It's practical
One of the troubling things I find about local-church theology (id est theology lived out in local churches) is how by saying the words "practical" or "it is just not practical" is able to bracket out all other theological reflection, plus all considerations of community and reduces people back to the automatons the church tries to eliminate.
For example, it is not practical to invite strangers into your home (they could be psychos). It is not practical to leave home with only a robe and not even a staff. It is not practical not to save money for the future. This could go on and on and I do not mean this in a demeaning way. I am not saying that seminarians get it right (by God they do not, I do not), what I am interested in is how, as a pastor, this realm of practicality can be broken down. How do we teach that there is no realm of life where Jesus is not Lord without the self-righteousness of my own tone here? Plus, what does practical theology have to do with this, where I see 'practical theology' as a passive aggressive attempt to diminish impractical theology. Am I wrong in this dismissal of the practical?
For example, it is not practical to invite strangers into your home (they could be psychos). It is not practical to leave home with only a robe and not even a staff. It is not practical not to save money for the future. This could go on and on and I do not mean this in a demeaning way. I am not saying that seminarians get it right (by God they do not, I do not), what I am interested in is how, as a pastor, this realm of practicality can be broken down. How do we teach that there is no realm of life where Jesus is not Lord without the self-righteousness of my own tone here? Plus, what does practical theology have to do with this, where I see 'practical theology' as a passive aggressive attempt to diminish impractical theology. Am I wrong in this dismissal of the practical?
posted by Unknown at 8:08 AM
2 Comments:
Wilson: You have named a struggle that I have come across time and again in ministry. Mostly, I think it stems from our collective self-denial about our condition and God's abundant redemption in our lives. As pastors, the best thing we can do is to ask the questions in the midst of our brothers and sisters as we struggle along to discover the Kingdom of God in surprising ways (ex: inviting in the stranger, etc). This dispenses the notion that the pastor is the one with all-knowledge to pass down to the people, and it also creates an opportunity for us (as pastors) to be honest about our participation in this deception. This experience of perceiving and witnessing will eventually foster more courageous opportunities to live into the Kingdom more faithfully.
I love discussions of this nature, thanks for posting your ever-thoughtful ideas! :)
I think the "all-knowing" pastor is an unfortunate fallacy perpetuated by the reformed tradition (this is what I refer to as "humor"), but the divide suffers most when people think the Doctrine of the Trinity does not effect their lives.
Let me be a little more concrete about this. In a recent discussion with a friend about his field ed church, I bemoaned the lack of confessinalism at Duke 20 years ago whereupon my friend said that his supervisor was confessional, he just was a bad supervisor who thought of the field ed student as an associate pastor. Confessing the creeds should reorder a pastors life so that they do not use people in ministry.
Alright, I understand that this happens everywhere. The issue is not "are we sinners?" the issue is "where do we locate and how do we describe the sin?" Is the sin poor management skills or is the sin a denial of the caritas of Jesus Christ? The pure/practical divide is hierarchical, as you point out, and it stems from the false enlightenment hierarchies of Kant et al., I think a major need is the willingness to see just how much theology covers all of our lives and that the times we board up against it are the times we are boarding up God.
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