Natural Theology

And now I want to briefly share what you may expect taking courses at Chiist University.

Natural theology is a theological perspective that starts from a default position of no religious belief. It uses human reason, scientific discoveries, and philosophical arguments to prove the existence of and explore the nature of the holy spirit that has different names in different tongues. To be clear the concept of God depends on the nature of the culture of which it permeates.

There are many perspectives of natural theology much of it from the Eurocentric perspective as many of us know, to be discussed in Depth in the course curriculum. There's the Judeo-Christian, the Islamic, Jewish, Asian perspectives and so on. Each one providing an opportunity for their adherents to see God from their depth.

In African Natural theology the goal is not to dispute diverse religious thoughts, but to affirm the people’s understanding, or their attempt to understand the unknown, without contempt and rancor. Given that Chiist University is focused on introducing to students, the African perspectives of who ChinEke is, students will venture into Africa’s relationship with God from the traditional ontology of being.

In relation to the forces of nature, our ancestors had imagined a kind of physiological structure of ChinEke by the way of departmentalizing the forces of nature, and ascribing their functions to each department, have pulled out an ontological hierarchy presided over by ChinEke in which

our ancestors saw the sun, the moon, the elements of the sky, thunder and lightning, rivers and lakes, the earth and the Ancestors, as the symbols of ChinEke in all living things, omnipresence, and immortality.

In Igbo Natural Theology, natural occurrences in nature extracts who ChinEke is to us. Our ancestors, by ascribing different aspects of nature to is ontological structure of ChinEke, explained the interconnectedness of the natural order of the cosmos to the very nature of ChinEke. In Africa, Natural phenomena bears a masculinity and feminine attribution to nature, as is also male and female attributes in humanity.

Chiist learners will learn the significance of these ontological structures, the philosophical and spiritual blessedness of nature, and its unconquerable connectedness to the eminence of ChinEke.

Students will engage in detailed discussions and learn the imperatives of valuing natural phenomena as instructive tools for the relative elucidation of African conscious focus on experience, scientific discoveries, and practical description of the unknown to explain their

understanding of the nature of ChinEke, not based on faith and exclusive truth.

What has long been ascribed the term animist with derogatory and outright hostility, by many religions of the book was common-sense approach by civilized minds of yore, and require more understanding, appreciation, and careful study.

The books to be used for this course and the university library is the Nkomii the Holy book of Chiism with pragmatic and spiritually empowering content, books written by African researchers

into African spiritual tenets and wisdom, and many anthologies written by Ahanyi K.O.K Onyioha, who propounded Chiism (Godianism).