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This is a rough draft, & no substitute for reading the book.

Paul Tillich begins by saying that faith is the state of being ultimately concerned. Concentrate at first on state of being -- how we think, speak, act. Like other beings, humans have concerns such as food and shelter. Unlike other beings, we also have "spiritual concerns." Think of what drives & shapes the behavior of people:
Graduating, and college admission.
Food.
Friendship.
Physical appearance.
Alcohol & other substances.
A person they love.
Professional success, and its rewards.
Creating things.
A sense of meaning and purpose.
Family.
Physical pleasure.
Shelter.
Political beliefs.
Doing good.
Religious beliefs.
It could be a long list. These things we care about are "concerns." Any of these concerns can come to dominate one's life. How can we tell if they do? They would demand total surrender -- chiefly of all other concerns. They would promise total fulfillment -- a powerful lure. They would carry a threat of punishment if the demands aren't met; PT uses the example of the Old Testament Hebrews dealing with their demanding God. If one of our concerns is that important, you could say it claims ultimacy in our life. They often don't.
An example close to Tillich is Germany in the 1930s. The nation became the overwhelming concern of citizens. They were focused, centered, "together" as individuals & as a society. Ask: What did the citizens surrender to this powerful vision? How did they hope to be fulfilled? And what was the threat? Those who weren't with them died, or fled like Tillich, or hid.
Another example Tillich uses is social and financial success. It may demand sacrifices -- of genuine relationships with others, of one's deepest principles, of the complex creativity we embody. It may promise fulfillment. And it may threaten with social marginalization and poverty.
If a person accepts the unconditional demand, the promise of ultimate fulfillment, and is willing to risk the accompanying threats from the ultimate concern, they have faith, he says. Their acceptance is an act -- hence faith is dynamic in nature. And all other concerns may be sacrificed if necessary.

Freedom ? PT has a different take on this than most of us. He insists not only that "Faith is a matter of freedom" but that they are identical. He seems to think it has to do with a "possibility" -- the possibility of making a centered personal act (5). Don't panic. PT says that possibility seems to exist only through faith; in fact, he flies in the face of the modern notion that faith -- or commitment -- limits freedom. Freedom requires faith. Think about what he means by freedom, and what a centered personal act is. In which someone has it all together; wherever they are, they are all there, in the moment, aware and alive and able to act. Is this familiar?

Having it together leads to ecstasy, PT says. Not an emotional outburst,ecstasy seems to be a result of the unity of every element in the centered self; no contradictions, a life marked by integrity and wholeness (6-7). Think of those rare moments when the performance of an athlete, dancer, musician, artist flows effortlessly, thought and action in total synch. The memory of such moments makes them want to repeat them, sustain them. For a spiritually-inclined person, a parallel can be drawn to the motivations behind prayer, sitting, and many other forms of "practice." Increasing the opportunities for harmony, unity, ecstasy, all contained within us, elusive yet achievable.

We might think of ecstasy as related to passion -- the passion for the infinite -- "restlessness of the heart" being a symptom of our intuitive understanding that there is something more to this existence than there seems to be on its face, and the resulting sense of tension, agitation, dissatisfaction. (Reflect on Lasch's essay, on Theo in Children of Men, on Marlowe's journey.) PT says there is an "element of infinity" in human beings -- we're able to transcend the flux of relative & transitory experiences of ordinary life. We can understand the meaning of God/ultimate/Sacred/infinite. We have the necessary tools. And, sensing the infinite to which we belong, we are driven toward faith -- it's "infinite passion," for the infinite (9).

Think about the things that separate people -- unable to connect, relationships that don't work, when the gap between you (subject) and someone else (object) is wide. Think about the closest relationships you have, in which boundaries seem to dissolve, the gap disappears. What unites you?
Tillich says the ultimate concern unites the subjective and objective (10). The act of faith (subject), & the ultimate concern itself (object), overcome separation. An example: "Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with sighs too deep for words. And he who searches the hearts of men knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God." (Romans 8:26-27) This seems to say that even a prayer is successful because it is God as Spirit praying within us. The "source" of the act of faith is present in subject, in object, and beyond both (11). Big Thought. Let's infer that ideas of God are thus provisional -- ambitious but inadequate attempts to get a handle on the source.

