From Suffering to God: Exploring Our Images of God in the Light of Suffering

220 Pages·1994·11.37 MB·English

by  Marian F. Sia

FROM SUFFERING TO GOD
Also by Santiago Sia
GOD IN PROCESS THOUGHT
CHARLES HARTSHORNE'S CONCEPT OF GOD (editor)
From Suffering
to God
Exploring Our Images of God
in the Light of Suffering
Marian F. Sia and Santiago Sia
M
St. Martin's Press
© Marian F. Sia and Santiago Sia 1994
All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of
this publication may be made without written permission.
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Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this
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claims for damages.
First published in Great Britain 1994 by
THE MACMILLAN PRESS LTD
Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 2XS
and London
Companies and representatives
throughout the world
A catalogue record for this book is available
from the British Library.
ISBN 0-333-61638-3
Printed in Great Britain by
Ipswich Book Co Ltd
Ipswich, Suffolk
First published in the United States of America 1994 by
Scholarly and Reference Division,
ST. MARTIN'S PRESS, INC.,
175 Fifth Avenue,
New York, N.Y. 10010
ISBN 0-312-12185-7
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Sia, Marian F.
From suffering to God : exploring our images of God in the light
of suffering / Marian F. Sia and Santiago Sia.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references (p. xxx-xxx) and index.
ISBN 0-312-12185-7
1. Suffering—Religious aspects—Christianity. 2. Theodicy.
3. Image of God. I. Sia, Santiago. II. Title.
BT732.7.S53 1994
23V.8—dc20 94-25373
CIP
To
the memory of
INNA
(Gregoria B. Sia)
mother and mother-in-law
whose counsel and life
taught us
to turn to God
in times of suffering

CONTENTS
Acknowledgements viii
Before Another Dawn xi
INTRODUCTION 1
PART I: FROM SUFFERING...
Reflecting on Our Experiences of Suffering 17
1 RELECTIONS ON JOB'S AND HOPKINS' QUESTION 19
2 LITERARY MEDITATIONS ON DEATH AND
CHRISTIAN HOPE 33
3 WHAT KIND OF GOD?: AN INQUIRY INTO
THE CHALLENGE OF SUFFERING 54
PART II: ...TO GOD
Conceptualising Our Images of God 73
4 THE TASK OF DESCRIBING GOD 75
5 THE CONCEPT OF AN IMMUTABLE GOD 88
6 REFORMULATING THE MEANING OF
GOD'S COMPASSIONATE LOVE 107
7 PARTICIPATING IN GOD'S LIBERATIVE ACT 124
SOME CONCLUDING REMARKS 141
ENDNOTES 149
SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY 187
INDEX 195
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
One of the satisfactions of completing a piece of work is being
able to acknowledge one's indebtedness to those who made it
possible. The present work is no exception, and we gladly take
this opportunity to express our gratitude for all the help and
encouragement we received in the course of writing this book.
First of all, we would like to thank the very many individuals
and groups—the oppressed, the victimised and the poor—who
shared with us their experiences of suffering and challenged us to
reflect on the topic of this book. Although we have not document
ed their stories and testimonies, they will recognise in these pages
the lessons we have learned from them. We want to thank our
families and friends whose example and counsel in the midst of
suffering have been a constant inspiration to us. We would also
like to express our gratitude to our numerous students and
colleagues in the Philippines, Ireland, England, Poland, Belgium and
the USA with whom we discussed many of the things which we
say in this book. Their questions, comments and suggestions
helped improve the manuscript. The institutions we have been
associated with during the writing of this book also deserve our
gratitude for their support: Terenure College, Dublin, Ireland, and
Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles, USA.
Many of the ideas in this book were first presented in papers
or talks given at different locations and to various groups: St.
Scholastica's Priory, Petersham, Massachusetts, USA; Catholic
Teachers Federation in Birmingham and Coventry, England; Center
for Process Studies, Claremont, California, USA; International
Conference on Process, Peace and Human Rights, Kyoto, Japan;
Second European Congress of URAM, Leuven, Belgium; Second
Yoko Civilization International Conference, Takayama, Japan;
International Symposium on Process Thought, Tokyo, Japan;
Mater Dei Institute of Education, Dublin, Ireland; East Asian
Pastoral Institute, Quezon City, Philippines; Katholieke Universiteit
VIM
Acknowledgements IX
Nijmegen and Rijksuniversiteit te Utrecht, The Netherlands. We are
grateful for the invitations and for the opportunity to interact with
those who attended these presentations. We also wish to express
our thanks to Rev. Prof. Boleskaw Bartkowski, Prorector of
Katolicki Uniwersytet Lubelski, Lublin, Poland for the honour of
giving public lectures based on the subject matter of this book at
their university. Discussions with their faculty and students,
following each of the four lectures, helped us immensely. We are
most appreciative of the Senior Research Fellowship awarded by
the Katolieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium, which gave us the
opportunity to share our work with the faculty and graduate
students of the Hoger Instituut voor Wijsbegeerte and to complete
the manuscript. It certainly was an honour to do research in such
a renowned academic institution.
Some of the chapters in this book were based on sections of
articles of ours published in various journals but revised for this
work. Our thanks to the editors of Spirituality Today, Ultimate
Reality and Meaning, New Blackfriars, Modern Theology, Process
Studies, American Journal of Theology and Philosophy, The Clergy
Review (now Priest and People) and Nederlands Theologisch
Tijdschrift for permission to make use of material which originally
appeared in their journals.
Several individuals in one way or another facilitated the
preparation of this book for publication. We want to thank them
all, but especially Charles Hartshorne and John B. Cobb, Jr., who
read the entire manuscript. We feel especially encouraged by their
comments. Schubert Ogden, Jan Van der Veken, David Griffin,
Mary Elizabeth Moore, Dermot Lane, Piotr Gutowski, Vincent
Brummer and others provided us with constructive comments and
helpful suggestions on early drafts of parts of the manuscript. We
have tried to incorporate them here. We appreciate the interest
shown in our work by Belinda Holdsworth, Annabelle Buckley,
John Smith and the staff of Macmillan. Their encouragement
supported us along the way. This work and many others have
benefited from Richard Morris' expertise with computers. We are
truly grateful to him. We want to thank Julie Morris for the time
spent poring over different drafts of the manuscript and for her
insightful comments on it. We are also grateful to Edna Hastings,
Bernadette Bernard, Margaret Edwards and Rita Dehaes for secre
tarial assistance. Our thanks also go to Gil Braganza and Eric