This Christmas finds me reflecting on the nativity of Jesus with some concepts typically not associated with Christian theology, or at least the kinds most commonly preached.* There is a pop rendering of Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle holding that observation of an event changes the nature of the event itself--that by involving ourselves in something, we (not as generic "humans" but as uniquely situated beings with a distinct perspective on and relation to the event) partly influence what it is. Quantum physicists dismiss that as an oversimplificaton, though modern epistomologists have made intriguing arguments to that effect, and the notion also makes sense on an intuitive level. From whatever source, the idea that one's relation to something helps to contitute that thing (and vice-versa) is out there, circulating.
Well. Suppose, for arguments sake, that there is something roughly corresponding to what we call "God." That there is some pervasive presence we could call the heart, or the spirit of the universe. What if this presence could take some uniquely situated form, with particular, concrete relations to some time and place, existing not everywhere but somewhere. What change would that make in the world where this incarnation occured? And what change would this encounter work in that spirit? What if that incarnation was reenacted by communities of people who fashioned a way of living inspired by that initial "situation" of the divine?
Given the often sorry state of our world, I think caution is in order if one tries to delineate any sweeping change for good that came of that nativity in Bethlehem or the life that followed it. But these creative interactions are always complicated things, and the propostions offered by the one celebrated today are, I think, quite interesting nonetheless.
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*Process theology inspired by A.N Whitehead includes similar concepts, though I'm working here with a more traditional notion of God. The Buddhist notion of "Interdepent Origination" partially parallels what I'm suggesting here as well.
Religion; Christmas
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