In the beginning there is community Implications and challenges of the belief in a triune God and a personcentred

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1 Peter F. Schmid In the beginning there is community Implications and challenges of the belief in a triune God and a personcentred approach Invited lecture given at the International Conference 'The Spiritual Dimension in Therapy and Experiential Exploration: a conference for those counsellors, psychotherapists and other practitioners concerned to explore the significance of spirituality to their life and practice' (Norwich, 18th 22nd July, 2004) 20th July 2004 revised version to be published in the Conference Reader by Moore, Judith & Purton, Campbell, 2005 Abstract Western tradition tends to give preference to the individual and their values of autonomy and authenticity. On the opposite, there have always been traditions favouring the community and esteeming the value of relationship and of thinking in societal categories. Throughout occidental history the unum-multum-problem has been dominating the building of conceptions in theology, philosophy, psychology and psychotherapy. In theology, the conception of and belief in a triune God ( God as communication and community ) brought the dialectics of unity and plurality, identity and difference, individuality and community to a hitherto unknown peak of human thinking and understanding of both God and their image, the human being. This leads to tremendous consequences for the understanding of the human being as a person, a being of innate plurality, for example as men and women. It is communication, originating in encounter and presence, which builds community. 1 In this paper I am going to explore the social and community-centred aspect of Christian belief and its consequences for a person-centred image of the human being both in anthropological theory development and the practice of person-centred work, particularly in groups. The Powerpoint presentation will be followed by a discussion with the audience. Peter F. Schmid University of Graz Institute for Person-Centered Studies (IPS), Vienna, Austria In the beginning there is community Implications and challenges of the belief in a triune God and a person-centred approach Conference The Spiritual Dimension in Therapy and Experiential Exploration UEA Norwich, July 20, Cf. Schmid, Peter F., Im Anfang ist Gemeinschaft: Personzentrierte Gruppenarbeit in Seelsorge und Praktischer Theologie, vol. III: Beitrag zu einer Theologie der Gruppe. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer 1998, chapters 1 & 2. 1

2 Where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them. (Mat 18:20) Dear colleagues and friends It comes as a great honour to me to be invited to give this talk to such a distinctive audience and I wish to express my gratitude for the invitation to do so. Unfortunately I have to read the paper, because English, as you can hear, is not my mother tongue and I apologize in advance for not being able to make use of the subtleties of language as I would like to do in order to express myself as clearly as possible. The task I chose to undertake, in fact, is not at all an easy one. I am going into theolo0gy and philosophy. And I must warn you: It might well be that I am not going to give you an easy time; I shall tax your intellect and make demands on your willingness to delve into territory at the edge of our capacities to understand and to belief. And this will take some time. I want to talk about God and a subject that is not at all a matter of fashion today the mystery of the Trinity. As you might know I devoted a great deal of my time and energy to clarify what it means from a person-centred perspective that the human being is a person which led me to explore the meaning of encounter and presence from a philosophical perspective and to understand the Person-Centred Approach as an intrinsically relationshiporiented approach. Today I am going to further delve into the foundations of a person-centred comprehension of the human being which originates in experiences people understood as experiences with God and initiated by God. In other words: At the early beginning of what we know today as the Person-Centred Approach there was spirituality and reflection upon it. I am convinced that we need to go to its roots to really understand what the Person-Centred Approach is about. Some major ones of these roots lie in the Jewish-Christian tradition and its spiritual, theological and philosophical considerations of what it means to be a human being. To give you a rough overview: I will proceed in three steps: Overview I. The image of God II. The image of the human being III. Consequences for the understanding of the PCA 2

3 I. The image of God In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit Firstly I am going to explore 1. the relationship between the image of the human being and the image of God. 2. Then I come to the unum-multum-problem, one of the main dichotomies in occidental philosophy. 3. After this the peak of the unum-multum-dialectics is further investigated: What does it mean to belief in a tri une God? 4. This will be examined particularly in the light of the so called social analogy of the Trinity: God is community, which leads to 5. a most interesting coincidence of person and group, when trying to understand God. 6. Perichoretic love is the theological term to express the mystery of God the Tri Une. Overview I. The image of God Why and how to ask the question about God? The unum-multum multum-problem The belief in a tri-une God God is community A social analogy of the Trinity God Person? Group? Perichoretic love God the dancing group 1. Why and how to ask the question about God To talk about God, to even talk about the Trinity what an enterprise, what presumption! Wouldn t it be much more adequate to fall silent, to keep quiet and perhaps meditate? Of what use should it be to ask such a question, particularly in the context of psychotherapy? Maybe it would be wise to stay abstinent and agnostic? And yet from a Christian perspective at the beginning of the question about the human being and their relationship with one another, their understanding of themselves and their way of living together, there has to be the question about God, because the human being is understood to be the image of God. At the very beginning of the Bible there is the basic statement: God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them. (Gen 1:26) This simply means: We cannot talk about God without talking about ourselves and vice versa. Or to answer the question to whose benefit we do this: We do so in order to better understand ourselves as human beings. Thus, although it always only can be most temporary, most tentative, in a completely seeking manner to ask the question about God, it does make sense to bring this question forward. To be precise: We cannot think or talk about God; any endeavour to do so can only be an attempt to ask towards God, in the direction of God, to think towards God as the Dutch theologian Piet Schoonenberg (1986) expressed it, in other words: to seek God (Zauner, 1986). Any conversation about God is more wrong than right or, as theologians term it, it is only analogous, i.e. similar and corresponding, illustrative, metaphoric, symbolic. In a word, we only can stutter and stammer, approach the question cautiously and carefully. Yet it is profoundly human to ask, to ask oneself and the others, where we do come from, where we are going to, what our life is about. Psychotherapists and counsellors are familiar with this as theologians and pastoral workers are familiar with it: existential questions are demanding, they need to be uttered, even if we know that 3