If people focus on a "concern" that turns out not to be ultimate/unconditional/ infinite, disappointment is inevitable. We're wrapped up in something that offers the illusion of ultimacy. It is finite but claims infinity, as with nationalism (Nazi Germany). Mistaking something finite for something infinite leads to profound disappointment & often a cynical refusal of even the provisional claims of the shattered U.C. Example: If someone's ultimate concern is the U.S., its founding ideas, the Declaration, Constitution, Bill of Rights, etc. They slowly realize the country doesn't measure up. Cynical and disillusioned, they ditch the country and the ideas. They are victims of idolatry, PT says -- thus idolatrous faith focuses on something preliminary (not ultimate), finite (not infinite), and elevates them to ultimacy. It ends in existential disappointment. Think of people living for something or someone that turns out to be unworthy, fragile, flimsy, untrue, fleeting. They will face a loss of the center, disharmony, a lack of balance -- koyaanisqaatsi to the Hopi -- disruption of the personality. This is inevitable. Ecstasy can hide it, but only for a while.

A related idea goes back to Otto -- it's that the idea of the holy has shrunk (12-16). Reduced to meaning justice, or truth, moral perfection. Lost is the meaning of "separated" or "transcending," "fascinating & terrifying," "Wholly Other." It's no longer the oldest, deepest meaning of holy. In its deepest and oldest meaning Holy precedes ideas of good and evil, the demonic -- the destructive aspect -- is part of it. If the holy shrinks to what is rational, good, true, then the full meaning has been lost. It's genuine meaning must be rediscovered, in all its ambiguity.

Doubt, Risk, Courage Here's a thought some find odd & others find obvious:
There is no such thing as faith without a sense of doubt, despair and risk (17-22). Courage makes it all work; courage is an essential element; it accepts uncertainty, which can't be removed from faith. Courage is the "daring self-affirmation of one's own being in spite of the powers of 'nonbeing' which are the heritage of everything finite." (17)
Risk is a requirement, and so is courage. There can't be total, unambiguous certainty about the content of faith -- e.g., content as God, bible, nation, success. Take a deep breath and think about that sentence for a minute.
The risk comes because what was thought to be a matter of ultimate concern may turn out to be a matter of preliminary & transitory concern. This is the greatest risk; we may have surrendered ourselves to something which turns out to not be worth it. Given away our personal center. If so, despair results, and proof that the concern was idolatrous. The risk is unavoidable. Ultimate concern is ultimate risk and ultimate courage.
So take a minute and think about the risk. Every faith has a concrete element -- something or somebody, a concern which may prove to be not ultimate. Then faith in its concrete expression fails. A god vanishes, but the status and quality of divinity remain. If one concrete element vanishes, a new content can be re-established. In a related way, doubt is necessary to faith. It's a consequence of the risk. It's the kind of doubt that comes with a risk, with being ultimately concerned with a concrete content. It's existential doubt. It has nothing to do with proof, and thus it has nothing to do with the idea of belief.
A related thought -- existential doubt (20-22) is the awareness of the insecurity in every existential truth. Courage enables one to accept the insecurity. Doubt is not a permanent experience; it's part of the structure, however. Doubt is not the negation of faith. It's an element which was always & will always be present in the act of faith, doubt & faith being poles of the same reality.
Community and language are requirements for faith, PT says. Faith needs language and language needs community. Think of it maybe as "community" and also "communication." Why are they necessary? Faith is best seen in its doctrinal formulations & in a group setting (22). The act of faith depends on language & therefore on community; language requires a community of spiritual beings to come alive (23). Language is necessary for an act of faith or religious experience itself (24). And it can't be understood outside the community of believers. It's only as a member of such a community that we have a concrete content for our U.C. (formed by language), and only in a community of language can we actualize our faith.

