Radically Happy

Starting with John 17, introduce the term “diaphoris” (in contrast to perichoresis) to characterize the fractally emergent generative cycle of divergence/convergence at the heart of reality.

ChatGPT Prompt

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“The glory that You have given Me I have given to them, that they may be one even as We are one… I in them and You in Me, that they may become perfectly one.”
— John 17:22–23

When Jesus prays for His followers in John 17, He doesn’t ask the Father to absorb them into sameness. He doesn’t plead for uniformity, conformity, or even comfort. He asks for glory—a glory defined by oneness that is somehow mirrored in the Trinity itself.

But this “oneness” isn’t static. It’s not a melting into indistinction. It’s a communion of distinction, a unity born of love through difference. The key lies not merely in perichoresis—the classic doctrine of the mutual indwelling of the Trinity—but in something more dynamic, more painful, more creative.

Let me propose a new term for this dimension of divine life: diaphoris.

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A1. Perichoresis and Its Limits

Perichoresis is a beautiful, ancient word. It evokes the interpenetration and mutual indwelling of the Father, Son, and Spirit—a divine choreography of perfect love.

But in John 17, Jesus doesn’t just describe a present dance—He describes a movement. A journey. A mission.

• The Father sends.
• The Son is glorified through suffering.
• The Spirit is promised to draw all things into unity.

This is not just co-dwelling. This is sending and returning, distancing and embracing, glory gained through agony. This is something more like…

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A2. Diaphoris: Bearing Through Difference

Diaphoris (from dia, “through/apart,” and phorēin, “to bear”)

The sacred dynamic by which difference is borne, crossed, and ultimately reconciled, generating deeper communion.

Where perichoresis speaks of interrelation, diaphoris speaks of the journey to it.
It names the agonizing ecstasy of love that is willing to be torn in order to embrace.
It captures the rhythm of the Cross—a rhythm Jesus is enacting even as He prays.

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A3. The Diaphoric Shape of Glory

Jesus frames glory not as stability, but as movement:

“As You sent Me into the world, so I have sent them into the world.”
“I glorified You on earth, having accomplished the work…”
“That they may be one as We are one.”

This is diaphoric glory:

• Separation that creates space for love.
• Otherness that invites encounter.
• Suffering that opens the way to deeper union.

The Cross is not a pause in the divine dance—it is its deepest movement.
Christ is glorified not despite, but through, being lifted up, torn apart, and returned.

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A4. Creation, Church, and the Fractal of Diaphoris

The same dynamic echoes across creation:

• Cells divide, then differentiate into organs.
• Organisms compete and cooperate, forming ecosystems.
• Cultures diverge, then cross-pollinate into richer expressions of humanity.
• The Church scatters and gathers, fractured yet drawn into reconciled communion.

This is not simple oscillation. It is emergent, fractal, cruciform.
Difference becomes the womb of deeper unity—this is diaphoric structure.

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A5. Becoming One: Our Diaphoric Call

John 17 is not just revelation; it’s invitation.
Jesus prays, not just that we would believe, but that we would become—a people shaped by this dynamic glory.

To live diaphorically is to:

• Bear difference with grace.
• Endure separation in hope.
• Embrace tension as the birthplace of communion.

This is the path of glory.
This is the living oneness of the Godhead.
This is the prayer of Christ—still echoing, still creating, still reconciling.

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“I in them and You in Me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know…”

Let us live into that diaphoric glory—where love does not collapse difference, but transfigures it.