The American Context of Ministry: An Exploration with Daniel W. Hardy

Abstract

One of Anglican theologian Daniel W. Hardys continual occupations was with God's ways with world, and particularly with human creature in God. In order to do justice to this topic, he adopted a very distinct style of writing and speaking. He would at times develop neologisms, such as sociopoiesis; other times he would shape meaning of a term through innovative (some might say idiosyncratic) use, such as or sociality. His motivation for this, in part, was wanting to sidestep more common technical terms in order to avoid narrowing realities of God and world to one or another ready-made reduction, whether theological or philosophical: tidy playing fields that he found many content to play within, but much too small, he thought, to be confused with real.He also worked to conceive of God and God's ways with world visually as well as conceptually. Near end of his life, inspired by analogous efforts by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, he worked to diagram what he termed the of attraction.* 1 This is an attempt to draw together God's ways with world in a large-scale, comprehensive manner.The energetics of was his way of describing what he saw as God's working within creation to create sociality, a dynamism he termed sociopoiesis. Hardy observed that process of being made into social groupings of various sorts is intrinsic to creation when functioning as it ought. This happens spontaneously and healthfully: it is flourishing of human creation. This sociopoiesis is itself ongoing act of God in and for creation, and more specifically, within civilization (including family, government, and other overlapping social groupings).But sociopoiesis, creation and flourishing of sociality, is not simply for sake of creation but rather is means by which creation is attracted to God. Being attracted to God, humans fulfil their God-given capacity for relation with God and with others.2 This capacity is a part of being creatures; it is godwardness of all creatures. Drawing on Coleridge's use of term, Hardy called this process of attraction abduction, a process of being drawn to divine light and thus closer to all things.3And yet there was a manifest and darker possibility, too. Creatures are created to move toward God, yet at least human creatures have also capacity to resist this towardness. This comes in several different manners, which have a converging form: Hardy talked about it in terms of pathology-obsessiveness-and also self-reference or self-absorption: inertia of self-attraction.4 Not to be attracted to God is to resist God's acting and directionality of creation.5 He summarized it in Augustinian phrase, of humanity being curved in on itself.He further explained that being created is a matter of being dispersed; he often also talked about of creation in relation to infinitely intense identity of Lord. Although at points he referred to extensity as a neutral or simply given condition of creation, there are points where dispersion and extensity seem to be conditions to be overcome in abductive attraction of creatures to God. Dispersion and extensity constitute a counter to God, being distracted by multiplicity of things and failing to engage their depths.6And yet there is within creation not merely its directionality, but its life, both dynamism of sociopoiesis and abductive attraction to God, which I would suggest might be appropriated as work of Holy Spirit. This work can be resisted and, at points, even thwarted, but this does not close down possibility of Spirit continuing to work.A superficial reading of Hardy's work here might prompt one to worry about a loss of self. If being turned toward oneself is a violation of elemental directedness of creatures, and if route to healing is through attraction of God, an attraction which turns creatures away from self-engagement and toward God and created other, then it might sound as if self disappears. …