If you're thinking "great, but what about heresy (25)?" It means someone who has denied the foundations of their community's faith. They've turned away, to a false & idolatrous concern, and may undermine the community. Historically, heretics are sent away, or worse.....yet if a community succeeds in enforcing spiritual conformity it has removed risk & courage and changed faith into a behavior pattern which doesn't admit alternatives & loses its character of ultimacy.

In a related way, why is pushing infallibility not such a hot idea?
Well.... PT says it excludes doubt in those who subject themselves to these authorities (28). They can't struggle with doubt regarding the infallible statements of authorities. Their faith has become static as opposed to dynamic, a non-questioning obedience of the concrete elements -- religious authorities -- as well as to the ultimate. This is a case where something preliminary and conditional -- the human interpretation of the content of faith -- is elevated above the risk of doubt and "receives ultimacy."
This is what Protestantism fought against, and later the Enlightenment fought against in the increasingly static Protestantism.
Onward.
Do non-ultimate things point the way to the ultimate? Yes. Big idea.
For example, a creed in the Book of Common Prayer is an expression of the ultimate concern, and like all creeds, PT says, it must include its own criticism -- it must become obvious that it (the creed itself) is not ultimate, and that its function is to point to the ultimate which is beyond all of them (29).
Substitute for "creed" the word "minister" or "priest" or "rabbi" or even "Bible," and it's the same idea.
There must be room for protest -- a "Protestant principle," the critical element in the expression of the community of faith and the element of doubt in the act of faith. The doubt and the critical approach must always be possible, not necessarily acted upon. So in a tradition, its doctrines, institutions, and clergy, are not above "prophetic judgment'" or in any way immune. They stand under that judgment. And when a person, book, ritual, doctrine, etc., becomes the focal point, the community is in a world of trouble because no person, book, ritual, etc., is bulletproof.
These things point the way. They point to something else.
Hang onto the thought. And remember, we're having fun here.

Notes on Tillich's Dynamics of Faith, Ch. 3

Again, this is very rough.

Symbols are a big deal to Tillich; they unlock things.
The six characteristics of a symbol are that 1) they point to something beyond themselves, which connects to the idea that symbols are finite but allow access to something infinite; 2) they "participate in" that to which they point, for example, a flag "participates in" the power & dignity of the nation for which it stands, & can't be replaced except after an historic catastrophe that changes the nature of the nation it symbolizes. So an attack on the flag is an attack on the group it represents, & thus is "blasphemous;" 3) they open up levels of reality which are otherwise closed -- a view not otherwise available -- a way of seeing things, previously unknown, is created -- a new point of view; the vision is different. Think of the way a poem or a picture which reveals something otherwise unseen (e.g., pointillist, Impressionist, light, polytonal chanting); 4) they "unlock dimensions & elements of our soul which correspond to the dimensions & elements of reality." Hidden depths of our own being. Think. Something dormant within, occasionally stirred. And what we see through the symbol we learn to see in reality, & there are "within us dimensions of which we cannot become aware except through symbols, as melodies & rhythms in music"; 5) they cannot be produced unintentionally, but rather come from the unconscious & must be accepted by the unconscious to function. For political & religious symbols, the group's "collective unconscious" must accept them. 6) they grow and die like living things, growing when the situation is ripe, and dying when the situation changes. (e.g., a "king" is a symbol that has pretty much ceased to be). Note: Symbols do not grow because we long for them, & don't die because of criticism of a scientific or critical kind. They die because they can no longer produce response in the group......

Why say "not less than a symbol" rather than "only a symbol?" Well, maybe Tillich means that saying "only a symbol" takes the whole idea too lightly, dismisses it as not big deal. Thus the more correct way to think might be "Are you kidding? Only a symbol?! No: it's a symbol! Nothing less! " The way we express things with symbols -- symbolic language -- overwhelms nonsymbolic language in quality, strength, & power. Think of the relative power of advertising. Or the symbols used in many contexts. Rain -- in movies, plays, photographs, and songs. Or fire. The wind. The ocean. A river. Trees.

