Michael Amaladoss

Theological Reflections
In the context of the theology of religions, when one suggests that salvation for the people who are not Christians may be facilitated by their own religions through which they reach out to God, the question arises: How can this be since they do not believe in or relate to Jesus Christ who is the only saviour? The usual answer is that they do not encounter and profess faith in the historical Jesus, but they relate to the cosmic Christ, who relates to everything in the universe, through their own religious symbols. This is not the place to explore this particular theological proposition. A relation of Christ to everyone and everything in the universe is affirmed by Paul and John. Paul says of Christ: “He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation; for in him all things in heaven and on earth were created, things visible and invisible.” (Col 1:116) John says: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people… And the Word became flesh and lived among us.” (Jn 1: 1-4, 14) I do not intend to undertake an exegetical study of these texts. Their inclusivism is evident, independent of any conscious response of these beings to Jesus, the incarnate Christ. Theologians suggest that people who are not encountering in faith the historical Jesus may still relate to the Cosmic Christ of Paul or the Word of John. The Cosmic Christ and the Historical Jesus are the same person, but related to differently in different contexts. It would be interesting to explore this a little more deeply and to reflect on its implications for our relationship to Christ. Another reason to think of the Cosmic Christ is the way in which Teilhard de Chardin evokes the image of the Cosmic Christ as the goal of evolution, the Omega point. He suggests that the vision of Paul in his letter to the Colossians is actually being realized through the process of evolution. Paul wrote: “For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross.” (Col 1:19-20)

The Synoptic Gospels
It is interesting to see how the idea of the ‘Cosmic Christ’ evolves in the New Testament. The synoptic Gospels speak about Jesus, his life, teachings and miracles. In that context, however, the question whether Jesus is the Messiah comes up. After the disciples report that people think of him as John the Baptist or Elijah or Jeremiah, Jesus asks them “But who do say that I am? Peter answered, ‘You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.” (Mt 16:14-16) Messiah is seen as a special messenger of God. But he is not necessarily considered divine. But some exegetes today suggest that they are indications in the synoptic Gospels to show that they may have believed in Jesus’ pre-existence. They refer to a number of sayings in which Jesus is affirming “I have come…” which has to be taken to mean that he has come, not from another place, but from another heavenly world. The phrase does not refer to Jesus moving from one place to another, but from one realm of the cosmos to another – like angels coming down from heaven. Jesus is a man, but he comes into the world from another realm with the power of God.
This experience of Jesus from being another heavenly realm would have been confirmed by their experience of the risen Christ. Resurrection is not simply the coming back to life of a dead body, but Jesus gaining a new heavenly life which he is now ready to share with them. The contemplative experience of Paul and John lead them to realize further the divine identity of Jesus.

The Vision of Paul
Paul may have had an inkling of this already at the time of his conversion. He is travelling to Damascus in pursuit of Christian to persecute. On his way he is struck down by a flashing light. When Paul asks: “Who are you , Lord?”, the reply comes: “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting.” (Acts 9:5) Paul is then struck blind. Paul realizes two things. First of all, Jesus is a heavenly being.” Secondly, the Christians whom he is persecuting are one with him. It does not take long for Paul to start proclaiming: “He is the Son of God.” (Acts 9:20) Later Paul will develop the idea that the Christians are the ‘body of Christ’. (1 Cor 12:12-31) It was more than a metaphor, because, he says, “In the one Spirit we were all baptized into one body.” (1 Cor 12:13) He recognizes the pre-existence of Christ.

He writes to the Philippians: “Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave… and became obedient to the point of death.” (Phil 2:5-8) Of course, God exalts him as Lord! (cf. Phil 2:11) Jesus, though he empties himself, is in the form of God. He is God, just as he would become a slave. He may not exploit it. But he is equal to God. God, however, exalts him. (cf. Phil 2:9) There is a special relationship here that will have to be explored. We see a different process in Paul’s letter to the Corinthians. Jesus rises and becomes the “first fruits”. Others too rise with him. Finally Jesus subjects himself and all things, “so that God may be all in all.” (cf. 1 Cor 15:20-28) Paul’s vision develops further in his letter to the Colossians where he asserts that Christ himself is this fullness.

