Nature's ReligionIn the wake of both the semiotic and the psychoanalytic revolutions, how is it possible to describe the object of religious worship in realist terms? Semioticians argue that each object is known only insofar as it gives birth to a series of signs and interpretants (new signs). From the psychoanalytic side, religious beliefs are seen to belong to transference energies and projections that contaminate the religious object with all-too-human complexes. In Nature's Religion, distinguished theologian and philosopher Robert S. Corrington weaves together the concept of infinite semiosis with that of the transference to show that the self does have access to something in nature that is intrinsically religious. Corrington argues that signs and our various transference fields can and do connect us with fully natural religious powers that are not of our own making, thereby opening up a path past the Western monotheisms to a capacious religion of nature. With a foreword by Robert C. Neville, Nature's Religion is essential reading for philosophers of religion, scholars of the psychology of religion, and theologians. |
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agape analogous antecedent anthropocentric anthropomorphic become black hole categorial complex concept consciousness correlation Corrington countertransference creative creator creator god current perspective deeply dialectic dimension divine domain ecstatic naturalism emerge encounter enter entropy epiphanies of power eros eros and agape erotics Eryximachus eternity finite folds and intervals folds of nature goals hermeneutic human process human sexuality innumerable orders insofar interactive field interpretants intersection kind logic logos manic manifest metaphysical momenta momentum monotheisms move movement nature natured nature's folds nature's sacred folds naturing and nature Neville numinous object ontological difference open infinite orders of nature panentheism panpsychism Peirce phenomenological philosophical theology plenitude posttemporal potencies of nature presemiotic pretemporal probe process theology projections providingness reality relation religious semiosis semiotic fields sense sexual shape sign systems sign-using space spirit structures sustains symmetrical relation temporal traits transference field transform unconscious of nature unruly ground whence worldhood