The nonexistence of the spirit world

It may seem absurd to the modern mind to indulge in the metaphysics of the godhead. What sort of rationality could we use for such a discussion? As we have noted, such a concept cannot simply be plucked out of the Bible. And how do we discuss something that by definition is beyond us?

Perhaps Athanasius, for all his thuggery, saw how things would go if Arius had had his day, a deficient theology that could not be at the centre of the flowering of the culture of the West. So perhaps the logic was more about the outcome than of seeing the invisible things of God!

One of the difficulties of the doctrine of the Trinity is that it is not a natural idea. To explain, language is natural, we already know how to speak before we go to school, while reading and writing is unnatural and we have to be intensively taught. The human mind contains structures that deal with language but must develop specific structures to deal with literacy.

In the same way we relate to persons in a natural way and it is also natural to imagine a personal God. But it is not natural to conceive of a person who is described as three persons in one, this has to be taught.

This is why, in the absence of church teaching, ideas about God will always revert to simple monotheism. That is why Arianism is the Archetypal Heresy because our minds are naturally attuned to single persons. If Christianity is not to revert to folk theology the church must grasp the nettle and actively teach Trinitarian theology and its history. We already have the example of 19th century liberalism in which Jesus was just a nice bloke and that after Arianism had declined to extinction, in the clergy at least.

The liberalism of Protestant Churches, so like the Latitude men of the 18th century, who thought that such theological niceties were not important, is not an option. They may feel that they can more easily communicate to the man in the street, but who would be excited about that communication?

Dumbed down theology is boring and ineffective and should be avoided. It is right that the liturgy should begin with the words “In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit” but how much of our preaching actually reflects this?