic imperatives as Lonergan’s conversions; minimalistic realisms: semiotic, aesthetical, moral and metaphysical; Kung’s nowhere anchored and paradoxical trust in uncertain reality; practical nihilism of strong and weak agnosticisms, nontheisms and speculative atheism

Our methods precede our systems. We can successfully reference realities we have not yet successfully described. We can model realities we have not yet fully explained. We can partially apprehend (intelligibly) realities we have not yet fully comprehended. We can thus apprehend, reference and model a reality, even if we cannot otherwise comprehend, describe or explain that reality. However, we cannot a priori know whether our lack of comprehension, description or explanation drives from temporary methodological constraints, from a permanent ontological occulting, or some combination of same.

Faced with such epistemic indeterminacy and ontological vagueness, we must retreat into a semantical vagueness. This semantical strategy thus prescinds from any robustly metaphysical approach to a more modest and tentative phenomenological perspective. Our modal ontological categories of the possible, actual and necessary change to possible, actual and probable.

Our application of first principles then varies from one modal category to the next such that 1) both noncontradiction and excluded middle hold for actualities, while, 2) for possibilities, noncontradiction folds and excluded middle holds, and 3) for probabilities, noncontradiction holds and excluded middle folds. Possibilities thus differ from probabilities in that the former are overdetermined and the latter are underdetermined. The necessary, or necessity, is an analytic concept, while the other categories refer to synthetic concepts derived from human experience and psychological expectations.

I suppose the practical upshot of all this is that when an overdetermined, epistemic indeterminacy, as epistemology, models an underdetermined, ontological vagueness, as ontology, we cannot aspire to a robustly metaphysical comprehension of such a reality and can neither successfully describe nor explain such a reality using robustly theoretic concepts. Rather, we can only reference and model such a reality using indeterminate and vague heuristic concepts. One might consider our theoretic concepts as those that have already been negotiated by a community of inquiry, while our heuristic concepts are those still-in-negotiation.

This consideration is methodological and semantical, an analytic and not a synthetic account of human signification, a semiotic of Charles Sanders Peirce, which Scotus, and maybe even Pseudo-Dionysius, anticipated, inchoately, such as with Scotus' univocity of being and formal distinction and Dionysius' neoplatonic logic? In this order of knowing and signifying (designating), we might say, with Wittgenstein, that we can distinguish our discourse about THAT things are from our discourse about HOW things are, such that we not confuse a successful reference with a successful description, a successful model with a successful explanation. This approximates the Scotistic quid-quale distinction although the quid is yet to be described. .One might refer to the reality of God, for example, by referencing God as a vague cause, a cause proper to such effects, a substance proper to such accidents, as could not be predicated of any other known causes. Thus we would have an existential statement involving universals, a meaningful statement because its predicates (effects and accidents) have a referent. Univocity of thatness, like necessity, is a logical or analytic concept. Apophasis is involved here to the extent we are literally saying, for example, not this cause and not that one and not any other cause known to us vis a vis primal realities. These semantical rubrics apply for all speculative sciences, for example, both metaphysics and theoretical physics, as well as natural theology.

As one's investigation proceeds, turning from a semantical perspective to an ontological consideration, which requires the equivocity of howness, we invoke the subset of equivocity --- analogy, and the different subsets of analogy, like metaphor (weak analogues), in our God-talk, and also in metaphysics and the speculative sciences. Kataphasis and apophasis are involved here, both sharing the positive epistemic valence of increasing our descriptive accuracy (beyond mere successful reference), describing what something is or is not like. Apophasis can also serve in our devising of coherent concepts for formal argumentation, such as in modal ontological arguments, where negative predications can serve to guarantee conceptual compatibility of concepts used in an argument and also to avoid parody of an argument. Kataphasis may also, of course, aspire to robust literal explanations, and maybe even full theoretic comprehension, for those realities that are more epistemically determinable and more ontologically precise.

At any rate, the divorce of our semantics from our ontologies is thrust upon us by different encounters with different realities insofar as they are variously overdetermined and underdetermined, epistemically indeterminate or ontologically vague. Not having normalized our accounts of gravity and quantum mechanics, much less primal reality, itself, Christianity remains in search of a metaphysic (Whitehead) but, happily, has thrived and will continue to thrive, enjoying a more or less phenomenological perspective.

An ontological question still begs regarding God's transcendence and the analogy of being, metaphysically speaking, and it is that of causal disjunction. How can any reality enjoy a causal efficacy upon another reality if related only as a weak analogue or metaphor? Must there not be a matrix of interrelated causes and effects holding reality together? And might that be a Divine Matrix (Joe Bracken)? Might the neoplatonists have an insight into this vast intraobjective identity of all realities from which emerges our grand intersubjective intimacies with one another and Reality in a vague participatory way? Might this support, if not a more epistemically determinate and ontologically precise panentheism, a more phenomenologically indeterminate and imprecise panSEMIOentheism, to which we can successfully refer even if not robustly describe? We needn't reject analogy within the order of being itself, for it is necessary to increase our descriptive accuracy of realities, both determinate and indeterminate, both vague and precise. But is mere analogy also sufficient? Confer Robert Cummings Neville in AMERICAN JOURNAL OF THEOLOGY & PHILOSOPHY Vol. 18 NO.3 September 1997 REPLY TO SERIOUS CRITICS 281:

I maintain the controversial view that although we arc responsible for our own actions insofar as they result from our decisions our decisions are also part of the overall singular creative act of God, and thus God and we are both authors of those actions in appropriately different senses." Issues of consistency and coherence aside, how does the experience of God bear upon this? Surely God is sometimes experienced as external, and we sometimes experience the perversity of our hearts, if not our moral successes, as being both non-divine and in opposition to God. But surely also we sometimes experience the loss of self, its evaporation, in the singular act of God, with the consequence that personal identity, including negative (or positive) moral identity, is trivialized and all is appreciated as a divine movement beyond good, evil, or personal significance. The constant fight against antinomianism in nearly all religions testifies to the latter kind of experience. I don't know which is most basic of the two experiences, but my theory allows for both and the process theory for only the first. Process theology in the long run is hostile to mysticism.
16 See Soldier. Sage. Saint (New York: Fordham University Press, 1978), chapter 5.

A Peircean pansemioentheism, relying on Peirce’s concept of thirdness (habits, regularities, axiological realities), would take a firm pneumatological stance in accord with a neoplatonic participatory schema. In the final analysis though, one cannot mend the causal disjunction problem onto-theologically, because, to the extent reality presents as an ongoing fugue between pattern and paradox, order and chaos, the random and systematic, we cannot a priori know and do not a posteriori yet know whether reality’s regularities emerged from chaos and contingency or from order and consistency insofar as probabilities occupy something of a middle ground leaving us to wonder about their primal origin and whether or not we inhabit a glorious contingency or grand probability. In the end, our hermeneutical turn, metaphysically, is a theo-ontology, an account of primal reality that enjoys epistemic parity with competing accounts and which then invokes the equiplausibility principle, which leverages our minimalist realisms into more robust but still critical realisms going beyond mere satisficing and survival values to ultimate concerns and meanings.

In addition to the semantical, univocal predication of being between Creator and creatures, also ontologically, in order for there to be any meaningful interactivity between the Uncreated and created, we can only suspect that there is some metaphysical reality that could, in principle, be univocally predicated of both Creator and creatures, even as we concede that, for all practical purposes, the epistemically determinate and ontologically precise nature of such a reality could be grasped only through special revelation. My guess is that it would be described semiotically and would involve an otherwise ineluctably unobtrusive but still utterly efficacious tacit dimension, which invites us, kenotically, per ardu ad astra, ad veritatem per caritatem. For our God is a gentlemanly suitor, Who would not force His way; neither timid nor coy, She seductively and patiently pursues us.

