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Note: The following poem has seventeen sections with the title of each section set apart in bold italics in the original manuscript.
A Process Theology in Rhyme
Or, A Poetics of God
Theological Words
One might find it odd
That God is not God.
Even a word the most precise and pristine,
Is, in this usage, malapropos and obscene.
Must we, then, of the word completely beware?
Rather, like radium, it may be handled with care.
Let me offer, now, a word to the wise,
God is not God in any verbal guise;
God is ineffable, true enough, but also, yes,
May be limned with metaphysical finesse.
To mistake abstractions for the concrete
Is, for metaphysics, a decisive defeat.
This is the fallacy most to be eschewed
By the savvy few and logically shrewd.
So said Whitehead, and Hartshorne, too,
And to this, above all, one must be true.
Be scrupulous of what you mean by “God,”
Hold only what holds you in adoration awed,
But also beheld with clear and cognitive rigor
Illuminated by the beauty of rational splendor.
In verbal formulations be watchful and wary,
Let them be precise, penetrating, and lapidary.
In a word—be not slipshod
In forming ideas about God.
The One who is worthy of worship and adoration
Adores ideas coming from deepest contemplation.
HyC