Theological Reflection and Education for Ministry

The Search for Integration in Theology

John E. Paver

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9781317011224
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Philosophy
• Subtopic: Philosophy History & Theory

A major and continuing problem for theological education and the practice of Christian ministry is how to best achieve a genuine integration between theory and practice, theology and experience. The key claim of this book is that theological reflection, beginning with experience, is a method of integration and that pastoral supervision is a vehicle for theological reflection. In establishing this claim, John Paver demonstrates that the model and method have potential to be a catalyst for reform within theological colleges and seminaries. Three different theological reflection models are developed and critiqued in this book, and their capacity to be developed in particular contexts is explored. This book does not stop at ministry, cultural and personal integration, but is bold enough to make recommendations for structural integration within the theological institution.

Chapter 1
Setting the scene

The focus in this book is upon pastoral supervision and theological reflection in Theological Field Education. It needs to be noted, however, that TFE was proposed as a solution to the problems experienced in theological education. To understand TFE we need to first understand the context from which it emerges and the situation it seeks to redress. The problem is the separation of theory and practice in theological education.

This chapter will discuss the influence of theologian Friedrich Schleiermacher whose scheme institutionalized the theory–practice division in modern theological education. It will then review the attempts of TFE and the theological academies to provide more effective methods of integration. Finally, there will be some discussion on the Report of the Task Group to Review Ministerial Education in the UCA. The implications of this report for the curriculum and TFE at UCTC will be discussed in later chapters.

The influence of Schleiermacher on the formation of theological education

Friedrich Schleiermacher (1768–1834) is regarded as being responsible for the definitive categorization of theological studies in the modern academy. He is the theologian from whom several significant trends in recent pastoral and practical theology can be traced. Schleiermacher set about to produce a rationale for his understanding of theological studies with the publication in 1811 of his theological treatise, A Brief Outline on the Study of Theology,1 which was an attempt to reestablish Wissenschaft or – disciplined critical research – on the one hand and professional education for ministers on the other. Because the University of Berlin was deliberately designed as a research university it was questionable whether a theological faculty had any place in it.

This question was to be answered by the appointment of Wilhelm von Humboldt as head of the cultural and educational affairs section in the Prussian government, which commissioned a three-person committee to help him draft provisional statutes for the new University of Berlin. Schleiermacher, who was one of these three, wrote the founding document. The Berlin model for theological education can be said to be Schleiermacher’s important legacy to theological education, but even he had to make a case for including theology at this new research university. Research and teaching students how to do research were the overarching goals of the university; its secondary goal was to be enquiry that aimed to master the truth, whatever subjects were studied. The only degree this university would award was the doctorate, the research degree. The desire to develop theological education in this newly founded University of Berlin played itself out in the decision to include, in 1810, a Faculty of Theology.

However, including theology in a research university could be seen as a betrayal of the educational revolution that the research university represented. Schleiermacher had to answer these objections if theology was to have a place so he added another pole by advocating that theological education should constitute professional education. His argument was partly sociological and partly philosophical–theological. Schleiermacher’s sociological argument was that every human society has sets of practices dealing with bodily, health, social order and religious needs. These are socially necessary for the wellbeing of society as a whole and each of these requires properly trained leadership. Schleiermacher’s philosophical–theological argument proposed that religions such as Christianity do not rest on principles, but on a kind of intuition or insightful experience, which can be the subject of philosophical enquiry. Hence, Christian theology can be a subject of Wissenschaft enquiry without threat or compromise to Christianity’s integrity or the integrity of the university. Schleiermacher advocated three levels of enquiry.

Historical theology

The first round of enquiry is the attempt to describe the condition of the faith community in the past and the present. Its outcome will be an account of what the Christian religion has shown itself to be throughout its history. In this account, which is evaluative and constructive, the church of the past is evaluated in the light of its faithfulness to its Christian identity. Thus, Biblical studies, church history and systematic theology come under the heading of ‘historical theology’. The community of faith was primary for Schleiermacher, serving as a critical point of reference for the truth claims and the relevance of the scholarly study of theology.

Philosophical theology

The second round of enquiry seeks to develop criteria to address the question: What is essentially Christian? To answer this question the results of the historical study of Christianity are subjected to a philosophical analysis to determine the essence of Christianity.

