Published in Karen L. Bloomquist, editor for Lutheran World Federation, Theological Practices That Matter. (Minneapolis: Lutheran University Press, 2009), 169-179.
Gwayanweng Kiki, a Ph. D. candidate at Charles Sturt University, Wagga Wagga, New South Wales, Australia, from the Evangelical Lutheran Church, of Papua New Guinea (ELPNG), wrote a doctoral thesis: “Wokabout Karikulum: A Community Praxis for Theological Training in the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Papua New Guinea.”
Kiki, pastor and teacher, cares about returning to an indigenous epistemology. He believes the current theological educational system of the ELPNG has adopted a wealth of Western educational philosophies on knowing, learning and teaching but comparatively few on Papua New Guinea indigenous ways of knowing. Recently graduated and now teaching at Martin Luther Seminary, in Lae, he provides contextual methods that are deeply rooted within dynamically living communities.[1]
Perhaps we have come full circle. Jesus walked about with his disciples. This is not to dismiss classical methods; the problem emerges when they dominate, overshadow, and diminish local ways of knowing so that we cannot see the churches and theological implications and methods right in front of us.
Abigail Schumacher is a Diaconal Ministry candidate at Wartburg Seminary, Dubuque, Iowa, U.S.A. She would be the first to tell you she is not the strongest student at the seminary. She lives with spina bifida and therefore uses a wheel chair. In our class, “Diaconal Ministry Theology and Formation,” she took her turn to lead a brief biblical devotion as we worked our way through Luke. Her text was Luke 5:17-26, the familiar story of some men carrying a paralyzed man to the place where Jesus was teaching. Trying to lay him before Jesus, but finding no way because of the crowd, they went up on the roof and let him down with his bed through the tiles into the middle of the crowd in front of Jesus. When Jesus saw their faith, he said “Friend, your sins are forgiven you.”
The issue is who has authority to say “your sins are forgiven.” I asked Abigail what she saw in the text. I thought she might say, “Stand up and walk,” but rather she said, “it was about the friends,” the friends who cared enough to bring their friend, through the inaccessible barriers, to Jesus. Embodied theology. I had heard the text many times, but when Abigail embodied the text, I heard it in an entirely new way.
Thinking Theologically in Integrative Formation
We can think about integrative theological approaches in a number of ways:
Contextual Theology Gwayanweng Kiki does notreject his own culture but begins there in relevant terms, concepts and experiences. In doing contextual theology—not just about people but with people—participants are not merely spectator or audience; all are subject, not object.
Embodied Theology Abigail embodies her theology. Actually, so does everyone; some people simply are not aware they do. The Creator God made us to live not simply abstractly but in bodies. The Incarnate Christ put on flesh and dwelled among us, the Body of Christ, as the church and individually members of it.
Inductive Theology We begin with mission and ministry, issues in the lives of people, churches and society. Thinking theologically from the practice of ministry leads us again to biblical, systematic and historical theology. Learning leads to mission leads to learning leads to mission. Doing theology from all directions, we return to Christ the center.
Theology in the Vernacular When people are able to think and talk about God in their own language, not just Swahili or French or English, but also farming, medicine, computers, or parenting, they never stop doing theology and that is good! Theology students do well to not forget the languages they used before seminary. And in the parish, pastors need to listen well and to learn how people think theologically about the human predicament, grace, salvation, church, and vocation.[2]
Translating and Transforming Theology Theology is an ongoing translating experience. How does Luther’s “What does this mean?” intersect with the “What in the world does this mean?” of daily life. What, then, does Law and Gospel, theology of the cross and resurrection, a Lutheran hermeneutic of biblical interpretation mean in the languages of the Laos? How does being able to translate doctrinal language into the vernacular transform people’s lives?
