Theology That Is Practical: The Model for the Next Millennium

Maureen R. O’Brien

Introduction: Three Contexts for Practical Theology
Family Shelter: A grassroots group is formed by Christians who are appalled by the rising rates of family homelessness in their local area. As they meet to work on a solution to the problem, they reflect on the Gospel injunction to shelter the homeless and the church’s call to respond. As others from their town join the effort, including local politicians and social service professionals, the group begins to define and justify its goal–establishing a transitional shelter for homeless families–by insisting on adequate housing as a universal human right.

Ministry Education: A graduate theology course for students in pastoral ministry includes extensive examination of case studies from the students’ experience. Topics range from the tensions between tribal initiation rites and Christian church membership in Africa, to the conflicting expectations of parents, pastor and a newly hired youth minister in a suburban American parish. As their major course project, students use these pastoral situations in a structured reflection process with selected themes from the history and theology of ministry. They then propose new pastoral responses for each case and new insights for their own ministries.

Church of the Covenant: A white, middle-class, small-town church is confronted by the presence of illegal immigrants from Central America. After an extensive process of committee work and adult education, the congregation votes to become a "sanctuary" church and welcomes three immigrants into its midst, in opposition to current United States immigration policy. Subsequently, a research project involves scholars in Bible, ethics, sociology and religious education in considering how this case illuminates the meaning of discipleship and citizenship in their disciplines, with implications for the education of Christians.¹

All of these are examples of contemporary efforts to do "practical" or "pastoral" theology.² They engage people in a variety of settings, with diverse experiences and goals. While the efforts are often incomplete and the term itself is in development, practical theology as a perspective and as a method is central to the way we understand and engage in theological reflection for the twenty-first century. In this essay I will first explore the evolving meaning of the term, and then elaborate on key aspects of practical theology, with reference to the examples given above.

A Capsule History

Before describing contemporary dimensions of practical theology, a broad historical overview may be helpful in showing how this "new" perspective attempts to retrieve early understandings and to overcome later compartmentalization. Research into Christian beginnings suggests that "theology" (although the term was not itself used³) was understood by the early church in two ways: as primarily a habitus, "a cognitive and affectional disposition or orientation toward God, others, and creation" that shaped their practice in the world; and secondarily as a discipline of study and instruction needed to foster and refine this habitus in believers.⁴ The major forms of theology as discipline were materials such as hymns, liturgies and catechetical orations, and were developed out of the recognition that Christians’ beliefs, affections and character dispositions must be formed and reformed. That is, Christians assumed that these qualities were not fully and automatically bestowed upon conversion, but were the result of ongoing cultivation in the faith community in light of the questions and situations that people confront in daily existence. Thus, this second sense of theology was focused on the task of supporting the believing community’s life of faith, and necessarily was developed in reflection upon the community’s current practices and questions.

In its long and complex history, the shift in the setting for theological reflection in the West from faith communities and monasteries to universities and, eventually, seminaries, occasioned changes in the understanding of what theology is, who engages in it, and for what purposes. While the sense of theology as habitus did not entirely disappear, a scientific and speculative understanding of the work of theology began to dominate in the university environment, as theology became one science among many and was divided into its own subspecialties. By the nineteenth century this had culminated in what Farley calls the "triumph of the fourfold pattern" in Protestant theological education, with its division of theology into biblical studies, church history, systematic theology and practical theology. The essentially practical nature of all theology as the possession and fostering of a Christian habitus, then, was marginalized in favor of a model where "practical theology" became the specialization for applying the insights of academic scholars in the other three subdisciplines to ministerial practice.⁵

The common outcome for both Protestant and Catholic theological education was similar: "pastoral theology" was that subdivision that "delivered" the findings of the other subdivisions to a community or congregation that itself had relatively little to contribute, but was the passive recipient of these ministrations. Pastoral theology, so conceived, contained little theological substance of its own.⁶

Thus, theology was done by specialists in the university or seminary and "applied" to pastoral settings through a program of studies designed to prepare clergy for their ministerial assignments. The "clerical paradigm"–Farley’s often-quoted term–became dominant, and a long-term narrowing of the functions of ministry to ordained clergy was solidified.⁷

Reclaiming Theology as a Practical Enterprise for Christian Communities

The current interest in reclaiming the centrality of the practical or pastoral in the entire theological enterprise gains impetus from a number of circumstances. Prominent factors in Roman Catholicism include, in particular, the theological themes developed in the Second Vatican Council. Lumen Gentium, the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, brought to the fore an understanding of the church as People of God, on pilgrimage in the world and universally called to holiness. If all Christians are to exercise the roles of priest, prophet and king as followers of Christ, then the cultivation of these roles as their habitus is essential, and the fruits of their efforts are integral to the self-understanding of the church. Thus, theological reflection on those efforts is necessary and the "sense of the faithful" is to be taken seriously as a source for theological truth, along with the teaching authority of the church.⁸