Turning our attention, now, from a mostly philosophical consideration, let me treat the interface between this architectonic and a more theological stance.

Authenticity, in our view, grows as our faith transists from the clear but tentative to the vague but certain (a paraphrase of Benedict Groeshel). And this so happens to track our spiritual movement beyond (but not without) the discursive and kataphatic to the nondiscursive and apophatic, beyond (but not without) the merely rational and practical (as well as storge' and eros) to the robustly transrational and relational (as well

as agape' and philia), which is the essence of the contemplative gaze.

Merton grappled with such distinctions as between immanent and transcendent, impersonal and personal, apophatic and kataphatic, existential and theological, natural and supernatural, implicit and explicit, acquired and infused, as did Rahner, in an effort to reconcile East and West. Many of these theological conundrums were rooted, perhaps, in philosophical error, as the essentials of the Christian message became needlessly entangled with arcane and archaic metaphysics.

What if, for example, Transcendental Thomism was ultimately derived from Kant who, instead of responding to Hume, should have ignored him? What if Rahner's thematic grace was, instead, a realization of transmuted experience (Gelpi)? What if we viewed original sin not so much, or at least not solely, in terms of an ontological rupture located in the past but as a teleological striving oriented toward the future (Haught)? What if the Incarnation was not a response to some felix culpa but a panentheistic reality featured in the cosmic cards and loaded in the probabilistic quantum dice (Scotus) from the eternal get-go, metaphorically-speaking? Might the dichotomy between the natural and supernatural resolve into the ontological possibility that "it's all supernatural" and that all experience is thus graced and differs, thusly - not necessarily in kind but, instead - in degree? Might addiction psychology better explain at least some cases of so-called demonic oppression and possession? If with Scotus, we take the Incarnation as an eternal inevitability, and with Phil Hefner, we take humanity as created-cocreators, might our theodicy questions change in focus from why it is that we suffer to what it is we will do about it?

Rather than the Rube Goldbergesque theological machinations of this or that Thomism (transcendental, existential, analytical, aristotelian and so on), for example, could we not, rather, prescind from our specific metaphysical ontological approaches to a more vague phenomenological perspective that affirms the robustly relational and personal, still conforming to humankind's vague intuitions regarding "intimacy" with the Divine, while recognizing that our autonomy from Bracken’s Divine Matrix of interrelated causes

and effects is, necessarily, only "quasi," thus also conforming to humankind's vague intuitions regarding "identity" with the Divine? Perhaps some of Merton's dualistic conceptions are mere distinctions and not, necessarily, true dichotomies, at least from the standpoint of salvific efficacy, which was the real conundrum with which Merton and Rahner were, in essence and at bottom, grappling --- that over against a somewhat prevalent exclusivistic ecclesiocentrism.

If all reality is graced and not bifurcated out into natural and supernatural, the very questions change even as the Incarnation remains the Answer, for it has never been an ideology or merely another set of affirmations, but, instead is an initiation into an intimate relationship. If grace is transmuted experience and all experience is graced, from the standpoint of salvific efficacy and Lonerganian conversion, then, we (humankind) have all been abundantly gifted with what is necessary and sufficient (let's say, at least,

minimalistically speaking). Implicit faith might thus be viewed as a type of unconscious competence. What is at stake, then, via explicit faith (amplified in sacrament and liturgy, for example) is the further transmutation of our human experience into a conscious competence, which leads, in turn, to a superabundance.

In this context, certain questions will not arise, for example, such as those that require such distinctions as acquired and infused contemplation, natural and supernatural, immanent and transcendent, while others take on a new significance, such as between the impersonal and personal, apophatic and kataphatic, existential and theological, implicit and explicit, for example. Our experiences of God will thus differ not necessarily in kind but in degree and not necessarily in ontological terms of either substance or process but

in those of fullness of realization. Our vague intuition of "identity" can re-gift us with the realization of our unitive destiny, we believe, reinforcing just how close God is to us via the Divine Matrix of interrelated causes and effects (without leading us into quarrels over monisms and pantheisms). It can serve to moderate our dialectical imaginations, which, in some parts of Christianity, have redistanced God in a manner tantamount to a de facto Deism, which is clearly at odds with a reality Jesus conveyed by calling Yahweh "Abba.".

At the same time, and ironically, our analogical imaginations have overemphasized the analogical and metaphorical and this has raised questions of relevance via causal disjunction, for how can a reality described only via analog interact causally with anything else? The "identity," which we like to describe as "intra-objective," we believe reinforces and does not detract from but, rather, enhances the "inter-subjective intimacy" in a reality that is radically graced, pervasively incarnational.

We are perhaps guided more so by Beauty and Goodness to hold these types of beliefs as Truth and not so much by metaphysical proofs, which, while they indeed hint at the reasonableness of our beliefs, cannot compel one to recognize their veracity or soundness. They can be normatively justified and evaluatively relevant, enjoying epistemic parity with other explanatory attempts, even if not otherwise epistemically warranted. This is also to say that being in proper relationship to Love is intrinsically rewarding, an end unto itself beyond any apologetic or theodicy.

Some of our experiences of God, East versus West, for example, thus may or may not differ with respect to their origin, natural versus supernatural (as we might attempt to describe same metaphysically, for example in ontological terms of substance or process approaches), but rather with respect to degrees vis a vis the fullness of our realization of the God encounter. This simply recognizes that there's a lot of room for discussion in this regard, to wit: Rahner vs de Lubac vs Gelpi vs other modernists and postmodernists vs

the old dualistic extrinsicism of scholasticism.

Insofar as it does help tremendously to know what you're doing, we think we must recognize the distinction between conscious and unconscious competence vis a vis explicit and implicit faith. We very much affirm that our God encounters differ "in kind" from this perspective. What we do resist, however, is any temptation to suggest that this versus that experience is necessarily natural or supernatural or that the Holy Spirit is

necessarily here but not there (pneumatological exclusivity).

Still, we would not deny anyone's experiences or even their own interpretation of those experiences even as we think we might properly question how much normative impetus such interpretations could and/or should exert for others in the broader community of human value-realizers.

Because there are metaphysical implications which flow from revelation, we prefer to think of human value-realization in terms of a recursive feedback loop such that the normative mediates between the descriptive and interpretive to effect the evaluative. Each of these human value-realizations presupposes the others.

This is not a strictly truth-conducive algorithm (or strong type of inference) but a fallible process that is also, maybe even moreso, truth-indicative (a much weaker form of inference). We cannot even give a complete theoretic account of how knowledge works but can attest, pragmatically, that it indeed works, slowly and falteringly but inexorably advancing such human value-realizations as truth, beauty, goodness and unity (through such as creed, cult, code and community). The categories, concepts and claims

associated with each aspect of this feedback loop are communicated, unavoidably, by a mixture of dogmatic, heuristic, theoretic and semiotic terms, which we can describe, respectively, as non-negotiated, still-in-negotiation, negotiated and nonnegotiable vis or vis this or that community of inquiry or value-realizers.

Here are the practical implications of this schema. First, clearly, our dogmatic interpretive positions have clear metaphysical implications, especially implicit in our affirmation of God. This leads to a positivist-like descriptive claim, to be sure, but it tends not to get in the way of other positivist endeavors because, as far as our metaphysical enterprise is concerned, it is a claim regarding primal and/or ultimate origins, boundaries, limits and initial conditions, (and, analogously, the tacit dimension of the Holy Spirit via a Peircean thirdness) or what we might consider to be ontological paperwork that resides in the bottom drawer of the last desk in the back corner of the basement of our metaphysical library.