Anyway, concepts are turned into symbols, as part and parcel of the character of ultimacy and the nature of faith. In other words, a person who is concerned with, say, God, thinks about God. And the person is driven to express those thoughts -- Otto says so, and so does Tillich. The strange fact is that one's concern -- in this case, God -- eludes discussion because our language isn't up to the task. We can't quite wrap God up in our language. Yet the need to express these thoughts about God is all-consuming. And they are eventually expressed, most deeply, powerfully, lastingly, in symbols -- so symbols are a way of directing thought, and perhaps of articulating. The true ultimate transcends the finite, including finite language (e.g., what believer really thinks that by saying "God" they've got a handle on whatever it is that word represents to them? God transcends its own name). And when we talk about that thing which is our ultimate concern, what we say has symbolic meaning, as it points beyond the words themselves to something immeasurably greater, in which it participates.

What is the fundamental symbol of our ultimate concern? Let's keep working to follow Tillich here when he says that God is the fundamental symbol of our Ultimate Concern, always present in the act of faith, even the act that is a denial of God. One God can deny another. Perhaps here Tillich is using the word "God" in a way familiar to Christians, Jews, Muslims; perhaps he is using it in a bigger way that would ordinarily have a small "g". In any case, here's a thought to hang onto: Tillich says that atheism, taken seriously, must mean the removal of any ultimate concern, and to be unconcerned about the meaning of our existence. Thus if someone isn't indifferent to the meaning of their life, all life, then they aren't an atheist, to PT.

Moving along here, Tillich notes that it's meaningless to question the ultimacy of an ultimate concern. The ultimacy in the idea of God is certain. And for P.T., the real question is "which of the innumerable symbols of faith is most adequate to the meaning of faith" -- which symbol of ultimacy expresses the ultimate w/o idolatrous elements?

Tillich says myths are not only "stories of the gods," in which man's ultimate concern is symbolized in divine figures and actions, but also the combination of symbols of our ultimate concern. Myths are symbols of faith combined in stories about divine-human encounters, present in every act of faith, because language (the medium of myth) is a symbol. The great traditions attack, criticize & transcend myths, which use material from our ordinary experience & put the gods into a time/space context although they are beyond both. Myths split up the divine; each resulting figure is less than ultimate, leading to conflicts of ultimate claims.

Because myths are "the language of faith," they can't be replaced by something of a different character, like a scientific substitute. Refer back to pp. 22-24. Rummaging around in here, pay attention to Tillich's interrelated ideas of demythologization (DEM), literalism, and broken myth. If DEM points to the need to see a symbol and a symbol & a myth as a myth, it's a positive idea. If DEM means the removal of symbols & myths altogether, it's destructive, to be attacked & rejected, and in fact will never be successful, because symbol & myth are the forms of the human consciousness which are always present. Myth can be replaced by myth, but myth cannot be excised from spiritual life.

DEM can be seen by some as a threat to their faith. Their resistance to the awareness brought about by DEM can be supported by systems -- political or religious, but authoritarian, to give security to subjects & unchallenged power to authority. Think of powerful religious or political figures who either manipulate symbols masterfully or put themselves at the center. Hitler. David Koresh. The Wizard of Oz saying "pay no attention to that man behind the curtain...." On and on. The people feel secure. The authorities love the power.