He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation; for in him all things in heaven and on earth were created, things visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or powers – all things have been created through him and for him. He himself is before all things, and in him all things hold together. He is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he might come to have the first place in everything. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross. (Col 1:15-20)

Jesus is the ‘image’ of God. To the Philippians Paul said ‘form’. He is not something made. He images God. He is the ‘firstborn’: it is sign of honour, not that he was he first creature, because everything was created in, for and through him. He is the divine fullness reconciling to himself all things. The Corinthians were told that “God is all in all”. Here it is Christ who is all.
In his letter to the Romans Paul also brings the Spirit into the process. “When we cry ‘Abba! Father!’ it is that very Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ.” (Rom 8:15-17) Paul extends this privilege to creation. “For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God… in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of glory of the children of God.” (Rom 8:19, 21) We see Christ and the Spirit as the divine reaching to people and creation itself to make them children of God. We see here God emerging slowly as the Trinity reaching out to the whole world communicating Godself. God does this, not through some angels, but directly. God, Christ and the Spirit are involved in the process. Christ is no longer a single human being like other humans but has a cosmic outreach. He is becoming the cosmic Christ.

Paul projects another vision in his letter to the Ephesians. “He (God) destined us for adoption as his children through Jesus Christ… he has made known to us the mystery of his will, according to the good pleasure he set forth in Christ, as a plan for the fullness of time, to gather up all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.” (Eph 1:5, 9-10) The cosmic vision of Paul seems to be from below, God gathering to Godself all things in Christ.

The Vision of John
The Cosmic vision of John seems to be from above, focusing, not on the end but on the beginning.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people… The true light, which enlightens every one, was coming into the world… And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of the father’s only son, full of grace and truth… From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.” (Jn 1:1-4, 9, 14, 16)
The Word of God has always been there, as God and with God. Everything has been created in him and through him. He is the true light that enlightens every one coming into the world. This Word becomes human in Jesus. John, together with other apostles and others knew Jesus, lived with him, was sent by him to proclaim the good news. His experience has made him discover the true identity of Jesus. He is not merely a heavenly being, but Godself in the form of the Word: a Word that reveals, enlightens. But it does so precisely be becoming human to give us a share in his fullness. So we see here the Pauline themes reiterated. Jesus is not a human who becomes God, but God who becomes a man. We see here the process of descent and ascent that we saw in Paul.

The Cosmic Vision
Two perspectives merge both in Paul and John. On the one hand, the real identity of Jesus is ‘discovered’. Jesus was indeed a man. But he is no ordinary man. He is the ‘image’ of the invisible God. He is the image, not merely a representation. He was in the ‘form’ of God, which is a real as the human ‘form’ that he assumed. The divine pre-existence of a person who becomes human, takes on a human body and is born on earth is affirmed. The ‘mystery’ will be, not explained, but set into a mental framework by the Council of Chalcedon, which will speak of one divine person in two, namely divine and human nature. Jesus is therefore is a human, who is also a divine, figure. The second perspective is that, the divine Word does not only become human. It is also at the heart of all reality. Everything has been created in and through him and everything will be gathered again into him. Jesus is the fullness that fills and embraces the whole universe. The story of the universe is the story of the descent and ascent of the Word. Distinguishing the reality of the cosmic Word from the reality of the human Jesus, the theologians tend to use the term Christ to indicate it. So one speaks of the cosmic Christ, distinguishing, not separating, it from the historical Jesus. The historical Jesus can be known through ordinary human means of knowing. But the cosmic Christ can only be an object of faith.