4 we never will have final answers. Theo-logy (i.e. literally speaking about God ) does the same, only in a systematic, scientific way. Furthermore, from a Jewish-Christian-Muslim perspective, the religions of revelation, it was God who started the dialogue, who spoke to us humans, who revealed, disclosed himself. God addressed us and therefore we are invited to respond, to enter into the dialogue. All our speaking, in fact our whole life, is answering God s call. This is what the term person whence the name of the Person-Centred Approach comes from refers to in its most profound meaning as I will show later. Revelation is the one side of the coin whose other side is experience. And here, at the latest, the question becomes important to psychotherapists and counsellors: How do we see the human being? How do clients experience themselves? How do we think about them and us as humans? To sum it up: The Bible starts with the conviction that we are entitled to think and talk about God, because this means that we talk about ourselves and vice versa: When we talk about ourselves we talk about our understanding of God. The image of God and the image of the human being are inseparably connected. The Second Vatican Council expressed it that way: Christ made the human being fully known to the human being. (GS 22) We are permitted to conclude from us to God and from God to us: God created humankind in his image. I. The image of God Why and how to ask the question about God? We only can ask towards God. We respond to a dialogue that God started. Revelation and experience are two sides of one coin. The images of God and the human being are inseparably connected. And what is the relevance for practice? I will concentrate here on one most important aspect. In the course of the history of reflection of the experiences with Jesus Christ this led to a breathtaking inspiration and it is our Christian belief that it really was an in spiration, brought forward by God s spirit: The reflection of the experiences with Jesus led to the understanding of God not only as the One and Only and thus the origin of our individuality but also as a Trinity, which means as community and communication and thus as the source of our being-in-relationship, being sociable and living gregariously, in a word: as the source of our nature as inevitably social beings. Christians are baptized and begin their prayers in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. What makes the Christian belief different from all other religions is the belief in the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, theologically called Trinity, as expressed in the Creeds, in God as a triune. The distinctive Christian image of God is God as a tri unity. But what does that mean? There have been lots of explanations and interpretations during a long existential and theological struggle to find an appropriate understanding of God the One and God the Trinity, in a word: God the Triune. 4

5 `God as a Tri-Unity Unity? 1? 3? Before we further investigate this we need to have a look at the wider context which will show that this is far more than theological speculation, irrelevant to our everyday life. On the contrary: This leads us into the middle of our existence. 2. The unum-multum-problem The question about the nature of God is a special case of what in the history of philosophy is referred to as the unum-multum-problem. Traditionally unity, uniformity and uniqueness on the one hand and plurality, pluriformity and variety on the other hand have been seen as being incompatible opposites. The unum-multumproblem preoccupied thinkers in Eastern and Western European philosophy and theology, the problem of the one versus the many, the singular versus the plural, unity and uniformity versus diversity and pluriformity. The contrast, the opposite of the one and the many, individuality versus community or society this is a basic issue throughout occidental thinking and human self-understanding. Is it the unum that is at the beginning, that is the source, the guiding principle? And therefore: Is diversity diversification, is multitude something deriving from the original one, leaving it, deserting from it? Hence something deducted, of less value, less power, less importance, something inferior and minor? Finally this would mean that the goal of all will have to be gaining back the original unity, struggling in the direction of the original unity, towards the one and only, making this unum the alpha and omega of everything. In politics this is the question of the understanding of power and leadership: Is mon-archy the true state system, given by God and only responsible to him? Is hier-archy the adequate constitution of religious systems, the church for example? Is there only one church, realized in many communities? And much more generally and of decisive importance: Do we live in a uni-verse (the word derives from Latin unum, i.e. one and vertere, i.e turn ), where everything is turned towards the one? Does uni-versity help us to understand how everything is connected to this one core? Will we find a world formula explaining everything from one principle in the natural sciences as well as in the humanities? Does spirituality tend towards finding the meaning of life? And finally in spiritual and theological terms: Is there only one God? Do religious and spiritual movements tend towards monotheism? Is monotheism the ultimate religion? 5