Again, we do not want to say, for example, that all hypotheses (let's say, this time, theological anthropologies) are equally worthy of acting as working hypotheses (let's say, spiritualities), as if it were sufficient that our logical arguments be merely valid but not also sound. But what epistemic criteria are at our disposal when it comes to speculative systematic theology, for example? or natural law interpretations vis a vis a practical moral theology? such that we can differentiate levels of external congruence with reality in addition to other criteria like logical validity and internal coherence? Or, to put it another way, how do we determine which tautology has the most taut grasp of reality?

Well, there are a host of considerations such as inventoried in the work of Stanley Jaki, and other criteria we previously listed such as hypothetical fecundity and such, as well as being mindful of the proportional mix of dogmatic, heuristic, theoretic and semiotic terms that are employed in any given metaphysical affirmation. It is not enough that

we engage our fanciful imaginations vis a vis what might have happened to humanity (i.e. death) regarding original sin in light of evolution. It is not enough to claim that our natural law interpretations are philosophical and not theological in order to compel a moral vision. We must be mindful of our terms and definitions and employ as many nonnegotiable (semiotic) and negotiated (theoretic) concepts and categories as possible, and as few non-negotiated (dogmatic) ones as necessary, employing those that are

still-in-negotiation (heuristic) mindfully and respectfully. Otherwise, our moral and political discourse will only be heard and heeded in ideological and dogmatic echo chambers. Otherwise, we are "proving too much." Otherwise, we will experience major disconnects from other people and their lived experiences, thus missing out on other credible and important witnesses to revelation.

divine liminoid as formative play
        chaos theory
        complexity theory
        evolution and emergence
        physical anomalies & paranormal 

Aspects of Thirdness - Logos
 
    Definition of Delimitation: creativity  
    Definition of Relimitation: help
    Definition of Liminal: transformatively helpful creativty and creative help; limit exploitation
    Definition of Liminoid: formatively creative play; limit exploration

Thirdness as Limits: pneumatological delimitation, relimitation & liminality
 
Kenosis as Divine Delimitation both Pneumatological and Christological
    Divine Liminal Threshold (neoplatonic proodos)   
       Firstness - modal ontology of the possible
           Reality of the Ens Necessarium
 
 
 
Liminal Space (neoplatonic mone)
    ontology of quasi-autonomy referenced by Process approach of divine matrix
        Thirdness - modal ontology of probable
        generally unobtrusive but utterly efficacious and tacit dimensionality
            incarnational reality as pneumatological relimitation and human divinization
                divine relimiting prerogatives
                    hesychastic theoria
                    signs and wonders
                    charisms
   
 
Theosis as Human Delimitation
    Human Liminal Threshold or Limen (neoplatonic epistrophe)
        ontology of intimacy described by Thomistic analogy of being
        ontology of identity described by Scotistic univocity of being
        Secondness - modal ontology of the actual
            incarnational reality as Christological relimitation
                divine humanization
                    Jesus of Nazareth   
                    Mystical Body
                    Cosmic Christ
 
 
Human Liminoid Experience

In a more comprehensive consideration, we would survey a hermeneutical progression from epistemology through the philosophies of science, mind and religion to a theology of nature, describing a putative fugue of Peircean thirdness as it resonates in each of these foci of human concern (hence, a tetradic fugue). Epistemologically, we would propose an exploratory heuristic to facilitate the discovery of this Peircean dynamic as it consistently and coherently informs the philosophic methods that will ultimately frame our theology of nature.

The fundamental argument that we would set forth is that a robust pneumatological imagination that is externally congruent, logically consistent, internally coherent, hypothetically consonant and interdisciplinarily consilient with both a Peircean metatechnica and the rubrics of modern empirical science is the 21st Century Rosetta Stone for unlocking an enhanced modeling power of reality as described by science, normed by philosophy, interpreted by theology and evaluatively realized by humankind in all of its prudential (both practical and moral) and aesthetical value realizations.

Hereinabove, we already addressed some practical aspects of this systematic theology for formative spirituality, in particular, the life of faith, in general.

Improperly considered, faith aspires to establish epistemic warrant in order to attain foundational interpretations of primal reality and articulate absolute norms for categorical imperatives, which can be a priori and objectively validated, privately even, through various noncontradictory abstractions. Properly considered, faith, propositionally, aspires to epistemic parity with other equiplausible interpretations of primal reality, and, evaluatively, radicalizes our fundamental trust in reality, transforming our existential orientations and temporal value-pursuits into the actionable norms of our transcendental imperatives and ultimate concerns, the transcendent nature and universal validity of which must be 1) communally discerned (orthocommunio); 2) tested argumentatively through rational discourse (orthodoxy); 3) authenticated pragmatically (orthopraxis) and 4) ritualistically cultivated (orthopathos). These norms are thus communally, or intersubjectively, actionable, which is to recognize that we invoke because we have first been convoked (ecclesially). And the action, then, is pneumatological, which is to say, divine.

PANSEMIOENTHEISM – a pneumatological theology of nature grounded in a minimalist realism

By pansemio- we are not specifying an ontology but are recognizing a phenomenological pattern that might include the proto- and quasi-semiotic, such as in thermo- and morpho-dynamics (or first and second order emergence), in addition to the biosemiotic and teleo- dynamic (third order emergence). Reality may present, for instance, with proto- (or primal) dynamics, thermodynamics, morphodynamics, teleodynamics and eschato- (or final) dynamics, similar to a neoplatonic procession.

First, second and third order emergence, or thermo-, morpho- and teleo- dynamics may thus represent proleptic realities. Both the formal causation (a Polanyian tacit dimension) and final causation (downward causation) of biosemiotic realities, however minimalistically conceived and without violations of physical causal closure, would proleptically present both back and front doors for a radically interconnected matrix (Divine per Bracken) of causes and effects in reality. Such interactivity can be utterly efficacious while still ineluctably unobtrusive acting pervasively through primal reality’s initial, boundary and limit conditions, whether temporally, atemporally or trans-temporally. [See Terrence W. Deacon, Emergence: The Hole at the Wheel's Hub, __Chapter 5, The Re-Emergence of Emergence: The Emergentist Hypothesis from
Science to Religion__ (Hardcover) by Philip Clayton (Editor), Paul Davies (Editor)  Oxford University Press, USA (August 24, 2006)]

This is a hermeneutic for a thoroughly enchanted nature, recognizing no necessary distinctions between natural and supernatural, or hierarchical orders of grace, or privileged levels of revelation, emphasizing, rather, the degrees of realization, levels of awareness and growth in the Spirit over any dualistic dichotomies and exclusivities.

Most postmodern Christian theologies of nature seem to be in the throes of metaphysical angst, as if other hermeneutical rushes to closure now require us to place our ontological cards on the dialogical table. Christianity was once said to be in search of a metaphysic (Whitehead) and that sounds very right-headed to me, still. Why should we join the rush to declare our position and specify our ontological claims just because everyone else is busy committing category errors, conflating their methods and systems? When has the Kerygma ever competed with positivistic and philosophic, descriptive and normative, methodologies? Do our theological anthropologies require the successful resolution of initial, boundary and limit conditions of the universe or multiverse, or even a decision in favor of one philosophy of mind or another --- eliminativist, epiphenomenalist, nonreductive physicalist, emergent monist or even a radically Cartesian dualist account? Haven’t we always survived and thrived, even, with our phenomenological accounts and subjective and intersubjective experiences?