Even more clearly, Gaudium et Spes, the Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, articulates a dynamic model of theological reflection that is practical. By reflecting systematically and prayerfully on the circumstances of human existence in our world, in diverse economic, social, political and cultural manifestations, Christians are challenged to bring the resources of their faith into their work for universal justice and peace. Gaudium et Spes brings the rich themes of human dignity, the communal nature of people, social justice and the common good to a compassionate and critical examination of the needs and issues of contemporary people. Drawing on these "universal" aspects and needs of human existence and articulating them within a theological understanding of salvation history, the document calls Christians to join with all others of good will to work for human fulfillment.⁹

In order to carry out their mission, then, Christians are to see the world as the sphere of God’s activity and, as church, to participate in it. Effective exercise of their divinely appointed role requires the ability to discern how grace is operating in the workings of humanity (and, indeed, of all creation) and to bring their particular talents to transform the realms in which they find themselves: marriage and family, work, social structures, the church itself. Thus they need modes of theological reflection that are "portable," "performable," and "communal," in the apt expression of James D. and Evelyn Eaton Whitehead.¹⁰

Practice, Theory and the Cultivation of Phronesis

The strongest common denominator in contemporary expressions of practical theology is the expectation that theological reflection moves in some fashion from practice to theory to practice.¹¹ "Practice" is here understood in Chopp’s sense of "socially shared forms of behavior that mediate between what are often called subjective and objective dimensions. . . . a pattern of meaning and action that is both culturally constructed and individually instantiated."¹² Practices hold rich layers of the communities’ shared experiences and the meaning they have drawn from these experiences about how they are to live. Much of the time we engage in our practices unreflectively. New questions raised by changing circumstances within the community and the broader culture, however, may force a reexamination of them. When such changes are explicitly reflected upon, practices are considered anew in light of the central themes of the community’s tradition. Through this consideration, new understandings are achieved about the meaning of the foundational tradition in order to shape transformed practices today.

For example, the group working on homelessness as noted in the Family Shelter story was galvanized when the neighbor of one of them faced eviction from her apartment. The original Christian members (mostly parishioners from the same Catholic church) began to study the rising rates of homelessness for women and their children and learn how current governmental "practices" actually promoted this homelessness. Most notably, they found, state funding could be used to place these families in isolated motels after eviction, but not to supplement their rent in order to keep them in their apartments. This led them into a deeper examination of Christian understandings of justice and concern for one’s neighbor. They looked at their parish’s current "practices" of community service, which were focused on giving charitable contributions to local organizations. They began to see the need for their congregation to adopt new "practices" of political advocacy in order to be true to their Christian vocation.

What abilities do people need for practical theological reflection? Contemporary practical theology emphasizes the cultivation and exercise of "practical wisdom," phronesis, as a central goal. Drawing on Aristotle’s distinction between poesis and praxis, scholars de-emphasize (while not rejecting) the former’s focus on technical skills and stress the latter’s ethically based "practice of human life [that] results from prudential decisions (phronesis) between making and practice."¹³ In opting for a Christian praxis–reflective action–based in phronesis–the capacity for arriving at decisions for action–we ground our reflections in the question: "‘Because of who God is in relationship to us and who we are in relationship to one another for the same reason, what kind of world should we be making, and how?’"¹⁴ Thus any specific skills possessed by men and women (including those taught traditionally as skills for ministry) are exercised within the framework of "phronetic," practical theological reflection.¹⁵

A Range of Contexts, Stages and Roles

Cultivation of this practical wisdom is akin to cultivation of the habitus claimed by Farley and others as essential for Christian identity, and therefore must be central to the tasks of theology. While it is always oriented toward transformation toward more faithful practice, it will be exercised differently in the contexts of academy, local congregation and everyday family and work obligations. Whitehead and Whitehead provide a helpful schematic for this in the introduction to Method in Ministry by drawing a continuum of theological reflection. On one end of the continuum, a faith community reflects on pastoral issues that are immediate and concrete in order to devise more prudential responses congruent with their Christian call. At an intermediate stage on the continuum, a community may take a longer period to consider a pastoral question in a larger Christian and cultural context, using theology and the social sciences more extensively to illuminate the situation and allowing more time to frame effective responses. At the other end of the continuum, a longer-term, more extensive, historical and philosophical process is used to examine the issue within the development of Christian theology and articulate new insights to inform practice. All stages are "practical theology" and operate in a "phronetic" mode, but the participants, methods and results may differ.¹⁶