6 I. The image of God The unum-multum multum-problem /1 UNUM The One is the source and guiding principle. Diversity is deducted and thus inferior. Mon-archy archy, hier-archy archy. A Uni-verse, uni-versity versity. B B Monotheism. C C C C Or is the multum there from the beginning? Does plurality characterize an original principle (Latin principium means the beginning, the origin ) making unity a second order category? Is it only unification that leads to unity, based on induction, on agreement, negotiation? Is unity only achieved by uniting? Is unity only the consequence of finding commonalities, maybe only existing in our heads, not in reality? Is therefore the further development of individuality and diversity a ruling principle that leads to progress? And shouldn t it be combined with relationship building and the fostering and celebrating of diversity, looking at the differences of the multum and their richness, rather than the commonalities? Not the alpha-omega-principle but each letter of the alphabet in its own right? Therefore, democracy would be the adequate state system, power and leadership equally shared, responsible to all, in political as well as in religious organisations, a council-like and synodical principle for the constitution of churches where the many have the say. Are there many communities that are churches in the full meaning of the term, which together form a worldwide, a catholic church in the original meaning of the word (Greek καθολικος [katholikós] = concerning the whole, general, comprehensive, universal). And generally: Do we live in a multi-verse (a term coined by the philosopher Heinrich Rickert ( ) for the cosmos seen from a non-universal perspective [Rickert, 1899; 1921; 1934])? A world, a cosmos the structure of which is not connected up to the one (core, idea, God), but interconnected among the many (ideas, human beings, things), without one world formula but with many principles, ideas, cores, more like a net than like a family tree structure? Does spirituality encompass essentially different contents and directions for different people without any preset and thus essentially common values? And in terms of religion: Are there as many gods and goddesses as there are peoples or even people? Are different religions and spiritual movements simply an expression of this fundamental, original, essential diversity? Is polytheism the genuine reflection of this belief? I. The image of God The unum-multum multum-problem /2 MULTUM Plurality is an original principle. Unity is of second order, based on agreement. Democracy, synodical structure. A Multi-verse, interconnection. A A A Polytheism. A A In the course of time European thinking, originating in Greek culture, has tended to give preference to the unum, the individual and their values of autonomy and authenticity. The multum got the reputation of the 6

7 inferior which can be seen as an ongoing fear of becoming and transience, or, in the meaning of Habermas, the new confusion. (Beinert, 1998). If there is not one highest principle, one truth, one point to which everything relates, one position from which to determine what is right and what is wrong won t this lead into chaos? I believe that this is the strongest psychological motive for the desire for hierarchical structures and the wish of having a strong leader and clear, pre-determined positions, standards and values and therefore the strongest motive for the traditional preference of the unum, of our individualistic and hence ultimately narcissistic view. One example might be the idea that wo-men derive from men an exegesis of the biblical narrative of Adam s rib that does not focus on the message of equality ( bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh ; Gen 2:23) but on the priority of the man (Hebrew אּיּשׁ [ îs] ) over the wo man (Hebrew אּשּׁהּ [iššā] ) (ibid.), making the woman the second, the one being derived from the original. Consequently, the woman has to obey the man; the man is of higher rank and value. Ultimately it might well be the fear of both women and men of losing clear although discriminating structures: It is easier to dominate and submit than to negotiate, consult and strive towards agreement in gender dialogue as everywhere else. On the opposite, also in Western intellectual history, in thinking and living, there have always been traditions favouring the community and esteeming the value of relationship and thinking in societal categories. We have heretic traditions, heretics that became saints; we have the clown at the side of the king; at carnival time the structures of power were turned upside down. In the church e.g., there is not only the hierarchical and patriarchal tradition, there is also the monastic tradition and the aforementioned synodical structure; tradition knows the prophets aside the priests. There are ancient democratic traditions in politics, religion and private and public opinion. The issues of Western thinking were not only about power and might but also about sharing and love. In the last century individualism on the one hand came to a hitherto unknown predominant paradigm in society, politics, economics and science, also in psychology and psychotherapy. On the contrary, later in the same century there was the big and great rediscovery of relationship and community. Not only was the group discovered, according to Carl Rogers (1970a) the most potent social invention of the 20 th century, but philosophy, psychology and psychotherapy realized the importance of relationship and encounter anew. Think of dialogical philosophy, of constructivism, systems theory, of the encounter movement, of group, family and systems therapy and particularly of the person-centred approach. Such a development from a more individualistic focus to a balanced conviction, also valuing the fundamental relational categories can, for example, clearly be traced in the life and work of Carl Rogers and the development of the Person-Centred Approach. I. The image of God The unum-multum multum-problem /3 European thinking prefers the unum,, the individual..[אּיּשׁ from אּשּׁהּ] man E.g. wo-man from But there are also traditions favouring the multum. E.g. monastic traditions. 20th century: individualism rediscovery of relationship and the group. 3. The belief in a triune God Back to our image of God. Christianity with its roots in Jewish thinking and understanding and heavily influenced by Greek and Hellenistic philosophy, developed an outstanding way of dealing with the unummultum-dialectics. The Jewish achievement was monotheism, carefully defended against all temptations from surrounding and occupying powers, e.g. the Mesopotamian, and also even the overall influence of the Roman Empire. Its core was the covenant between God and his people: one God, one chosen people (Ex 31). Christianity went one step further: It opened up to all people on earth and understood itself as the new covenant between God and humankind, now open to everybody from everywhere (Mat 26:28). 7