What are the implications of such a vision? The scientists look on the universe as a network of energy in the form of both waves and particles. It had its origin in a still point which breaks up with a ‘big bang’ and starts expanding more 12 billion years ago. Through a process of evolution it has given form to the earth and to the various forms of life that have filled it. The humans emerge as conscious, intelligent, spiritual beings who are not only products of evolution, but who also can act on the various elements of the universe. They can even destroy the earth. But the entrance of God – the Word of God – into this history has given us the hope that in spite of human misdeeds the earth and the universe are destined to be gathered up again so that they will become part of the fullness of Christ merging back into God who will be ‘all in all’. Entering into history, the Word/Christ, in a particular way, energizes and empowers the humans to animate and realize the march of the universe and of humanity towards their fullness in Christ and God.

This evolution of the universe and the humans into their fullness happens in two ways. On the one hand, it remains a cosmic process. God, through the Word and the Spirit, is present and active in the universe and in the humans leading them to their fulfilment. On the other hand, God has also offered a role to the humans themselves to contribute to this fulfilment and fullness. God has created the humans with freedom and responsibility. The humans therefore have to come together to build up a community of freedom and fellowship, love and justice. Godself becomes human in Jesus and gets involved in human and cosmic history, inspiring and animating the humans to build up what Jesus called the ‘Kingdom of God’. He proclaimed and initiated it, but is inviting the humans to carry on and complete this work.

The Second Vatican Council
The Second Vatican Council speaks of God’s plan in many places. In the document on Mission it says:
As the principle without principle form whom the Son is generated and from whom the Holy Spirit proceeds through the Son, God in his great and merciful kindness freely creates us and moreover, graciously calls us to share in his life and glory. He generously pours out and never ceases to pour out, his divine goodness, so that he who is creator of all things might at last become “all in all”. (No. 2)

In this paper we have been focusing on the role of the Son or Word of Christ. Here the role of the Holy Spirit is also evoked, though without specifying it. In the document on the Church in the Modern World, the Bishops say of Christ, the new man:
He who is the “image of the invisible God” (Col 1:15), is himself the perfect man who has restored in the children of Adam that likeness to God which had been disfigured ever since the first sin. Human nature, by the very fact that it was assumed, not absorbed, in him, has been raised in us also to a dignity beyond compare. For by his incarnation, he, the son of God, has in a certain way united himself with each man… Since Christ died for all, and all men are in fact called to one and the same destiny, which is divine, we must hold that the Holy Spirit offers to all the possibility of being made partners, in a way known to God, in the paschal mystery. (No. 22). Both these passages affirm in a delicate way the cosmic dimension of the mystery of Christ. While the second passage focuses on the humans and asserts that Christ ‘has united himself with each man’ and the possibility of being saved is offered to all, the first passage speaks of all things affirming that ‘he who is the creator of all things might at last become “all in all”.

The Consequences
God as creator reaches out to all beings, not only to the humans. Christ – the Word of God – and the Spirit are present and active everywhere. Since the humans are free beings God offers to all the possibility, in a way known to God, of reaching the goal set for them. There is a school of theology in Eastern Church of Syria, probably with roots in some of the Greek Fathers, which thinks that all the humans will eventually be saved so that the vision of Paul of God gathering all things will be realized.

This vision of God sharing God’s life and love with everyone and everything realizes in a concrete way the cosmic vision of Paul and John. If we are convinced of this vision then our own witnessing to the Jesus of history and the Kingdom which he proclaimed and inaugurated need not be aggressive. God, the Word and the Spirit ate present and at work everywhere, in all things and in all humans. God is actively gathering and reconciling all things. He has given us, through Jesus, a mission to witness to God’s love and goodness as manifested in Jesus. But this is not an exclusive mission. Our own mission is at the service of God’s mission, not a substitute for it. Commenting on the uniqueness of Jesus, Pope Francis affirms that it is inclusive, not exclusive.
The uniqueness lies, I would say, in the fact that the faith makes us share, through Jesus, in the relationship he has with God who is Abba, and from this perspective, in the relationship of love which he has with all men and women, enemies included. In other words, the sonship of Jesus, as presented by the Christian faith, is not revealed so as to emphasize an insurmountable separation between Jesus and everyone else; rather, it is revealed to tell us that in him, we are all called to be children in the one Father and so brothers and sisters to one another. The uniqueness of Jesus has to do with communication, not exclusion.

