How God acts: creation, redemption, and special divine action

Foreword / by William R. Stoeger

Introduction

Characteristics of the universe revealed by the sciences

A universe that evolves at all levels

A universe constituted by patterns of relationship

A universe where natural processes have their own integrity

A directional universe

The cost of evolution

Divine action in the Christ-event

Jesus' vision of divine action : the reign of God

Parables of divine action

Healing

The open table

The community of disciples

Divine action for Jesus

Divine action in the light of the whole Christ-event

God who lovingly waits upon creation

The vulnerability of divine love

Creation as divine self-bestowal

The specific and historical character of divine acts

Creation as the self-bestowal of God

Enabling and empowering evolutionary emergence

Noninterventionist divine action

Enabling creaturely autonomy to flourish

Divine action that accepts the limits of creaturely processes

Creating through chance and lawfulness

Special divine acts

Special acts in the providential guidance of creation

Approaches to special divine acts

Divine action through secondary causes

God's special acts in evolutionary emergence

The dynamism and the creaturely limits of special divine acts

Special divine acts in the life of grace

Experiences of the Holy Spirit

Personal providence

Disruptive grace

Special divine acts in the history of salvation

Mediation by created realities

Sacramental structure of special divine acts

Miracles and the laws of nature

The miracles of Jesus

Aquinas on the dignity of secondary causes

The laws of nature

A theological approach

The divine act of resurrection

Resurrection : a free act of God from within creation that gives creation its deepest meaning

Central expression of God's act of self-bestowal

Evolutionary christology

Sacrament of salvation

Resurrection as ontological transformation

Resurrection expressed in creation through secondary causes

Experience of the risen Christ in the Christian community today

The Easter appearances

The eschatological transformation of creation

God's redeeming act : deifying transformation

Redemption and deification through incarnation in Athanasius

The God-creation relationship

The central place of Christ's death and resurrection

Deification in Christ

Exploring a theology of redemption as deifying transformation

The deifying transformation of human beings

The deifying transformation of the material universe

The deifying transformation of the biological world

A participatory theology of redemption

God's redeeming act : evolution, original sin, and the Lamb of God

The scapegoat mechanism

Evolutionary science on human emergence

Original grace and original sin in evolutionary history

The end of scapegoating and the beginning of new creation

Final fulfilment : the deifying transformation of creation

We hope for what we do not see : God as absolute future

Hope for the whole creation in the New Testament : Romans 8:18-25

Hope for the universe in patristic tradition : Maximus the Confessor

The deification of the universe : Karl Rahner

The deification of matter

Radical transformation

Real continuity

Hope for the animals

Prayers of intercession

God wants our participation

Sharing what matters with the beloved

Entrusting ourselves to God

Prayer as desire for God.