Afternoon tea

I had the pleasure this afternoon of having tea with Grammy Alice. I am still a bit in awe of how much I enjoyed it. It was not a presumptuous "I will pretend this is meaningful and fun," but I found that I was talking to her about things very close to my heart and she was not only interested but we exchanged thoughts. This was only surprising because of the topics. One could of course exchange thoughts about tea, or weather, or cats. But how many can sit down dialog about God, death, life, injustice, questions... and other odd topics like talking to flowers.

It has reiterated the question constantly in me "What is God?" She is quite determined to walk again, even dance. I said I would love to see her. I meant it. She refuses to get an operation on her hip because she is terrified of surgery, but she believes that the answer is within her and lays in her mind. Had I not understood a bit about the social construction of reality I would not really have been serious when she proposed that she would dance. But I think, I suspect, I believe?, I hope... that she is right. If our interpretations, paradigms and actions have the power to determine what is real, it is perfectly understandable that she would heal. I think back to Jesus who would tell people to walk, or who spoke of mountains moving with a small bit of faith. Taking him at his authoritative word, they would pick up their mat and dance. The sea would adhere to the reality Christ proclaimed.

My question, "what is God?" runs around this concept. What. Essence, quality, being. Often thought of as a "person." Schaeffer locates personhood in feeling, thought and action. I am not convinced that these are the deepest seat. Who can say what is, but I wonder if it is not found somewhat in the meaning making faculty that humans have within their own being. Creativity. Meaning as understood as a social construction then fits with the traditional doctrine of the Trinity. God in dialog. The ultimate transcendent inter subjective objectivity. Add to that the incarnation and the creation of humans in God's likeness and there is the riddle of nature/nurture and the illusive boundaries between God and humans. Then throw in the fall, and arrive at a knot more confusing that any in the book of Kells.

What then is G-o-d? Is it more than the inherent mind's power and interpretation, meaning making? Is it the first cause that socialized the first human and they have left a decent of patterns of behavior and thought? Is it more than something intimate, even beyond ourselves and out creation? but so intimate that it is also the air, thoughts, nature--all created matter, including our own thoughts? Is God a human construction? Or can God be both human construction as well as fully outside of us, whole in person? Is this incarnation? Is the self in fact fully created and fully inherent?