To take a fictionalized but true-to-life contemporary example congruent with my Ministry Education context: a lay staff member is newly hired in a middle-class, Midwestern Catholic parish. She soon finds herself in conflict with one of the parish council committees for whom she has been appointed the resource person. Committee members complain to the pastor about her work with them; misunderstandings and miscommunication abound. After long and agonized discussions with the pastor and the committee and much prayer and discernment, a tentative solution is found. Subsequently, the staff member enrolls in a graduate ministry program and does a case study on her experience, in which she and her student colleagues discuss how the theology of ministry, systems theory and management literature on "formal" and "informal" authority illuminate the issues in the case. Her professor, whose own scholarly work focuses on the theology of ministry, draws on the case study as part of his larger project of outlining New Testament understandings of ecclesial ministry and how today’s practices shape our reading of key biblical texts. Thus, several different points on the Whiteheads’ continuum are touched upon by this multi-faceted reflection.

Thus far I have maintained that practical theology, rather than being a derivative subspecialty of theological inquiry, is in fact the normative mode for all theological discourse. At the same time, as this example shows, a particular "job description" is also emerging for those who serve as practical or pastoral theologians in a more specific sense. At the ministry oriented end of the continuum, this will include those who serve formally within churches as ecclesial ministers (whether ordained or "lay," in the current usage of the Roman Catholic church), since it becomes obvious that they are engaged in practical theology. The lay staff person in this example is such a practical theologian, and also a facilitator of such practical theological reflection in others (though often in short-term and informal circumstances). Moving along the continuum, those who train such ministers may be specialists in the traditional "practical" disciplines of pastoral care, preaching, catechesis and so on; or they may have the credentials of scholars in Scripture, systematics or church history. Imbelli and Groome state that "In a more specific sense, however, the pastoral theologian's ‘place’ is that of mediator between the work of the specialists in Bible and history, systematics and ethics, and those engaged in full-time pastoral ministry within the Church."¹⁷ This presumes that rigorous and specialized efforts are needed from both the ministers and the academicians in order to arrive together at new insights in their practice to theory to practice reflection. It further presumes that particular individuals and communities may serve to bridge these closely related endeavors.

In order to show more clearly the dynamics of this contemporary understanding, I will outline several particular aspects that I find integral to practical theology: emphases on critical and disciplined conversation; congruence with a reconceived understanding of education; and a claim for a public orientation.

Key Aspects of Practical Theology

Critical Conversation

No single image, of course, is adequate to capture our intentions. However, the metaphor of conversation is increasingly used to characterize practical theological discourse. In his "map" of four views of rationality in practical theology, Richard Osmer names this mode as "rationality as conversation."¹⁸ Indebted to Paul Ricoeur, it includes both the face-to-face dialogue of human subjects and their engagement with written (or artistic) "texts." It is sparked by the crises and questions arising from historically situated communities, as they seek to understand and respond to these through wrestling with the central stories of their tradition. It is intended to correlate, in David Tracy’s sense, interpretations of the community’s experiences and culture with interpretations of the Christian tradition.¹⁹

In naming the process as conversational with this rootedness in correlational method, a community of discourse is necessarily implied, as well as a method that is hermeneutical, critical and transformative.²⁰ A number of authors have developed this process as a variation on the hermeneutic circle of practice to theory to practice. Thomas Groome has outlined a framework of five movements (preceded by a focusing activity) in what he calls "shared Christian praxis," as follows: 1) naming/expressing a present action as experienced by the community, 2) engaging in critical reflection on this action, 3) bringing forth the Christian "Story" (expressed in Scripture, tradition, ritual and other forms) and "Vision" (mandates arising from the Story to empower the praxis of Christians) appropriate to the present action, 4) bringing the critical insights on present action into hermeneutical dialogue with the Christian Story and Vision, and 5) making decisions for Christian living as shaped by the critical conversation of the preceding movements.²¹

Don Browning has a highly developed and comprehensive understanding of practical theology as conversation and as the encompassing model for all theology.²² He reconceptualizes the traditional fourfold distinction among theological disciplines within a vision of the necessarily practical nature of all theological reflection, whether done in the academy, the faith community or other settings:

In saying that we should move in theology from practice to theory and back to practice, I am saying more than meets the eye. . . . Human thought works that way. We never really move from theory to practice even when it seems we do. Theory is always embedded in practice. . . . [O]nce we grasp the practice-theory-practice structure of all theology, the gulf disappears between our high-level theological texts and courses and the practical activity of religious education, care preaching and worship. The structure of theology and the structure of these concrete practices are the same.²³