The final methodological descriptions of our cosmic origins and epistemic faculties, however they turn out, will not change the essential thrust of our interpretive stances, whether of an aesthetic teleology or a pneumatological theology. We know from our empirical observations that biosemiotic realities require both a minimalist formal and final causation in addition to efficient causation. We can affirm, methodologically, top-down and bottom-up causations? There can be no denying of the possibility of a Divine Matrix of interrelated causes and effects even as we prescind from any robust descriptions of either the causal joints or the divine prerogatives. Whatever one’s ontic account of our putative cosmic or epistemic boundaries, we haven’t yet an account of primal reality, herself. All competing interpretations, if methodologically faithful to prevailing positivistic and philosophic norms, at best, are equiplausible accounts that, ontologically, enjoy epistemic parity but certainly not the epistemic warrant we might otherwise properly ascribe to our various ontic disciplines. All competing interpretations should not pretend to have discovered the perfect root metaphor, the complete consistent system (Godel), or metaphysical Mecca. For gosh sakes, we haven’t yet reconciled gravity and quantum mechanics.

And this isn’t a capitulation to the notion that theology only rushes in to fill gaps left by the positivistic sciences. This isn’t to deny that some theologians once did such a thing, and many still do; rather, it is to recognize that, when they do, they are simply being bad scientists. And vice versa; so many scientists are awful philosophers and god-awful theologians.

However integrally related our methods and findings are, they still represent autonomous aspects of inquiry about distinctly different value-pursuits. Interpretations of primal reality, as equiplausible accounts of primal reality, while descriptive enterprises, theoretically, are essentially evaluative posits, practically speaking, precisely because their propositional elements have left us with Scottish verdicts and in search of other actionable norms, which, then necessarily, go beyond the inferential to the manifold and multiform other aspects of human value-realization.

The strategy we put forward for competing with other metaphysical accounts is not to compete; their questions are wrong. Thus it is that phenomenology remains both necessary and sufficient for doing theology, which ends up being a practical and not a speculative science, for the most part. To the extent, then, that epistemology models ontology, and our ontology is a phenomenology, which is to say vague, then our epistemology is going to be, quite simply, fallibilistic. Hereinabove, then, we described what we like to call a Peircean metatechnica, which does not ambition metaphysical specificity but does rely on, provisionally, some patterns one can discern phenomenologically in nature. While we think it is important to affirm metaphysical realism, in general, we do not think it is otherwise important to engage any particular and robust metaphysic, in particular.

Applications – philosophies of science, mind and religion; theologies of nature; formative spiritualities

LIFE’S VALUE PURSUITS

If we take life as a journey made up of individual steps, which we might consider to be value-pursuits, and we measure the distance we travel in terms of milestones, which we might consider to be value-realizations, then we might consider each complete movement to require, minimally, three separate motions, optimally four. Those motions would be 1) the descriptive motion, where we ask: Is that a fact? 2) the evaluative motion, where we ask: What's it to me? and 3) the normative motion – normative sciences per Peirce being the logical (symbolic), aesthetical and ethical – where we inquire: How do I best obtain

There is no value-realization movement that does not consist of these three integrally-related motions. We won't specify, here, how this differentiates us from other animals as Homo sapiens, but will note that these distinctly human motions and movements are the very essence of spirituality. And we may, through the vagaries of formation, deformation and reformation, be variously competent or incompetent, spiritually. Also, even if competent, we may be either consciously or unconsciously competent, which is where the fourth motion comes in, 4) the interpretive, which asks: How does all of this tie together?

This interpretive motion, coupled with our evaluative attitudes, comprise the very essence of religion, which may variously be institutionalized (organized) or not, which may even be theistic, nontheistic, atheistic or agnostic. Thus it is that many can say they are spiritual but not religious, or that they are religious but not "believers."

GROWTH, DEVELOPMENT & CONVERSION

A fulfilling spiritual journey thus requires our ongoing development and growth intellectually, affectively, morally and socially. Optimally, it will also be religious, which, as an interpretive and evaluative motion, necessarily entails much more than mere propositional assent, descriptively, but also the celebrations of the beauty we have encountered, evaluatively, the preservation of the goodness we have discovered, normatively, and the enjoyment of the community we have realized, unitively. [Piaget, Erikson, Kohlberg, Fowler and other developmental theorists have described such growth dynamics psychologically. Gelpi, building on Lonergan, describes them in terms of conversion, which leads to progressive human authenticity.]

There is much that humanity shares spiritually, and even religiously, of a nonpropositional nature. This allows us to endeavor together to celebrate the beauty, advance the goodness and enjoy the community we have already realized and can foster our engagement in ever more authentic dialogue that we might together construct a much more compelling metanarrative.

A MERTON-INSPIRED REFLECTION ON THE HUMAN JOURNEY

In Thomas Merton’s writings and recorded lectures, he generally describes our human journey in terms of humanization, socialization and transformation. Early on, formatively, we become less like little animals and more human. Primary school teachers report that parents turn in mixed results in this regard, speaking of the little animals that often occupy our primary schools. After some success with humanization, next we

are socialized in all sorts of ways by all sorts of institutions like marriage, religion, government and schools. Through socialization, we learn how to function in society and we get our needs met through mutual give and take. This is mostly a pragmatic dynamic governed by extrinsic reward systems. We think in terms, hopefully, of enlightened self-interest as we buy into such notions of truth, beauty, goodness and unity. At some point, we might attempt to describe their origins, which, minimalistically and reductionistically might be partly explained in terms of evolutionary adaptive significance and sociobiology. There are even more robust explanatory accounts that can be had from a cybersemiotic perspective (cf. Soren Brier). These existential orientations might also be explained as transcendental imperatives. This is about as far as much of humanity ever goes. And, to be sure, it is nevertheless a beauty and wonder to behold.

Sometimes, due to exceptionally good formation, but maybe most often through crisis, as Merton would say --- usually a crisis of continuity (death in all its forms) or of creativity (the need to matter or make a difference) --- some journey further, which is to say beyond mere humanization and socialization to transformation. Transformation has many descriptions, which vary from tradition to tradition, but its essence, in our view, is marked by the move beyond extrinsic reward systems to intrinsic reward systems, which is to recognize that some pursue truth, beauty, goodness and unity as ends in themselves, or, as we might say, as their own reward. By definition, one needs no apologetic or defense or explanation of such a path. And, it sometimes can make little sense to invite anyone to take such a path because there is no way to explain such a reward system to the uninitiated. For one thing, it may not be developmentally appropriate. Also, it can only be self-realized. At any rate, this type of approach is more often "caught" than taught.

Another hallmark of transformation is the gifting of a new interpretive lens and evaluative disposition, which views reality not just empirically, logically and practically but also relationally.

Merton often spoke of Bernardian love which progresses from 1) love of self for sake of self to 2) love of God for sake of self to 3) love of God for sake of God to 4) love of self for sake of God. Richard Rohr has often spoken of this same transformative dynamic by contrasting the dualistic mind, which is preoccupied with its practical and functional concerns using its problem-solving mindset, with the nondual approach, which is a loving gaze at reality, a trusting stance, a wholly different consciousness. Hans Kung describes a

justified fundamental trust in uncertain reality. What seems to be equally compelling to many people, if I have properly interpreted their religious naturalist stance is this transformative dynamic, which progresses from 1) love of self for sake of self to 2) love of cosmos for sake of self to 3) love of cosmos for sake of cosmos to 4) love of self for sake of cosmos, where the cosmos is broadly conceived to include us all in ineffable solidarity with depthful compassion.

