Social and Theological Significance of Space

Martyn Percy (Editorial, Modern Believing, Volume 42:2, April 2001)

There was a young lady named Bright
Who could travel much faster than light
She started one day
In the relative way
And came back on the previous night.

Anon

Time and space are two taken for granted commodities that we could all use more of. In this first (proper) year of the new Millennium, public attention to the meanings of time and their spatial celebration have been noticeably prominent. The Greenwich Millennium Dome is now closed - at least as an event - but many monuments to the last year or so will live on both spatially and temporally. The marking of time and space never ceases, and what is behind us is ever before us.

In keeping with the year, this issue is concerned with a cluster of perspectives that examine the social and theological significance of space. Ralph Norman's paper on the Ascension revisits a doctrine that has been often ignored in the twentieth century, at least in terms of theological writing. The paper begins by noting why the doctrines of the Ascension may be interpreted as a legitimate development of the early Christian tradition, whilst cautiously exploring the cosmological themes that are connected with the doctrine in patristic medieval and reformation writing. Having shown that these classic interpretations of Luke's model led to a sophisticated understanding of the doctrine which already foresaw and sidestepped Bultmann's later criticisms of the Ascension, the paper explores the extent to which this classical model remains a viable theological concern for today.

Absent bodies is something that is also reflected on by Gerald Downing, Peter Mott and John Rodwell in their article 'A Matter of Life and Death'. Although Christian funeral liturgies invite us to reflect on the life to be lived before death, and to an extent the life to come, they have little to say about corpses and their disposal. Increasingly, the disposal of the body is a matter for non-discussion, left to either local custom or the vagaries of commercial pressures. What though, would it mean to reflect theologically on the disposal of the body? The authors consider that the lack of shared attention to the issue is not only unsatisfactory, but also invites some positive applied theology that could lead to some possible interim suggestions.

Christopher Liley, a clergyman from Shrewsbury, now the Archdeacon-elect of Lichfield, also looks at images in space and time. He offers a personal and theological perspective on the 'Seeing Salvation' Exhibition that took place in the National Gallery during 2000 - another millennial event that still resonates. In particular, Liley addresses how the actuality of salvation is announced in a particular place, which leads him to conclude that salvation itself is a process, not simply an event. Time and space are again related.

Finally, Theo Hobson steps up to the Podium of this issue, and takes a swipe at the National Lottery. In 'Another Dome, Another Scam', he invites us to consider the relationship between the Millennium Dome, the process of raising funds for that, and the original Dome of St Peter's in Rome. As they sometimes say in Private Eye magazine, 'I wonder, could these two by any chance be related'? Who knows. At any rate, the proverbial wisdom of T. S. Eliot is as illuminating as ever:

What is actual is actual only for one time.
And only for one place.
In time and space, we cannot but pause for thought.

Modern Believing, MCU, October Vol. 42, No. 2, April 2001