Celebrating the Past, Present and Future of British and Irish Practical Theology

Roots, Shoots and Fruits

Andrew P. Rogers, Nicola Slee, Andrew P. Rogers, Nicola Slee

• Éditeur: Routledge
• Année: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781000330755
• Édition: 1
• Sujet: Théologie et religion
• Sous-sujet: Théologie

Practical theology has become a well-established academic discipline in Britain and Ireland over the past half century, evidenced in its chairs, journals, books, conferences, and contribution to transformed practices. The British and Irish Association for Practical Theology (BIAPT) and its journal, Practical Theology, has had a significant role to play in the story of the discipline.

This volume is a celebration of practical theology in Britain and Ireland in all its inventiveness and variety on the occasion of BIAPT's twenty-fifth birthday. It offers an account of its roots in its emergence from the Scottish Pastoral Association in the 1960s, its trajectories established in the journal Contact / Practical Theology and how human experience has been a constant companion on the journey. The book considers a range of methodologies including engagement with popular culture, public theology, the arts, and the importance of conversation. It explores new shoots in the discipline that consider how sexuality, ethnicity, and different religious traditions may be addressed within practical theology. It concludes by asking how it may be fruitful in the future, by reflecting on the challenges ahead, not least the ubiquity of ignorance. This is a landmark text in the unfolding of British and Irish practical theology in all its glorious distinctiveness, which promises to be a major contribution to international debate in the discipline.

The chapters in this book were first published in Practical Theology.

Part I: Roots

Soil, roots and shoots: the emergence of BIAPT

David Lyall and Paul Ballard

ABSTRACT
Celebrating twenty-five years since its foundation, this article traces the origins of the British and Irish Association for Practical Theology (BIAPT) from the emergence of Pastoral Studies in the sixties, through the annual Conference on Pastoral Studies, to the British and Irish Association for Practical Theology in 1994. Attention is also drawn to the importance of the journal Contact, the forerunner of Practical Theology, in 2008, and the emergence of the Professional Doctorate in Practical Theology. It is suggested that the characteristics of BIAPT have been shaped by Lambourne’s (1971) opposition to the formation of a professional association in favour of a broader, inclusive, lay, adventuresome association. This informs the discussion of a number of perennial issues, such as the relation between academic and practitioner, professional and lay, and the nature of the theological enterprise, that have shaped and still confront BIAPT.

Introduction

This edition of Practical Theology celebrates the twenty-fifth anniversary of the founding of the British and Irish Association for Practical Theology (BIAPT) in 1994. In 2019, the annual conference in Liverpool was attended by over one hundred and fifty participants out of a membership of three hundred and fifty.

The emergence of BIAPT on the theological scene witnesses to the growing interest in Practical Theology. Here is one strand in a complex and ongoing saga. Within the academic theological enterprise, the past fifty years has seen a continuous growth in university related courses, from first degree level through Masters to the Professional Doctorate in Practical Theology. In effect, there has emerged a new theological subject area, alongside Systematics, or Biblical Studies. How did these radical changes in the understanding and teaching of Practical Theology come about? Part of the answer can be told through BIAPT’s experience.

Received wisdom

We can perhaps begin with some personal reminiscences. Over fifty years ago, when the authors were training for their ministries, our experiences illustrate how this journey started. We were both given a sound grounding in the traditional ‘academic’ theological disciplines, taught by scholars often of national or international reputation. But practical pastoral training was certainly not included in the academic curriculum. It was incidental to, or at best parallel to, the ‘real’ scholarly task, even where, as in the Church of Scotland, there were,in the University Faculty of Divinity, Professors of Ethics and Practical Theology. In the Free Churches, theological college staff were normally ministers, appointed for their scholarly abilities, having served in the pastorate. Anglicanism, for a number of reasons, had, in the nineteenth century, developed diocesan and other theological colleges, providing a semi-monastic community to provide spiritual formation and an introduction to church practice, followed by an apprenticeship, often at a recognised training parish, as a curate. This was not an entirely negative experience as most of the teachers had spent many years, often eminently, in congregational ministry and would often suggest ways to relate scholarly study to ministerial and pastoral practice. This era has sometimes been described as the ‘tips and hints’ approach to training. It was basically the handing down of a tradition, learning from those with expertise in the craft and wisdom of ministry.

