The snake in the mandala: dialogical aspects of Jung’s ‘A study in the process of individuation’

Jung’s study centres on the amplification of pictures painted by a woman patient and posits their sequence as evincing the initial stages of the individuation process. His text performs a dialogue with its audience whereby Jung persuades us of this truth, and also reveals Jung’s dialogue with his patient and with his own ideas. The present paper revisits the clinical material first with a focus on the interaction between Jung and his patient. The second part compares the 1940 and 1950 versions of Jung’s study with attention to tensions that traverse them, such as Jung’s attitude to the animus and his two voices as a practitioner and a theorist.     

Beyond Dialogue: The Role of Science Within Theology

Abstract : The purpose of this article is to provide background overview and contemporary context for the theme of this issue of Dialog, the role of science within theology. Over the last fifty years, this role has primarily involved dialogue and the drive to mutual understanding. That discussion has now reached a new stage seeking to move beyond dialogue toward what some are referring to as hypothetical consonance. One of the most serious constructive proposals moving beyond dialogue is Creative Mutual Interaction (CMI), proposed by Robert John Russell. The first five ways he discusses in CMI specifically address the role of science in theological reflection. It is argued that these five ways will assist the reader in contextualing the discussion found in the articles in this issue. Elaboration of each way is given, concluding with a constructive theological example of the heuristic use of scientific concepts found in quantum field theory.     

The Perspectives and Challenges of Primacy and Synodality in the Orthodox Church Today

The Holy and Great Council of the Orthodox Church in 2016 should be perceived and received as a genuine manifestation of synodality at the beginning of the 21st century. It has reminded us that it is within the exercise of primacy and synodality at the universal level that the unity and the orthodoxy of the church is guaranteed. Its message referred to the proposal for the Holy and Great Council to become a regular institution to be convened every seven or ten years. By saying this, the Holy and Great Council has perhaps inaugurated a new era of synodality in the Orthodox Church on the universal level. This is perhaps the greatest contribution of the Holy and Great Council in an era of globalization, when the pastoral problems encountered by each local autocephalous church, due to a growing secularization of the world, are very similar and need a common synodal response.