Relational, Dialogical, Interactive Theology We wonder if we can go “too far” with dialog. Not if we continue to go more deeply and listen ever more carefully while not forgetting our own Lutheran theological tenets which ground us. Dialogical, interactive theology sharpens the mind, as Joas Kahesi of Tanzania says, “building relationships where they don’t exist, healing them when they are broken, and deepening them when they are weak.”[3]
Constructive Theology This does not mean simply making theology up. Quite the contrary. It is about taking what one learned through the classical disciplines and integrating that learning with the ministry God has called us to do. Through this integration we develop new constructs and grow in theology and ministerial leadership.
Trinitarian Theology. Theology is rooted in the Trinity. Called by God, we are creating in ways that connect theologically not only with our minds, but with our hands and our hearts. The liberating God, Christ Jesus, is present in all parts of life that need to be set free. The Empowering Spirit strengthens and connects us as churches that serve.
As we think theologically in these integrative ways, we need to 1: Identify issues in our churches and society; 2) Develop and Use a Variety of Theological Approaches; 3) Do Inductive Theology Collaboratively.
Identifying Issues in our Churches and Society
John Hernandez Vera from Colombia believes that issues that seem academic in one context are life and death concerns in another. One does not read the works of Dietrich Bonhoeffer dispassionately when one lives today in a society steeped in so much violence that there seems no way to speak about it and the price of one life is small. And one cannot simply make a list of societal issues when violence hides other problems such as HIV/AIDS. The challenge is great.
We must recognize the inadequacy of simply acquiring and applying theology to the practice of ministry. And we must see the potential in thinking about ecclesial and missional issues theologically in connectional, transformative ways. The goal is to learn from one another, each in one’s own wide range of contextual issues around which we are called to do theology in our varied churches. No one individual, church body, or nation possesses a hierarchy of knowledge. Biblical and confessional theology transcends time and space, and yet is always local, contextual. Faith communities and their leaders need to minister faithfully among the people where they serve and also to do theology inductively in the midst of that ministry. How do congregations identify the issues in their own church and broader society?
For example, a number of congregations in my country are moving into yoked parish arrangements. One can say this is a matter of budgets, of not being able to afford their own pastor. The deeper theological question, often unstated, is, “Can we be a congregation if we don’t have our “own” pastor?” Embedded in that question are issues of the office of ministry and ecclesiology. Likewise, economic crisis is a societal issue that affects everyone. Yes, it is a matter of personal job losses, and cut-backs. It is also about unregulated greed, and the theological question, “In whom or in what do we place our trust?” Does “In debt we trust” no longer hold? What do we believe about the protecting and providing God? How does global recession increase disparity between the rich and the poor?
The simplicity of methods of doing theology through beginning with contextual issues is matched by the profundity of their potential. A teacher might be tempted to hear people’s concerns and say, “Now that you have told me your issue, I’ll tell you the answer.” But, of course, one cannot do that because people are the source of knowledge in their own contexts, whether that be nations of the world, or neighborhoods in a parish, or lives they bring to a common classroom. However, there is a role for teachers. Were we to glean all the issues and theological questions identified in a particular context, we would have a curriculum for a year or five years. Our teaching is crucial and becomes an engaging communal calling.
Our curriculum needs to be communal because we need one another in this global learning community. The Lutheran church in Colombia is small; therefore they know they need the solidarity of churches of the Lutheran World Federation. And large churches with greater voice and power need smaller ones.
Using Integrative Theological Approaches
How can a seminary or theological college learn from congregations, strengthening the connection between theology and the life of the churchess, as we worship and learn, engage in diakonia, and pursue justice?Each faith community has its own ways of doing theology. Some have not reflected upon the theological implications of the methods they are using. We do well to afford the opportunity for such reflection, for sharing these approaches with one another, and, together, growing in effectiveness of formation in faith; participatory engagement increases motivation for shared learning. It is important that everyone speak and that no one voice dominate. The invitation needs to be open-ended and participants encouraged to take notes on one another as together we read the “books” that are the people of God.