TRANSFORMATIONAL DYNAMICS

Most of the great traditions very much affirm what we would call the erotic aspect of our relationship to reality, or, in other words, the "what's in it for me" dynamic. This is a good thing and quite natural. This eros is, in fact, both necessary and sufficient, spiritually and religiously, for all reality really requires of us, at bottom, is an enlightened self-interest. This is, in fact, the exoteric aspect of most traditions. The cessation of suffering in Buddhism would be such an example. The mystics of all traditions, however, also give witness to a more esoteric aspect, which is the agapic dynamic, which is the realization of the superabundance to be found in the intrinsically rewarding parts of our journey. This goes beyond doctrines and metaphysics and belief systems, though not necessarily without them. Similarly, agape goes beyond eros although not without it. This goes beyond the empirical and rational and practical to the robustly relational, to the "just-because-ish-ness" of reality. This theme also resonates in the writings of many

humanists and very poetically so in the writings of our early American transcendentalists and universalists.

In the spirituality practiced by all of the great traditions, we do encounter many utterly transformed people and can reasonably attribute this to their esoteric teachings and mystical practices (and I broadly conceive mysticism to include both existential and theological varieties). And that is quite the essence. They otherwise differ, then, in the exoteric and socialization aspects of the human journey. And we do not want to say that getting those aspects as right as we possibly can is not important because optimal humanization and socialization and indoctrination can best foster transformation and better form people for transformation. Adjudicating which paths best lead to authenticity, following the aphorism that orthopraxis authenticates orthodoxy, is another task for another consideration. What we want to emphasize is that it is important to pay attention to the world's transformed people and to listen to their reflections on how it is their transformations may have come about because each such story contributes, along with many others' reflections regarding their paths, to part of the blueprint for the human journey. Also, it is great to recognize what we have in common with others even as we grapple with those aspects of the journey that are different. If all had transformation in common, we'd collectively figure out the norms of humanization and socialization much faster!

THE CONTEMPLATIVE STANCE

For those who cultivate a habitual contemplative approach, as commended by Merton and reinforced by Rohr and many romantic humanists, it can be difficult to discuss reality at a level that is one or two removes from experience. As one dwells habitually in a relationship to reality with an approach that goes beyond words and without prejudgment, with an approach that is robustly relational and not solely analytical, the ineffability that inheres in the process does not readily lend itself to a lingua franca of mysticism precisely because we are being led into an experience beyond words. We must rely, rather, on stories and myths and songs and koans and poetic narratives and metanarratives. And it seems to me that this presents special challenges for contemplative dialogue, whether interreligious or with coreligionists, or existentialist or humanist. How do we, then, otherwise profitably discourse with others about such experiences? Does contemplative experience lend itself to philosophical parsing and theological

anthropology? Yes, but with caveats.

In our view, any dialogical segue back into the world of words and analysis, in order to remain consonant with our contemplative approach, must simply and foremost proceed, similarly, without prejudgment and with a simple loving gaze. It also proceeds more profitably from an enhanced self-awareness of our own descriptive, evaluative, normative and interpretive stances as this awareness, in turn, heightens our awareness that others won't always share our descriptions and interpretations or our norms and values and

that they won't always use our concepts and categories when making various claims about their experiences.

Contemplative dialogue, then, perhaps more than many other types of dialogue, especially lends itself to idiosyncratic use of vocabulary and especially leads to situations where people can easily talk past one another. There is another type of dialogue where this happens often, metaphysical talk. And there is yet another, perhaps the most challenging of all and, as you guessed, it is the metaphysics of contemplative

experience.

Perhaps this is why so many contemplative critiques seem rather facile and also fraught with misunderstanding as people try to fit one another with hermeneutical straightjackets. The difficult spade work of philosophical disambiguation of categories and concepts is indispensable if the garden of dialogue is to bear good fruit. Even within faith traditions, which share vocabularies, dialogue is challenging because there is so much disagreement regarding what is essential vs accidental, core vs peripheral, regarding those traditions and their teachings and practices.

WHAT IS METAPHYSICS THAT WE SHOULD BE MINDFUL OF IT?

In our view, following Whitehead, Christianity indeed remains in search of a metaphysic, but so does all other human endeavor. So, we have a very open mind about "how" it is that all manner of things may, can, will and shall be well. And we have to be similarly open regarding just what “well” means. Exactly "how" this may be so is, for me, a positivist or descriptive endeavor (e.g. scientific, falsifiable), which articulates its claims with categories and concepts that are, in a word, theoretic, in other words, scientific or positivist.

Those claims and concepts and categories are negotiated by those in humanity who participate in our fallible but earnest community of inquiry. As previously set forth, many claims and concepts and categories are still-in-negotiation (heuristic) in this community of inquiry that we call humankind. Humanity, as a community of value-realizers, also engages in interpretive and evaluative endeavors, staking various claims regarding whether or not --- "that" --- all manner of things may, can, will and shall be well and articulating them with categories and concepts that are religious or ideological and, generally, not negotiated (dogmatic).

Human spirituality more fully comes into play as a philosophic or normative endeavor, which might be thought of in terms of "best practices" that serve to mediate between our descriptive-positivist and interpretive endeavors to effect our evaluative goals in all types of human value-realizations. Ultimately, what is "best" is not negotiable; it is, then, in a word, semiotic, making meaning and intelligibility possible, in the first place, like various "first" principles; it simply is what it is, although discovering it is somewhat problematical.

The normative, then, mediates between the descriptive and interpretive to effect the evaluative. Or, we could say that the philosophic mediates between the positivist and ideological-theological to effect human value-realizations.

The practical upshot of this hermeneutic is that our interpretive and evaluative stances make some claims on our normative approaches, which, in turn, will certainly bolster our descriptive endeavors through enhanced modeling power of reality without, at the same time, making any specific descriptive or positivist claims. These various stances, approaches and endeavors are integrally related, intellectually, but not strictly related, logically, which is to recognize that human value-realizations, such as knowledge, for

example, are not merely formally derived or driven by strict computational algorithms, instead being open-ended or plastic and dynamic. What we are suggesting is that metaphysics is mostly a descriptive and positivist endeavor and that we do not look to religious or existential mystical traditions for direct metaphysical insights. Our religious and ideological traditions exert their influence over positivist endeavors, instead, indirectly, through their shaping of our normative or philosophic outlooks, thereby, hopefully, enhancing our modeling power of reality.

All of this is to say, then, that, for example, we do not look to any religion or ideology to determine the nature of human consciousness, to determine whether or not what we call the human soul is intrinsically immortal, to determine whether or not the universe is eternal, or how to resolve the many paradoxes that result from the classical tensions between essentialism and nominalism, substance and process approaches, or all manner of dual and nondual claims, categories and concepts. We do affirm metaphysics as a viable enterprise and say let a thousand metaphysical blossoms bloom, but let us judge them empirically, rationally and practically in the crucible of human experience by how well they foster Lonergan's conversions.

Metaphysics, at this stage of humankind's journey, in our view, remains a great way to "probe" reality but not a reliable way to "prove" reality. Our deontological claims, then, should be as modest as our ontologies are tentative. However, they have been anything but modest as the general tendency among the great traditions, religious and ideological, has been, as we see it, to attempt to "prove too much." Perhaps we reflexively recoil from Mystery and thus try to banish the vague by anxiously pursuing the specific? There

is a certain irony in that it is in our encounter with the concrete and particular that we most encounter the vague and mysterious, in the depth dimension of reality and other persons, while the abstract and conceptual only provides a "seeming" escape into the clear and certain. Still, we would not deny anyone's experiences or even their own interpretation of those experiences even as we think we might properly question how much normative impetus such interpretations could and/or should exert for others in the

broader community of human value-realizers.