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

It was in 1961 when some students from New College, Edinburgh (including one of the present authors), responded to their perceived lack of training for pastoral ministry, other than preaching, which was the responsibility of the Professor in Christian Ethics and Practical Theology. They decided to set off into darkest East Lothian for an overnight stay to see what could be done about the situation. This event was not described as a ‘retreat’ but as an ‘advance’. It turned out to be a totally depressing twenty-four hours. Something had to be done, but they did not know what. However, salvation was nearer than when they first thought. In 1959, the Scottish Pastoral Association (SPA) had been formed, one of its founders being the then Edinburgh University Chaplain, James Blackie. Conversations with him resulted in an Easter vacation conference on pastoral studies, not for Edinburgh students alone but, ecumenically, for all Scottish theological students. Five years later Jim Blackie became Professor of Christian Ethics and Practical Theology at Edinburgh and began to transform the curriculum. One of that original student group was Alastair Campbell who went to San Francisco to do a doctorate in Practical Theology. Within a few years, he had joined Jim Blackie at New College, later writing several important books, not least Rediscovering Pastoral Care (1981). Between them, they laid the foundations of a vigorous department, with its courses fully integrated into a new B.D. programme, as well as Certificate and Diploma courses. Alastair Campbell went on to have a distinguished career in Medical Ethics, becoming the first editor of the Journal of Medical Ethics and holding chairs in Otago, Singapore and Bristol.

The other author, a Baptist, in training in Spurgeon’s College, London between 1956 and 1969, remembers sitting in a Pastoral lecture given by an experienced minister, which seemed, if not incoherent, then trivial. In reaction, on the back of an envelope, he jotted down an outline syllabus of what would provide the basis for exercising a pastoral ministry: an introduction to pastoral care and counselling; educational theory and practice; church as community and community work; and reflective practice. After a spell with SCM, which introduced him to the ecumenical world, including the works of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and a period in a college of education, a job came up in Cardiff. This included being responsible for the newly established Postgraduate Diploma in Pastoral Studies, with John Gibbs – lawyer, counsellor and Methodist Vice-President – as mentor and colleague. Building on this foundation, after a few years, that student dream was almost fully realised.

The emergence of the social sciences in a changing society

Between the two world wars, the social sciences were emerging as ways to understand the human condition and to provide bases for therapeutic and social practice: Freud, Jung and Adler, pioneers in mental therapy; theories of learning in education; approaches to community work and town planning. These were the theoretical and practical dynamics behind the implementation of the welfare state that emerged from the Beveridge Report, the Butler Education Act, the National Health Service and the social services. New professional groups were emerging and long-standing professions transformed. Here was both a challenge and a resource for the churches and their pastoral and community practices.

Secondly, especially from the mid-nineteen sixties, significant changes were transforming everyday social assumptions and behaviour. This was the time when the youth/pop culture burgeoned and which saw the beginnings of a new freedom in patterns of personal relationships. A key event was the prosecution of Penguin for publishing an unexpurgated edition of D. H. Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover (1960). New means of communication were also burgeoning: commercial radio and television, the pop-press, video and the CD, leading in our day to Facebook, Twitter and the mobile phone.

Significant changes were also taking place in the church. First, in 1961 the New Testament section of the New English Bible (Beare 1961) was published, among a growing number of translations and adaptations, which were designed to make the Scriptures more accessible but which also broke the folk attachment to the familiar Authorised text. Similarly, liturgical experimentation was in the air, notably through the Parish and People movement. The Second Vatican Council (1962–1965) brought sweeping changes not just for the Roman Catholic Church but on the wider ecumenical scene. Radical theological thinking, sometimes characterised as South Bank theology, hit the headlines. The classic example of this was the publication, in 1963, of a slight SCM paperback called Honest to God written by the Anglican Bishop of Woolwich, John Robinson (1963), while he recovered from a bad back and had nothing else to do. Drawing on the thinking of three modern theologians, Bonhoeffer, Bultmann and Tillich, it contained nothing that would have been unfamiliar in theological circles; but outside academia, the publication caused a sensation. The Observer devoted the front page of its Supplement, with twoinch banner headlines – OUR IMAGE OF GOD MUST GO. There was a range of reactions, from outrage to a welcome new openness. All this went with an upsurge in social comment and action, including such movements as Christian Action, leading eventually to the influential and controversial report Faith in the City (1985).