In order to exercise practical wisdom (he frequently uses the language of "practical reason"), there must be a first movement of 1) descriptive theology, the attempt to arrive at a "thick" description of the situation by examining the prevailing understandings of the community’s (faith-based) vision, obligational norms, human tendencies and needs, environmental-social constraints, and specific rules and roles. The social sciences are integral to this descriptive process. Second, the questions arising from practice are brought to the foundational texts of Christian tradition through historical theology to surface insights from our past in relation to our present dilemmas, drawing on the best of contemporary historical-critical techniques to understand what the past does and does not say. In the third movement, systematic theology, there is a hermeneutical "fusion of horizons between the vision implicit in contemporary practices and the vision implied in the practices of the normative Christian texts," creating new meanings for our situation.²⁴ Finally, in the phase of strategic practical theology, the insights of the previous three movements–always understood as part of the overall practical enterprise–are brought together in the attempt to frame faithful and effective responses to our concrete situations today. Here the traditional "practical" disciplines are prominent, but the "clerical paradigm" critiqued by Farley vanishes. Strategic practical theology, engaged in communally, is the responsibility of all Christians and is not confined to ecclesial affairs, but opens itself to engagement in the world.

The Church of the Covenant example named in my introduction has already been extensively analyzed by several authors, including Browning, and is helpful for highlighting the conversational model here. Covenant’s congregation delegated the task of studying the sanctuary issue to its Mission Committee. The committee itself engaged in a difficult and critical (and, at times, divisive) dialogue as they attempted to arrive at a "thick" description of the refugee situation in light of current American government policies. Key biblical and theological texts emerged to guide the committee and the congregation in their reflection: the Good Samaritan was evocative for many, while the leaders of the effort drew insight from Matthew 5:10’s call to endure persecution for the sake of righteousness and Bonhoeffer’s The Cost of Discipleship. Eventually, as the congregation came to vote on the sanctuary decision, the "fusion of horizons" occurred in which the church came to see that its current practices must be reevaluated in light of the normative Christian tradition. Having made the decision, plans for strategic action could be designed.

Disciplined Conversation

The need for phronesis oriented toward praxis is clear in such an example. It is also apparent that a disciplined quality is needed for such conversation if it is to be both theological and practical. This implies four key elements. First, in our classic Christian sense of "spiritual disciplines," the conversation of practical theology is characterized by prayerful discernment. This assumes that God’s grace is present and working in the situation we face and the conversation we have about it, and that our conversational "ground rules" help us to remain open to this dynamic presence of the Holy Spirit. Second, our discipline is a mark of our discipleship: the followers of Jesus remain faithful through keeping the faith tradition as a "privileged"²⁵ or "normative"²⁶ conversation partner and through ongoing attention to its resonance in our experiences and our practices. All the authors I have cited have explicit methods for bringing the tradition into the conversation and considering its message, usually at some middle stage of the process (following the description of practices and preceding the critical reflection that leads to transformed practices).

Third, such discipline requires a commitment to, and techniques for, keeping all the necessary "partners" in the conversation, although their "voices" may be more or less crucial at various points. All individuals and communities with a stake in the outcome of the conversation must be included, at least implicitly, along with key prior interpretations of central texts from the tradition, the pivotal experiences of the participants both within and outside the community’s experience, and understandings of the historical and cultural situatedness of all participants.²⁷ Identification of our own assumptions–what Browning calls our "pre-understandings"–is also crucial here, as the participants in conversation confront what has shaped them in their approach to the particular situation and to the other participants. Fourth, participants are regularly called to pause in their conversation and take note of its progress, of voices heard and not heard, of possibilities being opened and pathways being closed. This is the difficult practice of critical thinking both about the situation and about the limitations of our own thinking processes.²⁸ Yet it is also a spiritual practice of discernment, as ongoing openness to the Spirit’s work allows new insights to emerge beyond our expectations.

This conversation, however, is characterized by fluidity as well as discipline. Held together by the principles outlined above, it nevertheless takes place in multiple settings, with multiple and shifting participants. This is necessitated by the changing nature of the practical questions addressed, but also by the need for Christian communities to draw upon diverse types of expertise in arriving at the "thick" descriptions they need for responsible conversation. And further, even those most central to the conversation are themselves residents of a modern (or postmodern) world in which their own identities and conversation partners are multifaceted, complex and often ambiguous. Thus not only flexibility but also a sense of creative intuition and "playfulness" are essential to practical theology.²⁹

My Family Shelter example illustrates the aspect of fluidity. The members who formed the original planning group were from the same parish and knew one another well, besides sharing a strong faith commitment. In attempting to create a family shelter, they had to enlarge their conversation to include influential people in the wider civic community, thinking carefully about the many types of professionals required to make the project a reality. Amid all the hard work of fundraising, finding a location for the shelter, and renovating it, they also had to set up an institutional structure that would provide for ongoing professional staffing of the shelter and eligibility for governmental funding, while remaining faithful to the group’s sense of mission. Practical theological and moral reflection was taking place at many levels–among the group members, in their interactions with their parish, in the town, among the staff hired for the shelter, and eventually among the shelter residents–as they continually reshaped their goals and actions in ongoing conversation. As the Whiteheads wisely note, the difficulty of such conversation and reshaping is often well characterized as a "crucible," and discernment is vital.³⁰