8 But there was even more. The experiences with Jesus of Nazareth led to a new understanding of God and of those who decided to live their lives according to his gospel, his ευαγγελιον [euangélion], i.e. his message, and to live in his spirit, i.e. their experiences as a community. In theological terms: Easter and Pentecost. They gradually came to understand that the main mission and message of his life was to show and verbalize: The way I relate to you is the way God relates to you, in an early theologian s, the author s of the gospel of John, words: Whoever has seen me, has seen the Father (John 14:1). In encountering and experiencing Jesus, they believed, they encounter and experience God. Even more: In living their lives according to Jesus life, in a word: in his spirit, they understood themselves as living in God s spirit, his holy spirit becoming present and presence. Thus as a community in Jesus spirit they realized that they believed in encountering God by encountering each other. Therefore the questions arose: Who is this Jesus in relationship to God, whom he calls his Father? What does their most intimate relationship, expressed by the words Father, even Abba (Aramaic for Daddy ), and Son, mean? What or who is this Spirit we experience when we come together and live a life genuinely following Jesus example, so to say in spired by him? A mental attitude, a vital principle, a supplying energy, courage, Jesus himself, God Himself or even God Themselves? Hence quite rapidly experience pushed and demanded to further develop the image of God. Experience made the Fathers of the Church re-think this image leading to a new understanding of God. And this was how after a few generations the idea was born that was coined in the term of a triune God, in the contemporary language of that time formulated as one God in three persons unity and diversity at one and the same time. But, again: What does this say, express, picture? I. The image of God The belief in a tri-une God Monotheism was the Jewish achievement. The experiences with Jesus ( Easter and Pentecost ) led to a reconsideration fo the image of God. Father Son Spirit : God is community. One God in three persons ( Tri-unity ): unity & diversity. Here, once more we need to be reminded that we cannot and never will be able to understand God. God is and remains a mystery. If this wasn t, God would not be God, but an idol; God would be our creature, not the other way round. And yet, as stated at the beginning, it makes sense to think about, to try to reflect our experiences and find meaning in them. 4. God is community A social understanding of the Trinity Out of all possible ways to understand the mystery of the Holy Trinity we here are interested in a specific one, which is known as the social understanding of the Trinity. As with the understanding of person (where both dialectically linked meanings are equally important, the substantial and the relational dimension, but the relational dimension needed attention in order to really see both aspects and their interrelation and avoid to stay one-sidedly individually orientated), it is with the understanding of God as a triune. The tri is as important as the une. But since the substantial aspect of God s being totally different, the absolute Other, the transcendence and holiness (He dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see, 1 Tim 6:16), since original unity and absolute independence is usually stressed and associated with God, here I emphasize the aspect of community, to re-gain the balance, which does not mean that the other aspect is of less importance. Karl Rahner (1960; 1967) and others pointed out that the way we experience God in a trifold sense says something about how God is, not only about how we experience God. 8