Think of human value-realization in terms of a recursive feedback loop such that the normative mediates between the descriptive and interpretive to effect the evaluative. Each of these human value-realizations presupposes the others. This is not a strictly truth-conducive algorithm (or strong type of inference) but a fallible process that is also, maybe even moreso, truth-indicative (a much weaker form of inference). We cannot even give a complete theoretic account of how knowledge works but can attest, pragmatically, that it indeed works, slowly and falteringly but inexorably advancing such human value-realizations as truth, beauty, goodness and unity. The categories, concepts and claims associated with each aspect of this feedback loop are communicated, unavoidably, by a mixture of dogmatic, heuristic, theoretic and semiotic terms, which we have described, respectively, as non-negotiated, still-in-negotiation, negotiated and nonnegotiable vis or vis this or that community of inquiry or value-realizers.

Even if we concede our inability to reason from the given to the normative (which I do not, following Adler), we caricaturize human reasoning if we describe it strictly in terms of formal argumentation or logic.

This is all just to recognize that the hermeneutical, philosophic, positivist hierarchy is not wholly a one-way street and that, while our distinctly different value-commitments for our different human endeavors do involve autonomous methodologies, no value-realization, in and of itself, is otherwise fully autonomous but results from the fruits of this integrally-related feedback loop. They are, rather, indispensable separate motions required for any movement (as previously explicated).

NONFOUNDATIONAL EPISTEMOLOGY AND NORMATIVITY

There is often resistance to nonfoundational approaches because, apparently, many have a difficult time imagining how a compelling metaethic could be grounded by anything other than the epistemological building blocks of a classic foundationalism with its self-evident, a priori and apodictic access to transcendentals and absolutes. All other approaches seem to capitulate, in their view, to a radically deconstructive postmodernism with its corrupting relativistic outlook and nihilistic bent. To be moral, however, one needn’t resolve the debates between opposing epistemological stances and come down,

finally, on the side of correspondence, coherence, foundherentism, pragmatism or any other theory of truth or justification. However it is finally determined that we are grounded and justified, there can be no denying that, due to our radical finitude and invincible fallibility, our access to putative absolutes is highly problematical.

Resultantly, our approach to truth is a lot more like the strenuous climbing of an epistemic rope, which gains its strength from the intertwining of separate strands --- descriptive, evaluative, normative and interpretive ---, which makes for an ecological rationality that is inescapably fallible but slowly and inexorably progressive as each successive series of alternating hand, arm and leg value-pursuit motions effects a value-realization hoist, though not without the occasional slip or ropeburn. It is a lot less like the stacking of epistemic building blocks on a foundation of absolutes, always in jeopardy of crumbling should a bad brick be placed in the wall or, worse, should our site be discovered on shifting sands.

To whichever realism we subscribe, it must be self-critical. It must also respond to critiques, which need not come from competing systems to be effective, for one cannot credibly claim that the postmodern critique was of no moment. At the same time, deconstructionism, which cannot coherently hold itself out as a system, was nothing but an epistemic thief who’s come in a philosophical backdoor, co-opting another’s

tautology and turning its inconsistent concepts, categories and claims on itself like a knife found in a dwelling and placed to the occupant’s throat. This thief did not slay deontology but, admittedly, weakened it.

Whatever metanarrative one employs, it would necessarily contain within it, in the interest of descriptive accuracy, the manifold and multiform shared values that emerge from our somewhat universal human condition. To the extent our evaluative posits are attributes of a universal human condition, then, even though they may be relative, which one needn’t concede, still, they would avoid much of the difficulty normally associated with such relativity by virtue of being remarkably consistent, despite their relativity.

These posits thus would remain relative from a theoretic perspective but not so much so from a pragmatic perspective. When you think about it, this, and not some foundational, authoritative deontology, accounts for the resonance and shared respect we do enjoy for such as the UN Declaration on Human Rights, the US Constitution, the Declaration of Independence and such. Is it not evident that all of humankind does not share the same metaphysical conceptions, that all foundationalists don't appeal to the same foundations, and that all authoritarians don't point to the same authorities?

We need to be mindful of the proportional mix of dogmatic, heuristic, theoretic and semiotic terms that are employed in any given metaphysical affirmation. It is not enough, I maintain, to issue forth with metaphysical claims that do not conflict with positivist data; rather, in our formulations and affirmations, we must keep as favorable a ratio as possible of semiotic and theoretic terms to heuristic and dogmatic terms; thus we can better avoid idle tautologies (rationalisms) that bear little resemblance and have little relevance to people's daily lives and lived experiences.

Having faith, for me, has meant placing my trust, whether in this reality or that, or in Reality writ large, and then willingly living out the consequences of this or that trust relationship. I describe my faith life, then, in terms that apply to relationships, like fidelity, loyalty, love, trust and not so much in terms that describe my stance toward various propositions or, in other words,  that involve any particular fixation of belief. My faith does not ignore the empirical and logical, for that would be unfaithful, a betrayal of my trust relationship with Reality. My faith goes beyond the empirical and logical, super-reasonably you might say, to the robustly practical and relational, acting as an interpretive lens through which I evaluate descriptive and normative realities. Faith defines what I care about and shapes my responses to Reality with such a trust in and fidelity to and love of Reality as will generally allow for a steadfastness of those responses even in the face of a seeming rejection of me and my cares by Reality. Through faith I choose to relate to Reality like any other beloved of mine, going way beyond (but certainly not without) mere propositional knowledge of who or what I care about to a robustly relational dynamic marked by such a faith, hope and love as requires no justifications and makes no apologies. I can no more tell you why I love and trust Reality than I can tell you why I love my spouse and children, but I'd have to imagine that having known such love and beauty I have been rendered forever unable to fix my gaze, or place my trust, elsewhere.

Philosophically, in this Peircean metatechnica, the classical approaches (rational or internally coherent) mediate between the evidential approaches (empirical or externally congruent) and existential approaches (relational or subjective) to effect human value-realizations.

Theologically, in this Radical Orthodoxy, the rational (Catholic, BOTH Roman & Anglican) or presuppositional (reformed, Calvinist) mediates between the evidential (evangelical, Arminian) and existential (fideist, Lutheran, neoevanaglical) to effect human value-realizations.

For an explication of these philosophical correlations with these theological categories, see Faith Has Its Reasons by Kenneth D. Boa and Robert M. Bowman, Jr. http://www.bible.org/series.php?series_id=190 wherein John Frame’s presuppositional perspectivalism inchoately articulates, in our view, our own nonfoundational perspectivalism). The reformed approach cannot truly aspire to an epistemology per se because philosophy is an autonomous methodology and it is a category error to call it “Christian.” Frame’s reformed epistemology, however, might be well situated in our own epistemological architectonic, resonating, as it explicitly does, with our own robustly integral approach, only departing from our essentially philosophical treatment by uncritically substituting presuppositional scriptural norms in place of our own Peircean normative sciences of logic, aesthetics and ethics. Frame’s move is thus theological and, ergo, philosophically illicit, although our Peircean hermeneutic precisely takes one to the threshold of the abduction of the Ens Necessarium, thus leading into our pansemioentheist theology of nature, which values the reformed epistemology as a theology.

Sure, there are those who fideistically conflate existential outlooks with evidential methodologies, who are rightfully charged with placing God in gaps, but there is no discernable increase in philosophical rigor by those who commit the inverse category error, scientistically suggesting that we must all necessarily conflate our descriptive and normative methods with our interpretive systems and then rush with them to metaphysical closure as philosophical naturalists.

With Emerson, we believe that God arrives when the half-gods depart, and thus offer a re-enchanted (through and through) worldview over against any notion that either modernism’s incessant chant of secularistic God of the gaps pejoratives, or postmodernism’s nihilistic sensibilities, have ushered in either a philosophical naturalism, or an insidious relativism, as the default paradigm for primal reality, where our God of the ... gasp! still reigns.

