WARNING: this post contains rampant philosophical speculation!

What could a snowflake have to do with our understanding of God?

In an earlier post (Symbols of God), I suggested that in order to move away from our anthropomorphic views of God as a supernatural being who sits outside our universe creating us as a potter or watchmaker might and occasionally intervening in history as a chess master might move pieces across a chessboard that we instead turn to nature for new symbols of God. One symbol I proposed was to see our relationship with God as similar to the snowflake’s relationship to the water that lies behind the flake. The water is the “ground” of the snowflake. Each snowflake is a unique creation but shares with others the dynamic element that is the water out of which they are created. Similarly, God can be seen as the “ground” of all of existence – the creative essence out of which we and the universe come from.

I would like to explore this analogy a little deeper. The description above helps to illuminate one important aspect of the snowflake: although each has a unique crystallized structure, its ground is a different form altogether. The tiny solid crystal originates in liquid water that at one point was part of a vast ocean, but which evaporated to a vapor in the clouds. The snowflake will fall to the ground where it will later melt. Although the unique crystal will no longer exist, its essence, its water, returns to its source as the water molecules that made up the flake flow into a stream that eventually joins the ocean.

However, the water as the ground of the snowflake is not all that is required to make a snowflake. The snowflake comes into existence (it “becomes”) through a process. This process is governed by scientific laws of chemistry and physics that dictate how the water evaporates from the ocean and how the cloud vapor condenses, freezes, and crystallizes. This process is also influenced by external conditions: namely the temperature and the humidity of the surroundings. In other words, the creation that results in a unique individual snowflake is the result of the interactions of the ground (the water) with the crystallization process itself, which is governed by laws and external conditions.

Besides the concepts of “ground” and “process,” a third concept is necessary to have a snowflake: the concept of the snowflake itself. Begin with the same water vapor and the same physical laws but alter the environment and you might end up with a rain drop or sleet instead of snow. Even when all conditions are perfect for snow, we do not just get one kind of snowflake. The physical structure of each flake is unique, each is an individual, yet we can easily recognize that it is a snowflake and not a rain drop or sleet because the concept of a snowflake exists. The combination of ground and process creates an individual flake out of the potential for a flake. Thus, to the creative process, we add “potentiality” or “possibility.” A snowflake can only exist because there is a possibility of a snowflake to exist in the first place. The concept of potentiality is important because it not only allows for a snowflake to exist, but it is also a limiting factor. As stated earlier, change the conditions or alter the process and we no longer have a snowflake but a raindrop.

Now imagine again the relationship between God and the universe as the snowflake with the three aspects that allows it to exist: ground, process, and potentiality. In theology, we traditionally speak of the qualities of God in terms of words like omniscience (“all knowing”), omnipotence (“all-powerful), transcendent (“above” or “beyond”), and immanent (“within” or “present”).

I suggest here that we might better conceive of God as part of the creative essence and process that calls us into existence and then sustains that existence. Thus, we can think of God as the ground of existence (the water to the snowflake). We can think of God also as being the creative process or the power that calls existence into being (the process and the laws that govern the creation of the snowflake). The third part of our new Trinitarian view of God is that within the infinite nature that is God lies the infinite possibilities of existence (the concept of the snowflake itself).

God is thus the creative ground and force behind existence, but within existence there is freedom, just as there is freedom in the creation of each snowflake that becomes a unique crystal. However, our freedom is not unlimited. We are products of our environments. The process of our creation connects us to what came before and what surrounds us. Because of my genetic heritage, for example, I will never be a 6’7” basketball player, nor could I have been a Chinese national. I am uniquely me, and I have a great latitude over what I might do with my life, but reality dictates that this latitude is ultimately finite.

Our new view of God, therefore, contains an element of 1. Ground, 2. Process, and 3. Potential. These elements can also be spoken of in terms of having the qualities of 1. Essence or Being, 2. Dynamism or Becoming, and 3. Ideal or Form. Of course, these ideas are not new at all. From the 20th century theologian Paul Tillich we find in #1 his “ground of being.” From his contemporary Alfred North Whitehead, we get #2 in “process theology” (as expanded by Charles Hartshorne), and going back two and a half millennium we find in #3 the idea of Plato’s “Eternal Forms.”

Like the traditional Christian view of the Trinity, this new Trinitarian concept is not meant to be three distinct, finite qualities of God. The infinite nature of God means that each of these qualities is part of the larger whole; in fact, each can be seen as the same divine quality manifested in a different way.

Finally, we should caution ourselves not to take the metaphor of the snowflake too literally (as often happens with the monarchical imagery of God as a king sitting on a throne in heaven). The water that is the ground of the snowflake, the process that creates the snowflake, and the concept of the snowflake itself are meant only to be symbolic representations of the relationship of God to the physical universe. God is not foreign or separate to our universe or ourselves but is intimately connected in these ways.