This is literalism, the refusal to see a myth as a myth, or a symbol as a symbol. They've made the mistake of taking something finite, conditional, preliminary and elevating it to infinite, unconditional, ultimate. Something like a minister, rabbi, mullah, the Bible, the Koran, a prophet, a flag, etc. And so literalism is the resistance against DEM; it presupposes that God is a being acting in time and space and living in a special place, affecting the course of events & being affected by them. In this way literalism deprives God of ultimacy & majesty by drawing God down to the finite & conditional level. Thus symbols & myths are understood in their immediate meaning, and the idea of a symbol pointing beyond itself is disregarded. So a person might think, Adam & Eve really walked around in a real garden called Eden, Jonah really was swallowed by the whale, the virgin birth is a beguiling biological fact, and the Second Coming a sure-fire cosmic event. And Tillich says that in the last analysis, literalism becomes idolatrous, because it calls something ultimate which is less than ultimate. In contrast, faith which is aware of the symbolic nature of its symbols gives God the honor which is due.

Ask me about Lance Kelly breaking his grandfather's horse, in the pond near Huntsville. Think of broken myth, which refers to a myth understood as a myth but not removed or replaced. Tillich says Christianity denies by its nature any unbroken myth, because its first presupposition is the first commandment, which affirms the ultimate as ultimate & rejects idolatry. Thus mythological elements in the Bible, or doctrine, or liturgy should be recognized as mythological, but should also be maintained in their symbolic form & not replaced by scientific substitute. It is one response to one result of literalism, in which one sees the mythical and literal as indistinguishable, and so a "broken myth" is understood and lived with because our questioning mind breaks through the natural acceptance of the mythological visions as literal.

If faith takes its symbols literally, then we repress our questions & uncertainty, and choose a conscious literalism using as a tool an acknowledged sacred authority like the Church or the Bible. Tillich says this is unjustifiable for a mature mind; it is at war with autonomous thought.
Tillich says Christian theologians argue that the word myth should be reserved for repetitive natural processes & their meaning, whereas if we see the world in terms of a historical process with beginning, middle & end as in Christianity & Judaism, the term "myth" should not be used. But Tillich says this would reduce the scope of the word dramatically and turn myth into a "discarded idiom" of our language instead of being the "language of our ultimate concern." And, he says, history shows that there are natural & historical myths. If we see earth as the battleground of divine powers, or see God as selecting & guiding a nation through history toward some end, or see Christ as transcendent & divine but appearing on earth, living, dying, & rising again, then we have an historical myth.

Notes on Tillich's Dynamics of Faith, pp. 55-73

Read these hastily written notes critically.....
In pages 55-73 our man Paul Tillich covers some important turf. Some points to ponder: On 56-57, PT talks about the two main elements in the experience of the holy:
A) The presence of the holy here and now, so that it is present & felt as present. Here the holy is breaking into ordinary reality, shaking it and "driving it beyond itself in an ecstatic way." (Play with that one a while.....) And consecrating the place where it appears, & its own reality, provoking terror & fascination, setting up rules by which it can be approached. Curious? Check out the Old Testament.....
B) The second element is of the holy is "judgment over everything that is," demanding personal & social holiness in the form of justice & love, & commanding what we should be. In this case our Ultimate Concern represents what we are in our essence & ought to always be. So it's an experience of the holiness of what ought to be. This is the moral type of experience. Well, here's the big deal:
P.T. says these two elements shape the way faith manifests itself within a tradition, or among traditions. They are intimately personal, and an intimate part of the movement of the great historical religions. Found in every act of faith, but one element will be predominant, since we can't handle all aspects of faith in a perfect balance.

By tolerance, does our man think what we usually associate with that word? P.T. says that people are always trying to reach the ultimate, which can't be reached. That fact causes tension, and the issue of tolerance emerges. "Negative tolerance" is relativistic and asks for nothing ultimate; having no real content, it tends toward intolerant absolutism. (!) The struggle for one engaged in an act of faith is to harmonize tolerance, based on its relativity, with the certainty at the core of one's ultimate concern. This is particularly a problem with Protestant Christianity, he says (and that would mean Episcopalians, among others). It is great & dangerous because it makes possible the "power of self-criticism" and the "courage to face one's own relativity." So there's an infinite tension -- between the absoluteness of its claim and the relativity of its life. Test: What does "its" refer to in that sentence?