We question the classical patterns of dichotomous thinking, or at least suggest an overworking of same, as they necessarily divide reality into such categories as natural or supernatural, chance or necessity, existential or propositional, subjective or objective, reason or revelation, material or spiritual, nature or grace, acquired or infused, rationalist or empiricist or existentialist, evidentialist or fideist, secular or sacred, fact or value, and so on. We must discern which of these dyads are mere phenomenal distinctions and which are indeed ontological dichotomies without a default bias to either dualistic or nondualistic accounts. Instead, we affirm a holistic and integrative approach that, over against any sterile metaphysical compartmentalizations or epistemic absolutisms, and engaged by a robustly pneumatological imagination, sees creation thoroughly permeated by and wholly shot-through with the glory and splendor of our indwelling God-with-us. Our world is thus wholly, wholly holy (yes, theodicies notwithstanding).

If, with Lonergan (and Gelpi), we believe that orthopraxis authenticates orthodoxy, then our political, economic, cultural and social metrics of success will be gauged in terms of intellectual, affective, moral, sociopolitical and religious development of our citizens, a much more holistic and expansive set of goals than can otherwise be measured by stock, bond and commodity indices, labor statistics, gross domestic products, monetary and fiscal measures, median incomes, cost and price indices and other measures of so-called wealth. For, if wealth is not that which we possess but that which possesses us (Disraeli?), we may be otherwise seriously impoverished.

As contemplation attains to politics, we hope to expand later on how, in our view, Habermas improves on Rawls, how Ratzinger and Murray improve on Habermas, how Curran improves on Ratzinger and so on. For now, we must only emphasize that the political will only efficaciously mediate between the economic and the cultural to effect the social if it originates from an authentically contemplative stance, which is to suggest that, in the public square, we should not ever secularistically bracket our [religious] perspectives but should strive, rather, to semiotically translate them into whatever lingua franca is most accessible in this or that dialogical arena, which is to say with a suitably inculturated theology, which is what we aspire to offer to the American public as grounded in a Peircean-inspired nonfoundational epistemology. Most importantly, though, it is through our vibrant communities of creed, cult and code, that such conversion will be most efficaciously effected and not through state power or market forces. Human creativity and flourishing are so much more than can be gauged by marketplace metrics and are inextricably intertwined with the Holy Spirit, the source of all creative help and all helpful creativity. May we thus engage the Spirit both consciously and competently!

AFTERWARD --- NORMATIVE IMPLICATIONS:

May namaste, then, become more than a greeting but a way of life, as we look always and everywhere and in everyone for the pneumatological realities we profess herein. May our inter-religious stance be more irenic as we acknowledge the Spirit in one another with true reverence, in authentic solidarity and utmost compassion. A most fundamental aspect of the unqualified affirmation of human dignity would seem to be our nurturance of the attitude that all other humans come bearing an irreplaceable gift for us, that we are to maintain a stance of receptivity toward them, open to receive what it is they offer us through, with and in the Spirit. Whether the Magi were occidental or oriental, Jesus was receptive. When John offered baptism, Jesus was receptive. When Mary anointed his feet, Jesus was receptive. When invited to dine with tax collectors and prostitutes, Jesus was receptive. A critical gaze not first turned on oneself and one’s ways of looking at reality will have very little efficacy when it is otherwise habitually and arrogantly turned first on others. All of this is to observe that, beyond whatever it is that we offer to the world as our unique gift, rather than always approaching our sisters and brothers as fix-it-upper projects in need of our counsel and ministry, sometimes the Spirit may be inviting us to listen, observe and learn from them in a posture of authentic humility and from a stance of genuine affirmation of their infinite value and unique giftedness. While our encounters of the Spirit may be manifold and varied from one phenomenal experience to the next, especially when situated in one major tradition versus another, we may be saying more than we know if we attempt to describe such experiences with more ontological specificity than can be reasonably claimed metaphysically or theologically, suggesting, for example, that such experiences necessarily differ in either origin or degree even if they otherwise differ, as might be expected, in other cognitive, affective, moral, social or religious aspects.

More than semantics is at stake, here. We are not merely saying the same thing using different words when we draw such distinctions as between nature and grace, natural and supernatural, existential and theological, immanent and transcendent; such explicit denotations also have strong connotative implications that might betray attitudes of epistemic hubris, pneumatological exclusivity or religious hegemony, which are clearly unwarranted once we understand that our faith outlooks are effectively evaluative. I say this because, in my view, our belief systems are otherwise, at best, normatively justified existentially after essentially attaining, minimally, an epistemic parity with other hermeneutics vis a vis our best evidential, rational and presuppositional approaches. While there are rubrics for discernment of where the Spirit is active and where humans are cooperative, they do not lend themselves to facile and cursory a priori assessments, neither by an academic theology with its rationalistic categorizing nor by a popular fideistic piety with its supernaturalistic religiosity, predispositions that tend to divide and not unite, to arrogate and not serve, with their vain comparisons and spiritual pretensions.

Indeed, we have been admonished not to be seduced by any false irenicism, insidious indifferentism or facile syncretism. And this seems fair enough --- to the extent that we are thereby trying to affirm the role of epistemic virtue in our approach to fides et ratio, in general. However, to the extent one might otherwise be suggesting that any given faith approach, in particular, is necessarily privileged and that other approaches do not enjoy epistemic parity (by virtue of their own normative justifications) vis a vis one's own given approach,  that would be too strong a position to defend, philosophically?

While it would be illicit to a priori claim that primal reality is in-principle knowable (scientism) or unknowable (agnosticism), still, it is clearly too early on humankind's journey to imagine we have successfully described or explained primal reality. Clearly, we do not know where it is on our knowledge journeys that we will be methodologically thwarted or otherwise ontologically occulted, although the philosophical naturalists rush to closure with the former conclusion and urge their god of the gaps pejoratives on the fideistic mysterians, who hold out for the latter position, not altogether certain where that final gap will irreducibly present itself. Even given Godelian constraints on completeness and consistency, there is no a priori reason to believe that we may not one day be able to see the truths of the axioms we will otherwise be unable to prove.

And those aspects of reality that we are unable to successfully describe and explain, we may very well be able to successfully refer to and model. I suppose that all of this is to suggest that we can aspire to the rudiments of an onto-theology, modestly extrapolating a phenomenological pneumatology from our abduction of the Ens Necessarium as it emerges from our nonfoundational perspectivalism. This move doesn't require any robustly metaphysical commitments such as to necessarian or regularistic perspectives on natural laws, which is also to say that it does not require any final epistemic determinacy or ontological specificity but can abide with the same semantical vagueness employed by the early Church Fathers, Pseudo-Dionysius, the Neoplatonists and the Medievals like Scotus.

This is to say, then, that Christianity, properly conceived, still remains in search of a metaphysic even if, epistemologically, it commits to metaphysical realism. Even the Peircean Thirdness, with its minding of matter and mattering of mind, when combined with other emergentist accounts, can be appropriated as but a fallibilistic exploratory epistemological heuristic and not a metaphysical commitment to any realist, idealist, monist or dualist categories, for example. It does not seem like this minimalist pneumatology need offend anyone's epistemic sensibilities or theological imaginations. It does seem like it could pave the way to a much more irenic engagement in interreligious dialogue. For those of us whose theological anthropologies were a tad too optimistic vis a vis our transcendental thomistic perspectives and felt the Kantian foundations of same crumbling beneath our Gospel-ready shoes, this pneumatological hermeneutic can reinstill an optimism even if a more chastised and modest optimism. For those who affirmed a Perennial Philosophy or even a mystical core of organized religions, our approach can situate same philosophically. To the extent we affirm a mystical core, why should our approaches not be a lot more irenic? why could we not affirm some modicum of syncretistic sensibility? Perhaps we could legitimately engage others' perspectives less so as a foil (to understand them better while deepening our own self-understanding) but more so with the aim of looking to them for an assist? And this includes not just their theological imaginations but also their manifold and varied philosophical ruminations, all which (presumptively)  glimpse some aspects of reality as led by the Spirit according to the mode of the receivers vis a vis different stages of Lonerganian conversions of individuals and their societies, cultures and institutions.