A spirit of playfulness in the practical theological conversation is evident when student-ministers reflect on cases drawn from their own experience, as in Ministry Education. By bringing the narratives of their past ministerial practice to a new community of conversation, and by doing this in an academic context at some remove from their ongoing practice, they are given time, a safe environment, and the challenge and affirmation of others. All participants can "play" with the "facts" of the cases in ways that allow imagining other resolutions and new possibilities. And, as already suggested, the practice of theological education in the academy is itself transformed in unexpected ways by imaginative engagement with the ongoing efforts of real faith communities to cultivate a Christian habitus.

Educational Congruence

I believe that recognizing and fostering a viable practical theology and forming practical theologians requires viewing it as a disciplined conversation that is educational to its core. To adopt such a view requires abandoning the commonplace equating of education with schooling. Further, it requires a critique of our tendency to equate the doing of theology with abstract speculation.

Although practical theology may indeed be done in the contexts of academy and "Christian education"–and these settings are vital to its ongoing refinement–its scope and aims, like education itself, transcend these. As Gabriel Moran puts it in his finely tuned distinction: "Education is a different kind of reality from school or schooling. While school is a definite institution and schooling is a particular form of learning, education is not a thing at all but a lifetime process constituted by a set of relations. . . . Education is the reshaping of life’s forms with end (meaning) but without end (termination)."³¹ Implied here are the concerns of practical theology for ongoing practice to theory to practice reflection. We see the correlating, through conversation, of experience and culture with tradition ("life’s forms," "a set of relations"). This is done in order to bring forth new understandings and practices that are meaningful for today ("reshaping life’s forms with end [meaning]"); and the assumption that any present formulation is contingent and must be continually reformulated ("without end [termination]"). As Moran insists, this is a profoundly moral activity; and as Browning argues, practical wisdom must be informed by theological ethics.³²

This educational process is understood as practical theology, of course, when the conversation explicitly draws upon the Christian tradition in the consideration of how to "reshape" the forms or practices of our communal lives. The "end" in Moran’s first sense of meaning will focus upon the ways that Christians communally have made meaning in light of their own foundational "Story." Thomas Groome’s groundbreaking work on Christian religious education as the fostering of "conation" helps us to envision the aims of practical theology as fundamentally educational. In language very similar to Farley’s regarding theologia as a habitus, Groome speaks of conative activity as engaging whole persons in their self-actualization in relationship to others and the world. In its Christian manifestation:

Christian conation means "being" and becoming Christian. Pedagogically this poses the task of informing, forming, and transforming people in the pattern of lived Christian faith–to know, desire, and do with others what is ingredient to being Christian in right relationship with God, self, others, and creation after the way of Jesus. . . . The unity of knowing, loving, and serving God by knowing, loving, and serving one’s neighbor as oneself after the way of Jesus makes for specifically Christian faith conation.³³

Groome also uses the language of phronesis as practical wisdom to help encapsulate the central aim of this approach to religious education. A community well formed in conation will be able to reflect upon pressing needs and decisions in light of guiding metaphors and principles (Browning’s visional and obligational dimensions) in order to arrive at prudential decisions for transformed practices. As Browning comments in comparing his own approach to Groome’s, "[both hold that] the structure of theological reflection and the dynamics of Christian education should be the same. Doing theology and doing Christian education entail the same procedures. . . . Doing theology in all these settings [academia, congregations and others] should follow a practice-theory-practice model."³⁴

Public Orientation

Some practical theologians have noted a progressive widening of the "subject-field" of practical theology in contemporary discourse: from the narrow clerical paradigm, to the whole faith community’s involvement in reflecting on its internal practices, to the mission oriented role of the faith community in the world, to the broader subject-field of religious/moral practice in the world.³⁵ In favoring the latter approach, I argue that the imperative for a public orientation for practical theology arises from two major sources. First, the needs of human beings and of our world cry out for sustained reflection on current practices with a view to transformation toward greater justice and ecological order. These needs impel Christians to responsible engagement in public affairs. Second, such engagement means working with others who do not share our guiding story and vision, yet who are themselves shaped by foundational communal stories and visions; and practical theology gives us a way to recognize and engage in dialogue with those stories as well.³⁶ Browning maintains that all practical thinking includes some vision, some "deep metaphors" regarding life’s purposes, and that these are sometimes embedded in narratives. "I argue that we can discern the form of practical reason within the Christian narrative but that we can discern it within other narrative contexts as well."³⁷ If this is true, then even while acknowledging the historical situatedness of all communities and their narratives–and the inability of "outsiders" to know fully those communities’ reality–the conversation of practical theology can be widened to include non-Christian partners and metaphors.³⁸

