Vulnerability, Resilience, and Resistance: A Theology of Divine Love 公开
Gandolfo, Elizabeth O'Donnell (2013)
Abstract
This dissertation is a constructive theological project that lays out structures of the human condition that dispose humanity to vulnerability, suffering, and redemption. In this sense it participates in the methods of both fundamental and liberation theologies. I argue that the human condition is essentially vulnerable; that there is a dynamic, causal relationship between vulnerability, anxiety, and violence; and that divine love offers human beings existential and practical resources for redemption, experienced as resilience and resistance.
The project is divided into two parts. The first half of the dissertation is an analysis of human vulnerability and its relationship with anxiety, egocentrism, privilege, and violence. Here I posit that the fundamental dimensions of human life that make created existence and happiness possible also threaten the human telos by exposing us to pain and suffering. The anxiety surrounding suffering often causes human beings to collectively mismanage vulnerability in systems of privilege, which exacerbates the problem of vulnerability and leads to greater anxiety and violence. This analysis of the human condition lays the foundation for the theological heart of the dissertation, in which I argue that divine love responds to vulnerability by empowering human beings with resources needed for resilience in the face of harm and resistance to violence and oppression. This redemptive power of divine love has a Trinitarian structure to it, offering 1) the invulnerable power of preservative love, 2) the power-in-vulnerability of solidarity with the human condition, and 3) empowerment for creative transformation in the Spirit of holy longing for abundant life. The project concludes with an analysis of three practices that have the potential to nurture the growth of divine love in Christians, and human beings in general: dangerous memory of suffering, contemplative kenosis, and solidarity.
Throughout the dissertation, my argument is informed by women's diverse and multi-faceted experiences of maternity and natality. I place maternal narratives and practices in mutually critical conversation with Scripture, historical theology, feminist theology, philosophy, and ethics. Drawing on these sources, my constructive proposal suggests that vulnerability is both the site of our deepest wounds and the condition for the possibility of experiencing redemption.
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Introduction ……………………………………………………………..……………… 1
Vulnerability: The Beginning of an Alternative Theological Framework 3
Theological Method 8
Sources 8
Methodological Dangers 9
Epistemological Issues 12
The Place of Practice 17
Chapter Outline 20
Chapter One: Maternity and Natality: Icons of Human Vulnerability …………… 26
Finite Embodiment: Vulnerability to Physical Harm 31
(Inter)dependence: Vulnerability to Relational Suffering 40
Material (Inter)dependency: Inevitable and Derivative 43
Psychological (Inter)dependency 48
Perishing: Vulnerability to the Pain of Passing Beauty 56
Beginning the Long Goodbye: Mundane Grief 58
Early Goodbyes and No Goodbyes at All: Traumatic Grief 62
Conflict and Ambiguity: Vulnerability to Failure 66
Conflicting Goods: Something's Got to Give 67
Ambiguous Goods: Lack of Control, Unintended Consequences,
and Impossible Choices 75
Conclusion: The Vulnerability of the Human Telos 82
Chapter Two: Motherhood, Anxiety, and Privilege: The Anthropological
Origins of Violation in Vulnerability……………………………………….... 88
Vulnerability and Anxiety 90
Egological Existence, Vulnerability, and Relational Anxiety 103
Egocentrism, Vulnerability, and Violence 108
Privilege: Socially Mismanaged Vulnerability 116
The Costs of Privilege: Suffering and Perpetration of Harm 125
The Price of Privilege for the Marginalized 127
The Price of Privilege for the Privileged 140
Conclusion: Theological Implications of the Dynamic of Vulnerability
and Violation 148
Chapter Three: The Trinitarian Dynamics of Divine Love: Theological
Assets for Resilience and Resistance …………………………………..…… 154
Do Not Be Afraid: The Invulnerability of Divine Love 158
Feminist Dis-ease with Divine Invulnerability 162
Delores Williams: ‘Nobody in the wide world to look to but God' 164
Julian of Norwich: ‘I protect you most truly' 170
Courage 175
And She Gave Birth: The Incarnation of Divine Power-in-Vulnerability 177
Incarnation: A Coincidence of Opposites 182
Contemporary Feminist Theology: Only a Vulnerable God
Can Help 187
The Natal Body of Christ: Recovering a Place for Nativity
in Christology 192
Peace 201
Making a Way Out of No Way: The Creative Transformation of Spirit 205
Rachel's Lament: The Tears of Holy Longing for Abundant Life 208
Tears of Renewal: Making a Way Out of No Way 212
Compassion 219
Conclusion: You Will Not Be Overcome 222
Chapter Four: To Suckle God with Exercises of Love: Practices of Resilience
and Resistance ………………………………………………………..……… 226
Two Maternal Narratives of Vulnerability, Resilience, and Resistance 228
Memory of Suffering: Naming Vulnerability and Violation 234
Contemplative Kenosis: Re-membering the Self 248
Solidarity: Re-membering Communities of Shared Vulnerability 259
Conclusion: Embracing the Human Condition 267
Conclusion: Contemplating Vulnerability ………………………………...………. 270
Bibliography ………………………………………………………………………… 279
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