Practical theology

The third round of enquiry is practical theology. It attempts to delineate the means by which the faith community may preserve its integrity as the present gives way to the future. Its purpose is to determine the normative rules for carrying out the tasks of a specifically Christian ministry. It is a ‘theoretical undertaking rather than an action oriented function’. Theologian Stone and Church Historian Duke define it as ‘the serious thinking that reviews, evaluates, and orders activities so that Christian practice never loses sight of or strays from its properly Christian aims’.2 Theologian David Kelsey says the third round of enquiry ‘brings the description of theology in the research university back from research to “professional” education’.3

Schleiermacher believed that previous treatments of practical theology were too narrowly focused on preaching the word and administering the sacraments. While Schleiermacher focused on the ordained ministry his response to this narrow focus was not merely to construct a clerical paradigm: his practical theology was more interested in theological formation than who was responsible for the application of practical hints and helps. The study of theology is not to be constructed on the basis of whatever is playing in the parish at the moment, but on a theological analysis of the purpose of theological activity in the church. The purpose is to ‘ensure the Christian faithfulness of the ministry of the church’.4 Schleiermacher called for accountability, not to the actual practice of ministry, but to a theology that called for Christian faithfulness.

It was Schleiermacher’s intention that each aspect of this threefold pattern of enquiry should be in equal partnership with the other. He believed that each contributes to the overall task of theological education and that together they form an ‘organic unity’. In fact, in the 1811 edition of Brief Outline, he drew upon the image of an organic being, a tree, in order to depict the relationship between the three disciplines:

1. Philosophy – the root

2. Historical – the trunk

3. Practical – the crown5

Pastoral Theologian Graham says:

He argued for the essential unity of theory and practice, by stating that the practical should be given preferential status in assessing the authenticity and validity of the truth-claims of theological discourse. Thus it is the congregational reality that serves as the validating norm for Christian theology, and not simply abstract or ideal philosophical principles.6

This was Schleiermacher’s intention for practical theology, but in reality what emerged was the subordination of practical theology to the other two patterns of theological enquiry. Duke and Stone point out that:

Reference to this image [of an organic being, the tree] was dropped from the revised edition of 1830. Schleiermacher, it seems, feared that readers would mistakenly believe that he intended to subordinate philosophical and historical theology to practical theology, when his true intention was to emphasize the equality of all three.7

Whether it was Schleiermacher’s intention or not it was the beginning of some incongruity towards the stated unity, interconnection, and equality of all three disciplines. In fact, Schleiermacher himself makes some compromising statements. Again, Duke and Stone write that:

He argues that practical theology draws, and so depends, upon the interplay of philosophical and historical theology without itself exerting a direct influence on that interplay. He points out that practical theology tries to produce ‘rules’, whereas the other fields deal in knowledge.8

The evidence is clear that although Schleiermacher emphasized the integrated nature of theological studies and the serious contribution of practical theology to the academy, he regarded it as intellectually inert. And so:

… for 150 years after Schleiermacher, his legacy dominated: as a discipline in the service of Christian ministry, the focus of practical theology was more or less exclusively upon the activities of the ordained pastor.9

Schleiermacher categorized practical theology as applied theology, where pastoral ministry is the outworking rather than the source of theological understanding.

The other legacy that has endured is a debate concerning the place of practical theology within the theological curriculum. This development by Schleiermacher and others meant that practical theology became divorced from the new movements in systematic theology and biblical studies. Practical theology has to assume some responsibility for this situation as it has a history of detachment from systematic and biblical theology and attachment to psychology, which has often resulted in what some would term an ‘identity crisis’. In this case it was detachment from historical and systematic theology resulting in practical theology being understood as applied theology.

The early formation of practical theology

The beginnings of practical theology (Praktische Theologie) lie in the establishment of ministerial training in German universities in the mid eighteenth century. A rationalization of theological education took place and from this a recognized syllabus or curriculum emerged. This occurred primarily through the publication of the Theological Encyclopaedia that sought to categorize theological texts according to their major emphases, pertaining either to matters of dogma and belief or to practice and conduct. Thus, the boundary between theoretical and applied knowledge in theology was established with the study of Scripture, doctrine, and church history in one category and the practical disciplines of ministry in the other.10

Practic...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title page
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of Figures
• List of Tables
• Foreword
• Acknowledgements
• List of Abbreviations
• Introduction
• 1 Setting the scene
• 2 Theological reflection as a method of integration
• 3 Pastoral supervision – a vehicle for theological reflection
• 4 An integrated approach to theological education through the theological reflection seminar1
• 5 Structural integration within the theological institution – a case study
• Conclusion
• Appendix 1 The integration of personal experience, social sciences, spirituality, theology and pastoral care
• Appendix 2 Theological reflection – student handout for pastoral care seminar
• Appendix 3 Core curriculum – objectives and options
• Bibliography
• Index