9 We experience God in his acting as Father (the true, eternal, inestimable and unchangeable, incomprehensible, almighty and inexpressible God as the Fourth Council in Lateran, 1215, put it [DS 800], transcendent and far beyond our understanding), Son (Jesus of Nazareth, the prophet and Son) and Holy Spirit (God within ourselves, in the community of people, in the community of the church) Rahner pointed out that the way we experience God has to do with the way God is, in his inner nature. Theologians, always searching for terms to exactly describe what is meant, say: The economic Trinity (the Trinity we experience in the salvation-history) is the immanent (the inner, the heavenly) Trinity. This means that we do not only experience God in this way, God rather is this way. God shows, reveals himself the way he or she is in himself. In a person-centred jargon this expresses that God s being and his communicating are congruent. God does not only show love towards us, God is love (in him- or herself). This means: We may, from our experience, interpreted as experience with God, conclude how God might be. (Remember: Experience is one side of the coin whose other side is revelation.) This can easily be understood, if you compare it with a relationship between human beings: A person shows him- or herself by his or her acting; the better we know a person through our experience with him or her, the better we understand their acting. And furthermore this means: God in his or her self-communication, showing himself how he is, shows us, how we are (because we are his image). As already stated, the understanding of God and the understanding of ourselves are intrinsically interconnected. I. The image of God A social understanding of the Trinity /1 The substantial aspect (God as the absolute Other, independent, holy, in original unity, unchangeable) is usually stressed one-sidedly. The way we experience God = the way God reveals him-/herself. As images of God we may from our experiences learn something, how God is and how we are. During the history of theology we can find two paradigms of interpretation of the Trinity, an intrapersonal one and an interpersonal one. The first one, the more Western one, also called the psychological model (Augustin; Schmaus) goes from the unity to the trinity and therefore stresses the unity (and thus the Father), the second one, the more Eastern one, also called the social approach or the interpersonal, dialogic analogy, focuses on the trinity (and thus the community of the Three) and goes from there to the unity. This second analogy is closer to the experience told in the Bible. In the social approach unity is seen as perfect community. It is the relationship that makes the unity. It is the Father s, Son s and Holy Spirit s being totally wrapped up in one another, their mutual love, their mutual penetration by love without giving up their respective peculiarities. (Theologians call this perichoresis ; we come back to it in a minute.) This shifts the focus from a monarchic, hierarchical, patriarchal, androcentric idea towards an understanding of the Trinity as a community: It is relationship and community that is God s nature and intention: God themselves is relationship. God is relationship to us. God is the foundation of our relationship with each other. The peak of the universe is not isolation and loneliness, it is community and life at its fullest. In other words: Analogously spoken, God is society, God is group. 9

10 I. The image of God A social understanding of the Trinity /2 The social (interpersonal, dialogic) analogy focuses on the trinity, i.e. the community of the Three. It is relationship that makes the unity. It is relationship and community that is God s nature and intention: God themselves is relationship. God is relationship to us. God is the foundation of our relationships. 5. God is person is group Let me explain this a bit closer: Usually we say that we belief in a personal God. This term, person, refers to our present-day understanding of a person, which is almost identical with an individual. We say, e.g. Three persons in a car. It needs to be emphasized that this notion of person today is different from its notion at the time, when it was introduced from everyday language into theology and philosophy. This happened in order to clarify the Trinitarian questions, among others by Tertullian in the early 3 rd century. At that time persona in everyday language was a role term, a relationship term, used to denote independence in a relational structure (i.e. the judge, the lawyer and the prosecutor at a trial were called personae, i.e. persons.). This role-oriented understanding was used in the course of the theological considerations about God at the time of the Fathers of the Church to further develop the image of God. Thus the biblical relational thinking became equally important to the Greek substantial thinking a balance, which ever has to be gained anew, and still is important for the understanding of the human being as a person today as underlying e.g. the Person-Centred Approach. Today, if we say a person, we mean one individual. If we say three persons, we mean three different people. This was completely different at the time when the Creeds were formulated and the formula was coined of one God in three persons. Thus, nowadays we one must not mix up (1) person as used for the Three ( the three persons in God ) of the Trinity in order to characterize the societal nature of God and (2) as used for God, if we talk of a personal God ( God as person, a personal understanding of God ) in order to denote God s autonomy and uniqueness (God the One) on the one hand and God s fundamental being-in-relation, i.e. being-for and being-with, and solidarity (God the Triune) on the other hand. Nevertheless both ways of using person to understand God s nature point equally to the relational dimension as they point to the substantial dimension. Now, if we say: God is person (not: a person there are no other persons like God because of God s uniqueness) and think the way like we do in everyday language, there is the danger that we overemphasize the individual, substantial aspect. Thus, I think, we need another term, another name in order to balance this. Although this might sound unusual to you: After the aforementioned considerations we might also say: God is group. As it is with person (that God is person in a unique, analogous way; God is not only unique, he is the only one, it is with group : God is group in a unique, analogous way; God is not only relationship-oriented, relationship is not only an aspect of Gods being God is relationship in a unique and fundamental way. God is person is group. So, if this sounds strange and makes you think about God anew fine. I can even refer to the present pope as a witness. He used the analogy of the family to talk about God: Our God in his deepest mystery is not an individual, but family, he said in Puebla in 1979 (John Paul II., January 28, 1979) And Hans Urs von Balthassar (1985) called the family the most convincing imago trinitas innate to God s creatures. Similar did the liberationist theologian Leonardo Boff (1990). The analogy is far reaching: The members of the family are only through the family what they are (without being mingled) and the family is only through its members what it is. God is in a unique way person and in a unique way group. Thus to say tri unique God would be most adequate. What the social analogy of the Trinity wants to emphasize is expressed by this terminology: God is 10