We can note here that we speak of the ‘cosmic Christ’, not of the ‘cosmic Jesus’. Jesus was a limited human being, similar to us in all things, except sin. Even his resurrection does not divinize him. We cannot imagine John writing “In the beginning was Jesus, etc.”. It is true that he is one person with the Word. But as the council of Chalcedon warned us we should neither separate nor confuse the two natures. By speaking of the ‘cosmic Jesus’ we will be confusing the two ‘natures’ in Christ. It is to avoid such confusion that we are speaking of the ‘cosmic Christ’.
A second consequence of the cosmic vision of Paul and John is that our mission today, in collaboration with all people of good will, should reach out, not only to all the humans, but to the whole of creation. Christ is the fullness of all creation. God’s plan is to gather all things so that God will be in ‘all in all’. Francis of Assisi sang of the brother sun and sister moon. Ignatius of Loyola spoke of God present in all things working for us, helping them, so to speak, to achieve their own goal in life. We should, therefore, learn to live in harmony with creation.

Teilhard de Chardin
Teilhard speaks of the process of evolution in four stages: cosmogenesis, biogenesis, anthropogenesis, noogenesis (superconscious), leading to greater spiritualization and personalization. Teilhard suggests that this process is lead, not by a God above, but by a God ahead, the Omega point, which is personal, pre-existent and transcendent. This is Christ – the Cosmic Christ. Noogenesis is therefore Christogenesis. The universe becomes the cosmic body of Christ, experienced and celebrated in the cosmic Eucharist, the whole world becoming the body of Christ. This cosmic body is not a pantheistic entity, but a communion of persons united together in love.

Conclusion
The evocation of the Cosmic Christ as different, not separate, from the historical Jesus leads us to the vision of God as the Trinity of Father, Son and Spirit. The Trinity should not be seen in substantial terms, but as a dynamic circuminsession – a continuing perichoresis. In generating the Son, the Father also creates the universe, which the Son makes his body, offering it to the Father in love. It is love and freedom that avoids pantheism. All is divine, but all is not God.

History is a movement from fullness (Jn 1:16) to fullness (Col 1:19). India sings: “Fullness there, fullness here. From fullness proceeds fullness. When fullness has proceeded from fullness, fullness remains.” Metaphysical categories of energy, movement and relationships would be more helpful than those of substances and causes in our limited attempts to understand the mystery. The world as the body of Christ (God) is not pantheism, but Advaita. The world is not God. It is not apart from God either. It is in God, but totally dependent, one in life and love.

The Western approach to God starts with positing God outside and above the universe as the Creator. It is basically a dualistic outlook. Even the Trinity is hierarchical, centred in the Father from whom the Son is generated and the Spirit proceeds. So the image of the descent and the ascent and the Word – Cosmic Christ – as the mediator. Teilhard focuses on the Eucharist, the world becoming the ‘body of God (Christ)’. Can the human Jesus be more than a symbol? The cosmic Christ of Paul will be cosmic Word of John!

The Eastern approach rather looks for God within, in the depth of the heart/spirit (the Upanishads). It is the Atman/Spirit from which everything emerges. The Spirit evokes cosmic energy – the Tao. The energy is life and love. In the East, perhaps, one could speak, rather, of the Cosmic Spirit! This is not an attempt to equate the Christ/Son and the Spirit. These are two different experiences and two different paradigms. It is to suggest that the divine Mystery can have many names and forms.
Michael Amaladoss, S.J.