Most of all, I suppose this is an invitation to come on a philosophical journey that involves less hubris but not too much humility, that engages others looking for an assist and not a foil, that does not try to prove too much, that does not immodestly claim excessive normative impetus for (what can only be) tentatively held ontological conclusions, that emphasizes what we have in common while respecting why it is we differ, that doesn't enforce our own language and categories on others' unique experiences, that doesn't smack of pneumatological exclusivity, that doesn't claim normative superiority and reinforce theological one-upmanship on other hermeneutics that truly enjoy epistemic parity with our own having been, in the final analysis, "chosen" on what are - all things being equal after other more basic empirical (evidential) and normative (rational & practical) justifications - essentially evaluative (existential) "grounds."

All this considered, then, one might see very little legitimacy in any competing claims for denominational superiority within Christianity or even between the major traditions, for example, especially once considering that there are no a priori grounds for making such claims and that any a posteriori evidence would be of a sociologic nature and nothing our sciences could, presently, successfully adjudicate given the complex social and institutional realities in play (and nothing our denominations, as perennially pilgrim churches, would want to submit to given their often pervasively dysfunctional status, for example, vis a vis their successful institutionalization of Lonergan’s conversions). I guess this is to also suggest that, just because one is not religiously jingoistic does not mean she is also, then, an indifferentist.

The essential teachings of Christianity certainly rely on a metaphysical realism, which is an epistemological outlook, but do not require the types of ontological specificities or metaphysical schools as many would seem to explicitly suggest or implicitly imply. It is enough to speak, phenomenologically, of our general phenomenal experiences and expectations when, for example, discoursing about deontological morality or contemplative spirituality, for the living of a good moral life and the growing of a good spiritual life do not require robustly metaphysical accounts regarding all manner of putative ontological continuities and discontinuities. At this stage of humankind’s journey, we are saying more than we can presently know if we insist on one metaphysical account or another in our interreligious dialogue or our moral deliberations. Such ontological claims are highly speculative and our derived de-ontological claims, regarding such as how we should behave or even pray, for example, should, therefore, be commensurately tentative. Any specific teachings and traditions heavily invested in such claims, specifying, for example, all sorts of dual versus nondual realities, would necessarily be accidentals of the faith, not essentials.

Clearly, some aspects of our creaturely reality, even if presently unknown, would be ontologically continuous with the Creator and univocally predicable of both creatures and Creator, otherwise questions would be left begging regarding how one reality could efficaciously effect another reality if related only by the weakest of analogies, i.e. metaphor? The East has something to say about this insight and how it leads to authentic solidarity and compassion. Clearly, the intersubjective aspect of our relationships between one another and our Creator affirm an aspect that is ontologically discontinuous? Clearly, we are then, in the broadest of phenomenological terms, quasi-autonomous and suspended in something like Bracken’s divine matrix of interrelated causes and effects, participating in a reality something like the Neo-Platonist conceptions of participation, perhaps unfolding in accord with Haught’s aesthetic teleology as per Hartshorne’s notions of nonstrict identity. The West has something to say about this insight and how it leads to authentic solidarity and compassion. It is silly to argue about which insight is the most profound or important. Which realization comes first or last likely has more to do with whether one was raised with Eastern or Western sensibilities and ways of engaging reality and much less to do with which insight is the loftiest, whether spiritually, theologically or epistemically. (And such arguments DO take place!)

One practical upshot of this, below, is that I am somewhat reticent when it comes to a priori granting many distinctions full status as ontological dichotomies, while not at all denying that such distinctions might otherwise spring, quite authentically, from our collective phenomenal experiences. This is not to say that I a priori affirm or deny this or that dichotomy, dualism or nondualism; I'm only suggesting that obtaining such ontological specificity is highly problematical.

More plainly, we are hesitant in applying such labels as natural and supernatural, secular and sacred, profane and holy, acquired and infused, material and spiritual, evidentialist or fideist,  existential or propositional, objective or subjective, nature or grace, chance or necessity, reason or revelation, and so on. Phenomenally, of course, we simply must recognize the undeniable differences in the degrees of our realization of various relationships and values even as we prescind, ontologically, from any facile ascriptions of differences in origins vis a vis the above-listed distinctions and/or dichotomies. This applies, for example, to our relationship to the Holy Spirit. If something is life-giving and relationship-enhancing and fosters intellectual, affective, moral, social and religious growth, my hermeneutical presupposition attributes same to a pneumatological dynamic. This is a fallibilistic default bias, an optimistic theological anthropology, always open to the possibility of being wrong. 

In my search for theological norms, I am led (way) beyond the magisterial, traditionalistic or authoritative teachings of Rome to a much broader normative sensibility that resonates, nonetheless, with a radical orthodoxy. Presently, my heart is with Rome (my native religion) but my head is with Canterbury. Due to my earlier immersion in the early Fathers, Pseudo-Dionysius, the neoplatonists and medieval Franciscans (Francis, Bonaventure, Scotus) and then Merton and Rohr, my musings were discovered by others who labeled me an accidental peircean. As I further explore my theological sensibilities, it appears I am also, accidentally, radically orthodox.

None of my thoughts seem to me to be novel, in the least, although my syntheses might be novel and a tad idosyncratic because, as an autodidact, I was not able to fully follow others' thoughts on their own terms but had a tendency to appropriate them and modify them to suit my own philosophical and theological agenda. I am pleased to have them engaged because they guide my life of worship, which is my life in community with humankind and the cosmos, and I value accountability to this community, whom I love with all my being.

I hope this becomes a genuine assist to somewhat of a movement from 1) an ecclesiocentric exclusivism to 2) a Christological inclusivism to 3) a pneumatological inclusivism that is Christologically normed. The pneumatological inclusivism recognizes that the Spirit active in creation has gifted humankind with all that is necessary and sufficient to live a life of abundance. The 4) Christological norming, then, explicitly recognizes the otherwise implicit soteriological efficacies and incarnational realities that, when progressively appropriated into an ever more consciously competent awareness of said realities, leads the community, proleptically and eschatologically, into a life of superabundance (vis a vis value-realizations). 5) Any ecclesiocentric norming would then aspire to the most nearly perfect a) articulation of such truth through creed or dogma, b) celebration of such beauty thru cult or ritual, c) preservation of goodness through code and d) enjoyment of fellowship through communion, over against any facile syncretisms, insidious indifferentisms or false irenicisms. Of course, the Christological and ecclesiocentric elements can be bracketed for authentic dialogue, where there is so much that can be done on the pneumatological level.

The epistemological aspect of this project has been abstracted into one document, which describes the essence of this epistemological architectonic as elucidated within a practical framework of formative spirituality. See document #1: Tetradic Fugues.doc

The above document was mostly abstracted from document #2, which is

jss_desideratum_12feb2009.doc , which further elucidates this exploratory heuristic as it might be applied, also, to philosophies of science, mind and religion, and a theology of nature.

These two documents were largely abstracted from document #3, pansemioentheism.pdf , which is an assortment of notes, references and musings pertaining to this ongoing project, which describes a putative pansemioentheism, a pneumatological theology of nature. It provides a very detailed glimpse into this hermeneutic as it grew out of the autodidactic studies and meditations of a charismatic Franciscan contemplative spirituality.