Examples:
Case Studies have been used for many years in many professional schools, e.g. business, medical as well as theological. One can purchase them. I have long preferred to have students write their own case studies from internship, as there is great learning in reflection on praxis and the writing of a narrative. (This is different from writing a verbatim.) In over 30 years of using case study method—hundreds of students—I have never read an inadequate case. We provide two samples as well as guidelines: write in the third person; include yourself sparsely, and only as one of the characters; introduce the complexity of issues and personalities; let the situation unfold; and stop before you disclose the outcome.
The professor’s role is not to “correct” the paper, but to edit, ever so slightly, simply for clarity. The papers are returned for some student rewrite and then shared with all as in small groups students do each case study over the course of the semester. The author listens as the group moves through the four-part discussion: 1. The issues one sees; 2. The people—“get into their shoes”; 3. The theological concepts and challenges; and 4, The ministry options. All stages are important. The group is warned to not move too quickly to ministry options. It is at the third step where we do theology inductively. The process could take one hour or even two. During the process the writer remains relatively quiet (as if the case were written by some author far away). At the end the student reveals not only the ending, but their own reflections on what they have heard. Confidentiality is maintained throughout. This is a time to do dialogical, interactive, constructive theology, students beginning inductively and integrating their learning from all of their theological and biblical disciplines. We often speak in the vernacular, the terminology emerging from the context of the case. Doing case studies is a highly disciplined academic exercise and transformative for ministerial leadership.
Stories of Visits to Congregations Wartburg Seminary (Dubuque, Iowa, USA) a few years ago applied for grant money to visit our graduates for a weekend in their third year serving in a parish. That was not to check up on them but to learn from them and from the congregations they served all over the country. Each of us professors went out with a different set of ears, e.g. Duane Priebe with his systematic theology ears and Thomas Schattauer with his liturgical ears. Upon return, we engaged in dialogical, collaborative theological discussion as a faculty, which in turn continues to shape the curriculum.
During the visit, the graduate walked or drove us around his or her “neighborhood” (however that was defined). We wanted to see their context, but more than that we wanted to see what they were seeing in their context. The graduate gathered some local leaders for us to meet over a meal, perhaps in a local restaurant. We were curious as to whom they might invite. Sometimes it was the mayor, or a school board member, or librarian, or store owner. In one case the pastor asked the restaurant waitress to sit down with us. We spent time around another meal with congregational leaders. We listened in as they spoke in the vernacular. [4] In such dialog we were already doing theology interactively. The learning was not for faculty alone, nor graduate, but relational and communal within the congregation.
On Sunday we attended worship and adult study; we did not preach or teach but worshipped with and learned from the congregation. We concluded our visit by having a potluck meal with congregation members after church, reflecting with them what we had seen and heard about their mission and ministry, the human need for redemption and reconciliation, and the transformative power of the Gospel at work among them. The congregation inevitably thanked us for helping them learn from one another in their context. We then had a final conversation with the graduate. Our visit produced a surplus of meaning, from which we are still learning. Some of us continue visits as we are able, even after the grant period has ended.
Through case study and visits to congregations we learn from one another not in competitive, judgmental ways, but in a spirit of openness. Using integrative approaches people are informed and transformed in theological schools and churches. Such inductive, integrative approaches are being used in church bodies around the world. Elieshi Mungure of Tanzaniadescribes doing integrative pastoral care in Africa using narrative. She says that ministry arises as a response to the experiences of people in a certain context and that by telling their stories of both bitter and pleasant experiences the individual is acknowledged and valued. Whatever our context, our approaches need to be diverse, contextual, comprehensive and integrative.
Doing Theology Inductively Collaboratively
How do we begin where the people in our churches are? Full participatory conversation may seem simple, but it is not simplistic. We start with their daily lives. This is not to negate beginning with the teachings of the church, confessions and lifelong bible study, but it is helpful to begin from the other direction at times, doing embodied, incarnational and participatory theology.
