Preface

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    "Count it all joys, my brothers [and sisters], when you meet various trials, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing." (Jas:2-4) In other words, everything in life is a grace, i.e., everything happening in life is a blessing or a blessing in disguise by the grace of God, even a particular difficult trial.

     Just as all of us have experienced painful trials in life, so had the author. Having been healed by Providence of the shame and pain, he is now quite thankful to Providence for the two great trials in life which have gracefully produced the necessary faithful steadfastness for doing Catholic Theology of Energies which does require such a character. Despite 35 years of work trusting in the Lord's guidance and the advice of others, it is very sure that this Theology is put together more for the future generations than for the present one, although many people have been blessed by this project. As the history of theology teaches us clearly, the sensitive incultural or encultural development, communication, and acceptance of a theology as a process does not move as fast as the mass making, selling, and eating of McDonald's fast food.

     Accordingly, the two big trials the author's life are that he had completed successfully two doctoral theses but without obtaining the two Ph.D. degrees. The first time happened due to missing unintentionally a certain deadline of a very strict university in Germany in 1989 and the second time was because of some unexpected situation taking place in 1992. However, it was his third successful Ph.D. thesis completed in 2018 at Fu Jen Catholic University through which a doctoral degree was granted to him. In retrospect, if he had obtained a doctoral degree either in 1989 or in 1992, he would never have gone to the Far East providentially to study and helped to have developed to some significant extent the Catholic Theology of Qis founded by Rev. Emeritus Prof. Aloysius Chang, S.J. (1929-2015).

    In any case, entitled Energy in the Philosophy of Teilhard de Chardin, here is the cover page of the first doctoral thesis signed by his beloved professor. The second doctoral thesis supervised by another professor in another university was published in 1992 by the Edwin Mellen Press in Lewiston, New York. It was later presented as the volume one in the English series of Catholic Theology of Energies entitled Energy and Environment: The Spiritual-Human-Material Nexus.

    For the near future, due to other research works, there is no immediate plan to revise and upgrade Energy in the Philosophy of Teilhard de Chardin as "Energy in the Natural Theology of Teilhard de Chardin." It is true that there has been a plan to do so for many years. Therefore, this research paper completed in 1989 is now published online without any correction and revision as it was as a historical research document. Hopefully, it would be helpful to those who are really interested in Teilhard de Chardin (1881-1955) as well as in the development of Catholic Theology of Energies (Qis). Without doubt, it would be a tremendous loss to the future cultivation of Catholic Theology of Energies, if the numerous energy terms and their transcosmic process in the thought of Teilhard (cf. Chapter II and Chapter III of this research work) are not sufficiently tapped into.

    Finally, since there has been quite a lot of negative suspicions by many good Christians towards Teilhard's ideas, it may be important to list the following positive comments on this great Catholic thinker by St. Pope John Paul II, Pope Benedict XVI, and Pope Francis.

   Alleluia! Alleluia! Praise and thanks be to the Most Holy Trinity and Its whole Family of Holy Angels and Saints!

The Author, 

Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity Sunday. June 7, 2020 

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