Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- Preface
- 1 What is the problem?
- 2 What is chance?
- 3 Order out of chaos
- 4 Chaos out of order
- 5 What is probability?
- 6 What can very small probabilities tell us?
- 7 Can Intelligent Design be established scientifically?
- 8 Statistical laws
- 9 God's action in the quantum world
- 10 The human use of chance
- 11 God's chance
- 12 The challenge to chance
- 13 Choice and chance
- 14 God and risk
- References
- Further reading
- Index
14 - God and risk
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- Preface
- 1 What is the problem?
- 2 What is chance?
- 3 Order out of chaos
- 4 Chaos out of order
- 5 What is probability?
- 6 What can very small probabilities tell us?
- 7 Can Intelligent Design be established scientifically?
- 8 Statistical laws
- 9 God's action in the quantum world
- 10 The human use of chance
- 11 God's chance
- 12 The challenge to chance
- 13 Choice and chance
- 14 God and risk
- References
- Further reading
- Index
Summary
The central thesis of this book is that God uses chance. This appears to carry the implication that God takes risks. This simple statement has repercussions for most parts of theology but here we focus on the central issue. What is required is a theology of risk and this is what the chapter aims to provide. After some theological preliminaries, I commend a view which it is proposed to call critical orthodoxy.
DOES GOD TAKE RISKS?
We live in a society obsessed with risk. Risk assessment and risk management are part of everyday life in business and industry. We are exposed to all manner of hazards, not only to life and limb, but to our comfort and general welfare. The insurance industry has long existed to alleviate the problem by spreading risk but the threat of litigation and crippling damages has heightened awareness of the problem. It is hardly surprising that there should be a ready market for Peter Bernstein's book Against the Gods: the Remarkable Story of Risk (1998). But risk also raises questions for theology. Gregerson (2003b) has taken steps towards a theology of risk and followed this up (Gregerson 2006) with a study which, among other things, challenges the views of some contemporary sociologists.
All of this work looks at risk from the human side. There is also a God-ward side on which we concentrate in this chapter.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- God, Chance and PurposeCan God Have It Both Ways?, pp. 223 - 242Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2008