11 originally community, from the very beginning. At the same time this eternal, most intimate community is so perfect that it is a complete unity: Community as unity of and in differences without mingling. From this relational view the view of community and communication it can also be understood what it means that the Son is the Logos, the Word, and what it means that God is love. Therefore, ultimately, in God person and group coincide, because substantiality and relationality coincide. In God there is no tension between being fully from oneself, at oneself and oneself and being fully at and towards the Other. God is unity in distinctiveness (traditional metaphysics would say: substantial relationality ). Hence it makes sense to say: God is person is group. I. The image of God God is person is group Person : -today individual - persona in the 2nd & 3rd century AD: independence in a relational structure God is not only relationship-oriented, oriented, but relationship in themselves. God is tri-unique : Community as unity of differences. 6. Perichoretic love: God, the dancing group The theology of Trinity marks the peak in dealing with the unum-multum-dialectics (Beinert, 1998). It can be shown that throughout Christian history of trying to examine closer the mystery of the nature of God as unum and as multum again two strands representing the unum-multum-conflict developed one favouring the unitarian principle of hierarchy and one favouring the relational principle of equality in the understanding of God as Holy Trinity. Consequently different images of the Trinity led to different images of the church (and thus to different political consequences). In subordinatianism with its belief that the Father is above the Son and the Son subordinates to the Father you again find a dominance of the unum-principle giving priority to the Father. The same goes for the doctrine of the processions (Latin processiones, meaning evolvements, series of emerging), which wants to express that the Son came from the Father, and the Holy Spirit came from the Father and the Son or through the Son). The supremacy of the unum found its expression in the development of a hierarchical constitution of the church with the primacy of the pope at the top. With this kind of a principle of unity centralism is intrinsically connected. In ethics this means everything has its given place within a cosmic order, a place given by God. Ultimately this culminates in totalitarism, a temptation all monotheistic religions had to face. If the one is the whole and the many is the dangerous, then unification is divine and pluralism is satanic. The modern version of this is the turn to the subject replacing God as the centre of everything, which finds its peak expression in the fight of everybody against everybody, a free-for-all. On the other hand in the doctrine of God as mutual love and as communio et communicatio you find the multum -principle in the foreground: Communion and communication means that God himself is unity and diversity, identity and difference, equally original and tantamount, dialectically interrelated. This view is known as the doctrine of perichoretic love. Περιξωρησις [perichóresis] originally means a dance around each other what a charming, expressive and meaningful picture: God as a dancing triad, a dancing group! This term has been used since the 7 th century, mainly influenced by John of Damascus, in order to characterize the mutual penetration of the Three, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, without giving up the peculiarity of each of them. (The 11

12 Latin for perichóresis is circumincessio and circuminsessio, meaning to own each other and to proceed, to go into each other, respectively.) Perichóresis points to the deepest unity in sharpest distinctiveness (Schoonenberg, 1992). This community is so perfect that it is a complete unity, an eternal, most intimate community. And it is because of this perfect beingwithin-each-other, this perfect interrelation, why this belief does not lead to a tritheism, to three gods. I. The image of God Perichoretic love God the dancing group With subordiantianism ( Father is above the Son ) the principle of unity is stressed. With a perichoretic (interrelational)) understanding ( God as communion and communication ) the principle of mutuality is stressed. ( Περιχωρεσις = a dance around each other ) Recently in the English language the singular they became used again in order to avoid gender discriminating language. It perfectly fits when talking about God, not only in order to avoid to one-sidedly connecting the image of God with a male notion but also to point to the tri unity and thus intrinsic community of God. So we can say: God in their common play of dancing, God in their interplay of perichoretic dancing and love. And this God invites us to join their dance. 12

13 II. The image of the human being God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them. (Gen 1:26) This is where after the image of God we come to the image of the human being in the light of God the Triune. Firstly we ask: 1. What does the image of God say about the image of the human being? Then we deal we three essential dimensions: community, plurality and dialogue. Overview I. The image of the human being The image of the human being as reflection of the image of God Community Plurality - Dialogue What does the image of God say about the image of the human being? The afore described conception of and belief in a triune God in the sense of God as communication and community brought the dialectics of unity and plurality, identity and difference, individuality and community to a hitherto unknown peak of human thinking and understanding of both God and their image, the human being. God s being is being-with, God s love is love-with. As this is within God it is towards the human beings. This is expressed in God s name Jahwe (Ex 3:14), literally: I am who I am. Or: I am the I-am. As an answer to Moses question, who God is, what God s name is, this means: I am who is here for you and will be with you or simply I am who is present for you. In the light of this self-revelation and particularly in the light of the incarnation we must say: God s relationship to humankind belongs to their essence. God seeks and keeps community with the human beings: God is a God of the human beings (Schoonenberg, 1969); they take us into their perichoresis, invite us into their eternal intimate dance. God is forever related to the human being; the human being is eternally related to God. It is relationship that is essential to both of them. 13