For example, a few years ago I was working with a small group meeting in Syracuse, New York, USA, using a resource, Connections: Faith and Life[5], centered on Luther’s Large Catechism. Connections groups met in the places of daily vocation of participants. That evening we met at a firehouse. Our host, a fireman, said, “I don’t have much to tell you about my faith where I work.” Not much to say? Two and a half hours later we were still talking. That evening we were dealing with the petition, “Deliver us from evil.” Throughout the ages there have been thousands of unanswered philosophical and theological questions about the nature of evil. Had we been meeting in the church building the fireman might have remained quiet, but when we asked him in his language in his place, “What is evil?” he spoke. We thought he might say “fire” or “death’ but he did not. He said precisely, “unnecessary death.” He told a story of when one of his partners had been killed accidentally during a false alarm. He told the story of the violent death of a child. When he shared with us the meaning of that petition in his context, we gleaned a new depth of theological understanding.
As a world communion, we are not able to visit all of the places where each of us lives; that would take a lifetime or more. But we can share with one another, from across the globe in the companionship of accompaniment, and certainly within our own congregations. Some faith communities naturally participate in each other’s daily lives all week; for some, particularly in urban areas, this is a challenge. But, whatever the parish setting, intentionally making visits to places of people’s vocations, and reflecting with them about their core beliefs bares much fruit for faithful living.
Even though we come from different contexts and speak different daily languages, all of us have a “last week.” As we begin to do theology inductively we might simply ask in a classroom or small group setting, “Where were you last Tuesday afternoon (or Thursday afternoon, or Friday evening)?” “What were you doing there?” I don’t mean just, “I was at a meeting” but, at a deeper level, “Were you anxious,” “Was their conflict?” “Were you thinking about something else while someone was speaking?” And then the crucial question, “What do you think God was doing there?”
This may seem presumptuous. Hans-Peter Grosshans from Germany says that we cannot use our contexts or our experiences as the norm for knowledge of God because then we would end up with any number of gods. That is true. We cannot presume ever to fully know what God is doing in the world, but we know God’s revelation in Jesus Christ, and we can seek to see God at work in our diverse experiences. Our norm is the revealed Word of God, the incarnation, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ attested to in Scripture. Our Lutheran confessions provide a lens. In order for the scriptures to be transformative, they need to be embodied in the real lives of individuals and faith communities. We need one another to help us reflect and discern the issues of the human predicament and discover again God’s grace (Law/Gospel). We need to uncover false gods and misleading beliefs. We need time for silence and time for prayer. We need to study together in this way consistently.
Luther said that all Christians have stations (roles and relationships) and vocations. For Luther vocatio is rooted in the freedom of the forgiveness of sins.[6] When we begin inductively, we need to give close attention to the certainties, questions, and insights that have arisen about the nature of the Triune God. We need to be freed from our false gods. In order to be called to vocation again and again, we need conversation with brothers and sister in Christ in the midst of our very different roles in life. Listen to some global voices:
Grace Siromony from India: Last Thursday one of my palliative care patients, a young girl of 20 years, slowly started deteriorating. She had severe pain. Her mother was beside her giving her oil massage. It was difficult to see the girl suffering for I had been visiting her for almost a month. We held hands, praying with one mind for peace and love upon her. I also said the blessing. I believe that God was with me giving me strength to help her; God was with her giving peace and comfort; God was with her mother, father andher sister. She slept well that night, but the next day she developed breathing difficulty. I was with the family and I am sure God was in our midst strengthening us all. Saturday morning around 9:15 she died.
Lois Moyo from Zimbabawa: I was in a rural area at the offices of a partner organization. Two senior work colleagues and I had gone to interview caregivers for training in Memory Work and Psychosocial support for orphaned and vulnerable children. We were looking for candidates who are committed to community work and who can communicate in English as the course units are taught in English. We interviewed, among others, one young woman doing amazing work. She desired to be empowered to do her work better. I wanted to help make her dream come true. Empowering her with her level of passion would mean contributing to the empowerment of the community in their psycho social needs.”