In this mode, an important goal of practical theology becomes "development of a ‘public’ account of proper practice in the world; i.e., an account that is not confessionally-dependent upon the church.³⁹" The conversational/correlational activity brings Christian themes into public discussion, supported by the conviction that they have relevance beyond the faith community.⁴⁰ Effective education of "disciple-citizens" is essential: the formation of faithful Christians who take public responsibility seriously and understand the tensions in their dual roles.⁴¹ At the same time, what Browning calls the "inner core" of practical reason–the interplay between the demands of moral obligations and the tendencies and needs of human nature–can take place within a variety of visional "outer envelopes", i.e., narratives and metaphors that shape a community’s worldview.⁴²

Both the Family Shelter and Church of the Covenant examples illustrate this public orientation and its tensions and possibilities. The original housing group turned to the Christian narrative for inspiration and guidance in addressing the issue of homelessness. In becoming a broader organization with civic alliances, however, they consciously chose to use the language of universal human rights to persuade others to support the project. The Church of the Covenant took a different route: their transformation of practices was confined to their congregational vote for sanctuary, and they mainly conducted their conversation within a Christian narrative language. The term "sanctuary," however, had already moved from its biblical roots to become a multi-dimensional term in civic discourse, as churches throughout the country took similar votes to welcome refugees and publicized their decisions in public venues. Thus "sanctuary" had acquired a status as "Christian classic," in Tracy’s terms, and became a catalyst for action in multiple realms.

Conclusion

I have already noted that the framing of theology as practical is both new and rooted in Christian tradition. For the next millennium, however, I believe that we are called to be more intentional in how we conceive of all pastoral activity, as well as the work of the theological school or university department of theology, as grounded in a practical imperative. Our evolving understanding of the need for all Christians to connect their faith and their daily lives in order to fulfill their mission, the pressing problems of our time, and the imperative to work together with others of good will to address these problems–all these point to a practical sensibility as paramount.

In an early collection of essays on practical theology, Browning mused on conversations with his colleagues at the University of Chicago as they puzzled over the misconceptions regarding this endeavor:

Wasn’t it the case that practical theology appeared confused and softheaded because it was indeed the most difficult branch of theology, requiring the widest range of theological skills and judgments, and because the challenging intellectual work needed to clarify its logic and methods had simply not been sufficiently attempted?⁴³

Since then, significant work has been done in this work of clarification, through efforts understood as pastoral, practical, scholarly, ministerial, spiritual, political and so on. But this clarification will need to continue into the next millennium. Just as the dynamic of practice to theory to practice yields a certain provisional meaning and yet must be ongoing, so the work of practical theology, in Moran’s terms, will be "with end" and "without end."

Endnotes

1.This event is described and analyzed in two collections of essays: Tensions between Citizenship and Discipleship, edited by Nelle Slater (New York: Pilgrim Press, 1989) and Education for Citizenship and Discipleship, edited by Mary C. Boys (New York: Pilgrim Press, 1989). One of the authors, Don S. Browning, develops his own reflections on the case further in A Fundamental Practical Theology: Descriptive and Strategic Proposals (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1996), especially in Chapter 9.

2.There continues to be some interchangeable use of the terms "practical" or "pastoral" in relation to this emerging form of theological reflection. I prefer "practical" because it is probably the term more frequently used by scholars who are systematically developing its meaning within theology–many of whom I will cite in this essay–and because their explications more consistently include the practice-theory-practice method that I am using.

3.See Randy L. Maddox, "The Recovery of Theology as a Practical Discipline," Theological Studies 51 (1990), 650-651. He cites the Greco-Roman usage of theologia in reference to mythical, civil and natural or rational explorations, and the likely desire of early Christians to avoid association with these in their own thinking about God.

4.Maddox, "The Recovery of Theology," 651. Also see his development of this argument in "Spirituality and Practical Theology: Trajectories Toward Reengagement," APT Occasional Papers 3 (Spring 1999), 9-10. Probably the most influential work shaping this discussion of theology as habitus and the problem of its subsequent fragmentation is Edward Farley, Theologia: The Fragmentation and Unity of Theological Education (Philadelphia: Fortress, Press, 1983).