14 II. The image of the human being as reflection of the image of God Jahwe = I am present for you (Ex 3:14) It is relationship that is essential to both God and the human being. This leads to tremendous consequences for the understanding of the human being as a person, which among others emphasizes that the human being is a being of innate plurality. And it means that it is communication, originating in encounter and presence, which builds community. As far as time allows let us have a look at this a bit closer. What does the image of God say about the image of the human being? In what way are we reflections of the Trinity? If the nature of God is community, being-with, then the nature of the human being is being-with. The human being is a homo socialis. This is one of the essential meanings of being a person, a term characteristic for the Jewish-Christian culture and a proper description only for this world view. A community whose model is the Trinity, is always open, turning to the others; it is inviting and thus guaranteeing and fostering plurality. Because, if God is plurality, then the human beings are essentially plural and pluralistic. The important aspect here is the difference, the other one as really an Other. This is the origin of encounter. And finally, if God is communication and dialogue, then what makes the human being truly human is communication and dialogue. Communication anticipates community, it leads to community, and yet it already needs community to communicate. Both are interrelated. As outlined earlier, communication begins with revelation. This means that communication and community require presence and a fundamental understanding of the nature of relationship as being touched and surprised by the disclosure of the Other, by his or her revealing, opening up him- or herself. II. The image of the human being as reflection of the image of God Community: The human being as a person Plurality: Identity through encounter with the Other Communication: Presence through and in dialogue 14

15 1. Community: The human being as a person Trinity is the symbol for successful being a person and successful human community (Bernd Jochen Hilberath, 1990). If God is community, invites into their community and is the archetype of community then the human being is only a fully human being in community and when initiating community. God only is fully God, each of the Three only is fully him- or herself, if the Three are within each other as postulated by the Council of Florence in 1442 (DS 1331). Hence follows that the human being is only fully human, if he or she is with other human beings. Thus, the relationship-focused image of God leads to immense, far-reaching consequences for the understanding of the human being as a person, a being of innate plurality, e.g. as men and women. We come to this in a few moments. Beforehand let s find out what it ultimately means that the essence of being human is founded in the relationship of God to us. It was God who initiated this relationship. What makes the humans really human is to respond to their call into the relationship. This is what the profound meaning of the term person is. To be a person means to be a response to the call and invitation into the relationship with God the Triune. As a matter of fact the notion of person as underlying and characterizing the very essence of the Person-Centred Approach, is rooted in the aforementioned theological and philosophical considerations. It springs from the attempt to better understand who God is. In the meantime we learned that this inseparably also leads to a better understanding of us human beings. As a matter of fact, the understanding of the human being as a person developed out of thinking about God as person and God as persons. Substantiality and relationality What it means to be a person and which consequences follow for a person-centered approach to psychotherapy, I have described in detail many times (Schmid, 1991; 1994; 1998; 2001; 2002a; b). Here we lack time for more than a short summary. According to two different yet dialectically linked traditional strands of meaning the human being is characterized as a person if he or she is denoted in his or her unique individuality, worth and dignity (the substantial notion of being a person) as well as his or her interconnectedness, being-from and being-towards others (the relational conception of becoming a person). Thus, to be a person describes both, autonomy and solidarity, sovereignty and commitment. And it describes both as being equally important. Carl Rogers combined both views in a unique way for psychotherapy when he built his theory and practice upon the actualizing tendency which is at work in its best in facilitative relationships of a certain kind. Person-centred personality and relationship theory understands personalisation as a process of becoming independent and of developing relationships. The theory of the suffering person ( theory of disorders ) relies on the incongruence between self and experience (which might be seen as sovereignty deficiencies) as well as on the incongruence between the person and the context including the other persons within the society (relationship deficiencies). Consequently the theory of therapy understands therapy as both personality development and encounter person to person, and the practice is characterized by presence which means a principled non-directivity and empathic positive regard as a way of being with the client together with a position counter the client, i.e. a committed en-counter as a person meeting the Other face to face (Schmid 2002a). The dialectic basic axiom in person-centered anthropology is the actualizing tendency as the force of the individual embedded in the interconnectedness, the social nature of the person. Person : the human being in his or her independence and interdependence In the occidental philosophical tradition person denotes a specific view of the human being. It combines two inescapable dimensions of human existence: the substantial (or individual) aspect of being a person and the relational (or dialogical or transcendent) aspect of becoming a person (details in Schmid, 1991; 1998). The substantialistic conception was first defined by Boëthius (AD ): Persona est rationalis naturae individua substantia [the person is the indivisible substance of a rational being]. Substance derives from sub-stare which literally means remain standing on the basis of what is underneath. ( Substance originally meant something like remaining present by being bolstered from underneath, in spite of external forces and implies a kind of invulnerability.) Hence it means achieving a standing position from below, standing by oneself, being based upon oneself and thus implies autonomy and independence. Therefore, whoever associates person with independence and uniqueness, freedom and dignity, unity, sovereignty and self-determination, responsibility, human rights, etc., sees himself or herself in the tradition of such an 15