Other initiatives were also abroad, built around leading and strong personalities and not infrequently influenced by trends from America. It was all somewhat piecemeal and often unrelated to the formal structures of the churches or related to each other. Under the Butler Act (1944), Religious Education was required in all schools, including state schools. Developments in the field quickly began to influence Sunday School syllabi and methods. Adult education, too, began to thrive and affect church activities such as Bible study. The Institute of Religion and Medicine sought to bring together doctors, health professionals, clergy and theologians. More immediately in tracing BIAPT’s roots were groups concerned with pastoral care and counselling. The Scottish Pastoral Association (SPA) was formed as a forum for all those who considered themselves to exercise a pastoral function. Frank Lake founded Clinical Theology (now the Bridge Pastoral Foundation), running personal awareness classes and training groups. The Westminster Pastoral Foundation, long housed in Central Hall, Westminster, was the brain child of Bill Kyle, creating a chain of centres across the country. The Association for Pastoral Care and Counselling, long served by BIAPT Honorary President John Foskett, was an important division of what became the British Association for Counselling, which sought to enhance the standards and recognition of those in any form of pastoral ministry. The ‘New Library of Pastoral Care’, from SPCK, typified a new style of handbook designed to develop pastoral skills.

At a more formal level, the British Council of Churches set up a working party, in the 1960s, which issued an influential report (BCC 1969). The aim was to advocate the introduction of case work practice into ministerial training. A direct result was the appointment of directors of Pastoral Studies in Anglican theological colleges and courses. The fact that many of those appointed were women was a small but important step towards the ordination of women in the Church of England.

At this point, it is important to introduce another thread in the story–Contact: The Inter-disciplinary Journal of Pastoral Studies. 1960 saw the appearance of the first issue of Contact, the official journal of the SPA, with James Blackie as Editor, followed by Alastair Campbell. The papers in the first issue indicate the interests of the new organisation. The main paper was entitled ‘A New Kind of Man and the Pastoral Approach to Him’ (This title must surely reflect the absence of feminist sensitivity at that time). There was another paper on ‘Medicine in the New Society’. There was also a report on the SPA’s first conference at which the main speaker was Dr Harry Guntrip who was both a minister and a psychotherapist. Those familiar with Clinical Theology will be aware of his influence upon Frank Lake, its founder.

The history of Contact is inextricably linked with certain other organisations. While Contact began as the journal of the SPA, over the years it has enjoyed at various times the support of, sometimes being the effective journal of, a number of organisations in the pastoralfield. These include the Clinical Theology Association, the Institute of Religion and Medicine, the Westminster Pastoral Foundation, the Association for Pastoral Care and Counselling, the College of Health Care Chaplains and the Irish Pastoral Association. At one point it was one of the most widely distributed academic/professional journals in the country.

The conference on pastoral studies

The first tentative steps towards what was to become BIAPT was the meeting, in 1970, in St Ambrose Hall, Manchester, of a small group of university teachers. The immediate background to this was the emergence of the Postgraduate Diploma in Pastoral Studies (DPS), taking advantage of the growing trend for universities to offer further courses for practitioners in the social professions. In 1964, Birmingham’s Department of Theological Studies had, under the guidance of Gordon Davies and Ninian Smart, launched the first DPS, as an inter-disciplinary reflective course between theology and the social sciences. Bob Lambourne was brought in to head up the scheme. Under his guidance, followed by Michael Wilson and Stephen Pattison, the DPS quickly became a valued in-service opportunity for clergy and others wishing to explore the importance of the social sciences for ministry. In 1966, a similar course was set up in Manchester under Ronald Preston. It is arguable that these were the first steps in a process that would eventually take the form of the Professional Doctorate. In Cardiffunder the stimulus of Paul Halmos and John Gibbs, the DPS, starting in 1965, had a different emphasis. It was seen as a fourth year of training, similar to the PGCE in education. In those days, grants were available for such courses. North of the Border, as has already been indicated, similar developments were also taking place, through the SPA and its journal Contact and as departments of Christian Ethics and Practical Theology were transformed.

It was realised that there would be value to those in...

Table des matières

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Citation Information
• Notes on Contributors
• Introduction
• PART I Roots
• PART II Methodologies
• PART III Pluralities
• PART IV Challenges
• Index