5.Farley, especially Chapter 5, 99-124. Maddox points out that "practical theology" as a formal subdiscipline was initially moral theology ("The Recovery of Theology," 656-657). He also maintains that while theology as science became the university norm, practical theology as the cultivation of spirituality was confined largely to monasteries, where it "might meet the needs of the ascetic-contemplative life, but it was only tangentially related to Christian life in the world" ("The Recovery of Theology," 654).

6.Robert P. Imbelli and Thomas H. Groome, "Signposts Towards a Pastoral Theology," Theological Studies 53 (1992), 129. Farley comments: "Once functions of ministry comprise the unity of practical theology, that term becomes an aggregate of disciplines of the functions, each one with its specialist, auxiliary sciences, and so forth" (106). For an overview of the development of the "practicality" of theology in the American context, see E. Brooks Holifield, " The Practicality of Theology in America," audiotape (Pittsburgh: J. Hubert Henderson Conference, Pittsburgh Theological Seminary, 1998).

7.Farley, e.g., 114-115. For a comprehensive historical and theological overview of the "depositioning" of lay people vis-à-vis ministry, see Kenan B. Osborne, Ministry: Lay Ministry in the Roman Catholic Church (New York/Mahwah: Paulist Press, 1993).

8."The whole body of the faithful who have received an anointing which comes from the holy one (see 1 Jn 2:20 and 27) cannot be mistaken in belief. It shows this characteristic through the entire people’s supernatural sense of the faith, when, ‘from the bishops to the last of the faithful,’ it manifests a universal consensus in matters of faith and morals. . . . The people unfailingly adheres to this faith, penetrates it more deeply through right judgment, and applies it more fully in daily life" (Lumen Gentium, 12; from Austin Flannery, O.P., general editor, Vatican Council II: The Basic Sixteen Documents [Northport, N.Y.: Costello Publishing Company, 1996]).

9."The people of God believes that it is led by the Spirit of the Lord who fills the whole world. Impelled by that faith, they try to discern the true signs of God’s presence and purpose in the events, the needs and the desires which it shares with the rest of humanity today. For faith casts a new light on everything and makes known the full ideal which God has set for humanity, thus guiding the mind towards solutions that are fully human" (Gaudium et Spes, 11; from Flannery).

10.James D. and Evelyn Eaton Whitehead, Method in Ministry, rev. ed. (Kansas City: Sheed and Ward, 1995), 9.

11.There is a burgeoning literature on practical-pastoral theology on both sides of the Atlantic, along with the growth of professional societies and scholarly journals devoted to the topic. See Randy Maddox, "Practical Theology: A Discipline in Search of a Definition," Perspectives in Religious Studies 18/2 (Summer 1991), 159-169, for an extensive review of the state of the question and numerous citations of key sources in English and German. A significant, recent scholarly effort in the field is the establishment of the International Journal of Practical Theology (see http://www.deGruyter.de/journals/ijpt/ for contents of each issue).

12.Rebecca S. Chopp, Saving Work: Feminist Practices of Theological Education (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 1995), 15.

13.Francis Schüssler Fiorenza, "Theory and Practice: Theological Education as a Reconstructive, Hermeneutical, and Practical Task," Theological Education 23 (1987 Supplement), 125-126.

14.Bernard J. Lee, S.M., "Practical Theology as Phronetic: A Working Paper from/for those in Ministry Education," APT Occasional Papers 1 (Winter 1998), 3.

15.Lee insists upon the interdependent relationship of phronesis and praxis. He reconstructs Aristotle’s categories to give these primacy over both episteme/theoria and techne/poesis: "moving directly from theory to practice is never allowed. The passage must always go through phronesis/praxis. It is never enough to know how to do it and to do it. We need to know whether the kind of life we believe all people should be living will benefit from the doing" (14).

16.Whitehead and Whitehead, xii.

17.Imbelli and Groome, 137.

18.See Richard Osmer, "Rationality in Practical Theology: A Map of the Emerging Discussion," International Journal of Practical Theology 1/1 (1997); available online at http://www.deGruyter.de/journals/ijpt/pdf/11.pdf He characterizes the other three modes of rationality used in discussions of practical theology today as argument, rhetoric and postfoundationalist science.

19.David Tracy, "Foundations of Practical Theology," in Practical Theology, ed. Don Browning (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1983).

20.See Osmer, especially 29-31.

21.Thomas H. Groome, Sharing Faith (HarperSanFrancisco, 1991), 146-148. Groome also cites Farley’s outline of the four components of 1) attending to the contemporary situation, 2) critiquing the present situation by use of the faith tradition, 3) interpreting the faith tradition by use of the present situation and 4) bringing new, theologically transformed understandings to the contemporary setting (Farley, 165-68). Other prominent approaches to practical theology are named within the rubric of "theological reflection" for ministry and for Christian living. See especially Robert Kinast, Let Ministry Teach: A Guide to Theological Reflection (Liturgical Press, 1996), and Whitehead and Whitehead.

