Amma syncletica medieval4/20/2024 ![]() ![]() I am the first who calls the light from the "Shining Faces" of the Desert Fathers as an uncreated light and a discovery of a Hidden pre-Nicene (apophatic) Christology. ![]() ![]() I have imposed myself a line of research into the contemplative spirituality field, which in fact represents a hermeneutical trajectory: Glory in the NT (hidden-revealed or being-energies) – Glory in the NT (theosis as Christification) – pre-nicene Christology (eikonic and apophatic Light / glory) – Desert Fathers (“shining face” christology) – Efrem the Syrian (clothing metaphore) – Dionysius the Areopagite (veils of theurgic rays and Christ’s Presence as immanent transcendence or as tension between transcendent hiddenness and revelation) – Palamas hesychasm (christology of the uncreated light). This study attempts to make a mystagogical connection between those three theological developments which are standing all together in God’s holy fire with the ‘unveiled face’. The “shining face” theology as luminous metamorphosis of a visionary has experienced three great challenges: the anthropomorphic controversy, iconoclastic debate and the hesychast dispute. Drawing on a contemporary Christian anthropology located in the lay life, obedience leads to the fullness of human flourishing which is characterised by both autonomy and vulnerability in the mystery of God.ĪBSTRACT. Essential to this for western Christianity is the recovery of a contemplative praxis and ‘embodied obedience’ such as in the eastern Christian tradition of the spiritual mother or father. In this context, obedience is experienced as a dynamic process of becoming, as a way of being in love, in which we are called to become the person we are created to be. I then outline an approach to obedience where it is understood as a pathway to human flourishing, which in the Christian understanding reaches its apogee in union with a God who is love. In this thesis, I point to some of the reasons for the negative perception of obedience in the Catholic West. In contrast to early Christians, for whom obedience was the fruit of the experience of the Spirit, many laypersons today are alienated and confused by notions of obedience. Instead the pursuit of individual autonomy and self-fulfilment are the dominant western narratives in relation to the self. It is seen as contributing to abuse and has been devalued as a quality leading to becoming fully human. By contrast, in western societies in general, the concept and practice of obedience is regarded with suspicion and confused with subservience. In all major religions including in the early Christian tradition and now more particularly in eastern Christianity, obedience to God is named as a foundational element of the spiritual path and, for Christians, essential to the attainment of the goal of deification. In the Christian tradition ‘obedience’ is understood as attentive inner listening to God's loving call and an outcome of the movement of grace. ![]()
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