Readers who desire to explore the intersection of religion, spirituality, and science will appreciate these two titles.  Ilia Delio’s 2017 Madeleva Lecture in Spirituality is packaged as a 124 page tour-de-force that focuses on nature’s unstoppable drive to become something new and how quantum physics can help to better understand the relationship between mind and matter.

Delio offers insight on many topics throughout, yet all points are made within the constellation of “mind and matter.”  By discovering one’s inner world or “inner universe,” claims Delio, one can grow more fully and become more interconnected with the outer universe.

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, French Jesuit and scientist, observed two types of energy at work in the cosmos.  Tangential energy is the energy of attraction.  Radial energy is the energy of transcendence.  Delio builds on Teilhard’s explanations by unpacking how these energies can also be understood as love and consciousness.  With greater love, there is greater consciousness.

To probe the subject area even deeper, Delio explores the relationship between the soul and the universe.  She points out that nature is defined by its drive to actively self-transcend.  Thus, religion belongs to the universe.  The chapter, “Jesus, the New Person,” presents a possible understanding of Jesus as a cyborg (cybernetic organism), or a hybrid organism of a different nature.  Nature transcends boundaries on all levels.  Delio explains these realizations as an authoritative voice in the rising dialogue between modern science and religious consciousness.

Drawing from the wisdom and the authority of Scripture, Marie Noonan Sabin contributes an equally essential piece of Teilhardian scholarship.  Teilhard’s thought is rooted in the Scriptures, yet unseasoned readers may struggle to recognize this natural connection. 

Over the course of the text, Noonan Sabin presents concrete examples of the link between Teilhard’s thought and Biblical Wisdom.  In Job, the human idea of God changes as faith transforms Job to become a clearer, living reflection of a compassionate God.  Ascent literature provides the foundation for Teilhard’s proposition that the human person is evolving to become “ultra-human.” 

The ultra-human is a more authentic expression of the Divine within one’s being, as one consciously participates in the work of evolution.  The author demonstrates such mystical implications of transformation within the sacred notion of God’s Word in Judaism, within Wisdom personified as the Divine Feminine’s power to transform, and as Wisdom is personalized in Christ.

Noonan Sabin highlights how each of the Gospels goes deeper than the previous in portraying God’s presence in reality.  Mark’s presentation of the Divine is through mystery and the “Christ-Riddle” as Revelation.  Riddling aspects of Mark’s Gospel are clarified through their link to Scripture in the Gospel of Matthew.  Luke, like Teilhard, writes of how Christ’s story is driven by God’s Spirit.  John delivers his message using the Jewish Wisdom traditions and poetic meter.  As with Teilhard, John’s Gospel portrays a story where matter evolves into person, and persons evolve, collectively, into Spirit. 

It would be helpful for readers to have some prior knowledge of Teilhard’s thought before working with this text.  As an English scholar, Noonan Sabin conducts a masterful exegesis of the link between Scripture and Teilhard’s work.  She highlights the richness and relevance of the Bible’s wisdom in light of modern science, while also filling a gap within Teilhardian studies.

Both Ilia Delio and Marie Noonan Sabin offer essential works to the growing cannon of theological thought that is complementary with the modern understanding of the cosmos.  Inquisitive readers will find these works as valuable commentaries on how religion aligns with the insights of modern science, and ultimately leads humanity deeper into the mystery of becoming.