22.Osmer uses Browning as exemplar of this mode; see Osmer, 20ff.

23.Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology, 9.

24.Ibid., 51.

25.Whitehead and Whitehead, 7.

26.G.D.J. Dingemans, "Practical Theology in the Academy: A Contemporary Overview," Journal of Religion 75/3 (1995), 92.

27.Whitehead and Whitehead provide an insightful outline of the three interrelated elements of experience, tradition and culture as providing the "model" for their approach, and name the stages of their "method" as attending to these elements, asserting our voice in the conversation about them, and moving toward pastoral response. See Method in Ministry, especially the overview in Chapter 1. Jan Michael Joncas offers an overview of practical theology and a use of the Whiteheads’ model and method for initiating a conversation on a "theology of the choir." His postings are found at the World Wide Web site for the National Association of Pastoral Musicians: "Practical Theology for pastoral musicians," http://www.npm.org/theo.html

28."Critical thinking" is integral to practical theology. At the same time, it is a difficult cognitive skill that requires both developmental readiness and the creation of a safe environment for the expression of diverse viewpoints. See my discussion of pedagogical and developmental issues related to the use of practical theology with young adults in Maureen R. O’Brien, "Practical Theology and Postmodern Religious Education," Religious Education (forthcoming, 1999).

29.See, for example, Terry A. Veling, "‘Practical Theology’: A New Sensibility for Theological Education," Pacifica 11 (June 1998), especially 205.

30.Whitehead and Whitehead, 15.

31.Gabriel Moran, No Ladder to the Sky: Education and Morality (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1987), 12-13; emphasis in original.

32.Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology, especially 96-99.

33.Groome, 30.

34.Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology, 218.

35.Maddox, "Spirituality and Practical Theology," 14.

36.See Robert N. Bellah et al., Habits of the Heart: Individualism and Commitment in American

37.Life (New York: Harper & Row, 1985). The authors have done significant work in identifying what they call the "communal moral languages" of American tradition that arise from biblical and civic-republican narratives, and in urging that we reclaim these as a source for conversation about the common good. In our religiously pluralistic society, it is also increasingly apparent that we must recognize the foundational narratives of other religious groups as sources for such conversations.

38.Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology, 194.

39.Catholic social teaching has been a proving ground for this task in the twentieth century, and is likely to continue as we enter the new millennium. While largely philosophical in its early formulations, increasingly it is framed in the dual moral/religious "languages" of Christianity and of universal human dignity and rights. The two pastoral letters of the United States Catholic bishops, The Challenge of Peace (1983) and Economic Justice for All (1986), exemplify this approach. The bishops are clearly impelled to speak by their interpretation of the crises addressed by each letter (the nuclear arms race and poverty, respectively). Their aims are practical; they do not write in an abstract and speculative realm. In seeking to recommend transformed practices, they first draw upon biblical and theological sources to evoke the Christian vision of a peaceful and just world. They weave this visional narrative together with the principles derived from natural law ("just-war" theory and human economic rights, for example) and move into a consideration of the socio-political forces shaping present policy in light of these narratives and norms. This leads them to direct and specific recommendations both for changes to those policies, justified in "public" language, and calls for Catholics to address them in prayer, fasting and other pious and ecclesial practices particular to the church. See National Conference of Catholic Bishops, The Challenge of Peace: God’s Promise and Our Response, first published in 1983, in Pastoral Letters, Volume IV, 1975-1983 (Washington, D.C.: United States Catholic Conference); and Economic Justice for All, first published in 1986, in Pastoral Letters, Volume V, 1983-1988 (Washington, D.C.: United States Catholic Conference). For an extended discussion of the use of religious and public languages in The Challenge of Peace, see Maureen R. O’Brien, Religious Education and the Public: The Contribution of "The Challenge of Peace" (unpublished Ph.D. diss., 1990).

40.Maddox, "Spirituality and Practical Theology," 14.

41.David Tracy’s discussion of the "Christian classic" is very helpful in developing the argument that a "classic" holds the possibilities for disclosure and transformation beyond the believing community. See The Analogical Imagination (New York: Crossroad Publishing, 1981).

42.See John A. Coleman, "The Two Pedagogies: Discipleship and Citizenship," in Boys, 35-78.

43.See Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology, especially 106-107. It is important to note that Browning emphasizes his construction of the five dimensions as itself an exercise of practical moral reason rather than deriving them from abstract, supposedly universal truths: "I did not so much derive them as construct them. . . . They are reconstructions of intuitive experience of what goes into practical moral thinking, whether conventional or critical. . . . My claims for their usefulness are open-ended and modest" (107-108).