Abstract
What does the future hold? Scientific pictures of the world’s future range from merely bleak to fully catastrophic. The evidence shows that human beings, through their environmental irresponsibility, may even now be on the way to putting an end to life as we know it. Even apart from the human factor, scientists anticipate that natural phenomena will cause disruption and devastation on a grand scale through pandemic diseases or asteroid impacts or tectonic shifts that result in earthquakes, tsunamis, and volcanoes. The apocalyptic language of “living in the end times” takes on quite a literal cast in our day. What does Christian hope mean in the light of these scenarios of destruction? A robust Christian eschatology must include honest grappling with future prospects that science portends. In this issue, several scholars have taken up the challenge.
William Brown’s essay calls to our attention the iconic photograph of the earth (“the blue marble”) taken by the crew of Apollo 17. This “overview effect” of being able to see the earth’s fragile beauty from space forever redefined our sense of responsibility to care for it. Brown proceeds to offer an overview of the biblical accountings of creation from the first creation story in Genesis to the “new creation” in Revelation. The Priestly vision of God’s cosmic temple, both good and holy, and the vision of God’s renewal of creation must surely elevate our regard for the natural world and its future.
The future of human beings in particular is the topic of Ron Cole-Turner’s essay. He attends to emerging technologies for human enhancement: physical, cognitive, and emotional/spiritual. Many medical technologies are already in use for therapeutic purposes. Might they also be employed as “enhancements” for healthy persons? Some “transhumanists” advocate that human beings take their evolution into their own hands. Bioethicists speak of a moral boundary between therapy (where technologies have improved health and well being) and modifications (where enhancement aims at transcending human biological limitations). Cole-Turner elucidates key theological and ethical questions arising from these future prospects and, drawing upon the work of Karl Rahner, offers a constructive way forward.
Holmes Rolston argues pointedly that whether the earth has a future at all is largely in human hands and depends upon whether we can learn to love nature. With few exceptions, animals defend only their own kind. Human beings, however, have the capacity to enlarge their circle of care. Altruism begins when we recognize the claims of other humans, even when they are not compatible with our own self-interest. Rolston proposes that the “evolution of altruism is not complete until humans can recognize the claims of nonhumans—ecosystems, species, landscapes.” Can human beings live as the resident altruists we have the potential to become and enlarge the circle of our care? Rolston commends what he calls “love gone wild.”
Robert John Russell expands the question about the future to a wider reach—beyond the human future and even beyond earth’s future. In five billion years the sun will become a red giant that engulfs the earth and Mars. Life on earth will end. Further out in time, the endless expansion of the universe portends a cooling (cosmic freeze) that will make life as we know it (anywhere) impossible. What does all this mean for God’s purposes? How do we think about “resurrection” or “new creation” in the face of the scientific prognosis? Russell’s exploration shows the benefit of creative mutual interaction between theology and science as he articulates theological affirmations central to Christian faith.
Anna Case-Winters observes that theologians generally have been reluctant to take a long hard look at scientific pictures of the end of the world. Perhaps this reluctance is lodged in a presumed threat to meaning that this perspective seems to pose. Case-Winters urges honest and realistic grappling with what we are learning from science. She contends that the threat to meaning posed by destruction on a grand scale is not qualitatively different from that already posed by the reality of mortality. What are the resources that Christian faith brings to the threat of death? How might they help in facing the prospect of the end of the world? In conversation with Karl Barth, Jürgen Moltmann, Miroslav Volf, and process theology, Case-Winters explores the affirmation that “in life and in death, we belong to God.”