16 Response substantialistic conception of the person. That is what is meant when the human being is defined as a person, starting from the moment of conception and regardless of his physical or mental health and development. Being a person therefore means being-from-oneself and being-for-oneself. This conception of the person is especially influential in the (early) period in Rogers' thinking during which, based on the actualizing tendency, he mainly understands the human from the individualistic point of view and consequently sees therapy as a process of the development of personality with its emphasis on confidence in the organism, a realistic self and, above all, positive regard and empathy as beneficial conditions. As an ideal notion of the mature human being Rogers coins the phrase fully functioning person. The relationalistic notion of the person was defined by Richard of St. Victor ( AD 1173) in the tradition of patristic theology: He understood the person as naturae intellectualis eksistentia incommunicabilis [incommunicable existence of an intellectual nature]. Here, person is not conceived as a sub-sistence, but as an eksistence. Beyond its usual meaning (and different from present day notions), Richard deliberately spelled eksistence in order to stress the coming into being from outside ( ek, ex ), through others a position standing opposite to others. Therefore, a person is he or she who has become themselves precisely through others, which implies interdependence, solidarity and responsibility. So, whoever understands the person through relationship, through dialogue, through partnership, through connection with the world, through interconnectedness, whoever sees him or her in the totality of the community, follows the tradition of the relationalistic conception of person. Being a person thus means being-from-and-inrelationship; that is, being through others. This conception of the human as a person particularly characterizes Rogers' later work, where he understands people as being relational, in a group and in community, as person to person. Consequently, mutual encounter is a decisive element in therapy and personal development, and Rogers now considers genuineness as a pre-eminent facilitative condition. Both of these ways of understanding the human being are contrary, even conflicting, yet it is exactly this tension of autonomy and interconnectedness, independence and interdependence, self-reliance and commitment, sovereignty and solidarity, which uniquely characterizes being human. Also it can clearly be shown that the meaning of person in the original and genuine person-centered context precisely refers to these two dimensions which may be characterized by the catchwords actualizing tendency and fully functioning person on the one hand and relationship and encounter on the other hand. Furthermore, this anthropological stance, well elaborated by phenomenology and personalistic (or dialogic or encounter) philosophy, is the distinctive characteristic of personcentered understanding and action. Only in the dialectic of both interpretations, not in an either-or, but in a bothand does the mystery of the person become accessible to whoever allows himself or herself to become involved in a relationship from person to person. A conception gained from these two perspectives of the person contrasts with an privatistic conception of the human being just as it does with a collectivistic one. For many years Rogers himself dealt more with the individual aspect of the person in a theoretical sense, emphasizing the person as a unique and not-to-be-directed individual in therapy. It was only later that he concentrated more and more on the relational dimension. Furthermore, he did not document this in the structured way he wrote about the substantial aspect of the individual in the therapeutic relationship in his earlier writing. Nevertheless, contact and relationship were a central category of his anthropology from the very beginning (cf. Schmid, 2002a), and the formulation of the necessary and sufficient conditions of therapeutic personality change could never have taken place without it. Already here the first condition refers to contact a relational foundation (Schmid, 2002c). It is certainly no coincidence that Rogers repeatedly referred explicitly (e.g., Rogers, 1961) to two philosophers to whom the history of the conception of the person has always accorded a position of prime importance: Kierkegaard, who considers the misery of the individual, and Buber, who points out the opportunities implied by dialogue. To sum it up: The dialectic basic axiom in person-centered anthropology is the actualizing tendency as the force of the individual embedded in the interconnectedness, the social nature of the person. Both strands of the axiom form the foundations of the understanding of personalization of authentically becoming a person (Rogers, 1961). Both, autonomy and interrelatedness as a person, are responses to God s call into the relationship with them. This is what the profound meaning of the term person is as developed in the aforementioned theological and philosophical considerations. To be a person means to be a response to the invitation into the relationship with God the Triune. When we say the human being is response, this refers to the original meaning of response. Re-sponse (from Latin respondere ) etymologically means answer to an engagement, answer to a promise. Spondere means promise, bind oneself by contract (You still have this meaning in the term spouse ). The original meaning of respondere is correspond in the sense of being compatible and consistent. Thus to be a person means to co(r)-respond. In a developmental psychological perspective the human being is what he or she is out of communication. Their identity is drawn from the more or less loving relationship with their parents and other significant others. The human being is response to these relationships, corresponding to the relationship offer of those in whose 16