Are you thinking "Yes, but what is a sacramental type of religion? And why, oh why, is transparency important? This is important, and related to the ideas PT talked about with regard to symbols and myth.
Sacramentalism is present in all religions, keeping faith from becoming empty, abstract, and without significance; it enables the faithful to be "grasped by the holy through a special medium." Because the holy is present here and now, it manifests itself -- in a person, an event, etc., which is chosen or emerges through a visionary experience, is accepted by a group, passed on from one generation to the next, and changed in the process. So a concrete chunk of reality serves as the medium of the holy, communicating "the ultimate ground" and "meaning of all reality." Anything can become the "bearer" of the holy. Such a thing is sacramental in character. So: a jar of water, a tree, this cup of wine, this piece of bread, this river, powerful spot, time of day, moment in the calendar year, this color, word, book, person, "bears the holy." Through such a thing faith experiences the content of the ultimate concern. The reactions can run the gamut from awe to fear, adoration, fascination, idolatry, etc. Also, and these are big for our friend PT:
* no one can judge the validity of the sacramental object and another's faith, PT says!
* faith can't be judged from the outside, PT says. Let's ponder that one, compadres......
* the faithful can ask, or be asked, whether the medium expresses real ultimacy. This presupposes the inadequacy of the finite to express what is of ultimate concern, but we forget that and identify the object with the ultimate. Big stuff.
* transparency must be kept -- the notion that the source of holiness is shining through that you're looking through and past the object to the something greater, infinite, ultimate, absolute, unconditional, etc.

Want more? Let's discuss true mysticism & how it relates to the soul. Glimpse page 62. You may find this interesting.

Mysticism is "a type of faith," like sacramentalism. Every type of faith has a mystical element as well as a sacramental element. P.T. says (60) that mystics have been driven to transcend every piece of reality & reality as a whole in their faith, driven by the limitations and dangers of the sacramental type of faith. They realize that the U.C. can't be identified with a piece of reality or expressed in a rational system (61). Mystics identify the ultimate with the "ground of being," the irreducible substance of everything, going beyond the concrete & sacramental. All concreteness disappears in the abyss of pure divinity (you may want to read this sentence at least twice).

Mystics find themselves in ecstatic experience that can be described in language that denies the possibility of describing it. (Read that one twice, too...) Hence the paradoxes of Otto, Arjuna, Lao Tzu, Jesus, and innumerable others, driven to try to communicate because what they have experienced is so powerful, yet confined by the fact that what they confronted defies language's best efforts to capture it. They tend to say the infinite is present in the human soul. It's a point of contact; think of a spark. A fire. How earlier human beings tried to understand what fire was, where it came from, how useful & frightening & mysterious it was. To reach the point mystics have reached means getting beyond subject/object distinctions -- and specific techniques are developed to achieve that. And, mystics are in the business of trying to merge their mind with the Something, accepting a preliminary stage of union with the infinite and working & hoping for a final ecstasy. And friends, what he's talking about is a real pattern of religious life. It's going on around us, and around the world.

What's the big thing about secular and religious. And where does humanism fit in? P.T. uses lots of "ifs" w/ regard to Humanism. Always a clue for the careful reader to be on guard. He says that Humanism implies faith, faith means the state of being ultimately concerned about the ultimate; a humanist "makes man the measure of his own spiritual life, because the divine is manifest in the human & the U.C. of man is the "true man, man of the idea, in his essence." (63) In this case the humanist's U.C. is man, which is the ultimate in finite reality, just as sacramental faith sees the ultimate in a piece of reality or as mystical faith finds in the depth of man the place of the infinite. But the sacramental and mystical people try to reach beyond man & his world; humanism stays w/in those limits. Thus humanism is called "secular," while sacramental & mystical types are "religious. On pg. 64, I think, PT uses"secular" as a synonym with Eliade's "Profane." But if a "secular" person has an U.C., they are w/in the community of the f