However, the most senior work colleague among us declared that we dismiss all the candidates as unqualified and unfit for training. I felt a jab of pain in my heart and began to say an earnest silent prayer. God was hearing the interview and observing the desire in my heart. As we stood up to leave my senior abruptly said “Ok, maybe we should take her for training and see what happens.” I was so excited I nearly jumped, but said in my heart, “Thank you God. Thank you Jesus. Thank you Holy Spirit.” I was so grateful to God, the silent listener to our conversations and to our hearts’ desires.”
Samuel Frouisou from Cameroon: My flight from Douala to Frankfurt for the LWF Consultation in Augsburg, Germany, was delayed seven hours in Douala. Our flight landed in Addis Ababa at 1 a.m. and we had to spend the whole day there. On the first day of the Consultation during the morning devotion I heard Ernest Simmons from Concordia College (Minnesota, USA) where my daughter is studying pray for the Concordia community which was undergoing flood. I found out my daughter had to be evacuated from the college, but I didn’t know where she was. Two days later when asked to share about “where we were” and “where was God” in a small group of two, I immediately thought of what I was going through during those long hours of waiting at a very hot airport, not being allowed to take drinking water with us into the waiting lounge, in Douala.
Three of us sat together at the same table in that airport lounge: a young Jewish woman who had spent about seven months in Cameroon working with a Human Rights Organization was traveling back to Tel Aviv; a retired French man who worked with the French Embassy in Cameroon and had come to visit his friends. As we started introducing ourselves to each other, the woman from Israel asked me if I was a Muslim. I was a little bit surprised because I was not only wearing a clerical shirt, but I also wore a cross on my neck. People from my region of Cameroon are often falsely thought to be part of the majority group, which is Muslim. When I said I was a Christian, she asked why I had abandoned the religion of my fathers. She said she did not believe in God. When I asked her how she could say that she did not believe in God, she said she was born Jewish but is not a religious person, and that the Bible is only a good story book. The French man was listening to our discussion. When I asked him his opinion, he said that the woman was right and that Christianity was imposed on Africans by the Western countries. Once we arrived in Addis, the French man had a connecting flight, so he did not have to wait, but the Jewish woman and I had a whole day to converse on issues of faith.
Regarding my daughter at Concordia, Moorhead, it was on Friday that I received her e-mail reassuring me that she was safe, and was staying with Pastor Janet Miller, I thanked God for God’s goodness to me and my family members. God promises to be with us always, particularly in the midst of troubled times.
Dirk Lange from the United States: Last Tuesday. Oh what a day! I was teaching an extra load because my teaching partner was out of town, and, I confess, I had to finish my lecture for an LWF Consultation. Plus there were complications in the school schedule of my girls. Everything seemed to fall on Monday and Tuesday. I was totally worn out, very nervous about what I would present at the Consultation and how I would present it when, all of a sudden, out of the blue a student came up to me and simply told me how effective my teaching was! It was a moment of grace or a rush of the Spirit that kept me going through the rest of the day, through the writing of the lecture and through to the meeting.
A conversation partner later said that in the midst of a stressful time we may not be able to see what God is doing because we are tied up in our own needs: “God was still using you to teach.”
Other Voices: From Africa: I was screening and processing four applications for grants for HIV AIDS work. Later, I was joyfully surprised they were all approved.
From the United States: Last week I was sitting with a high school German host mother who was a WW II refugee and listening to her long litany of who saved her at each step of the way.
There are more voices and more stories, if we but ask people to share them. Although contextually our lives may be literally and figuratively oceans apart, there also may be surprising ways in which our daily lives hold similar joys and fears. If one would gather all the “last week” experiences, questions and challenges of people in a faith community, one would have a vital curriculum for doing integrative theology contextually, inductively, and constructively, translating from the vernacular in embodied, relational, dialogical, interactive and transformative ways.
One might organize theological issues that emerge in a Trinitarian manner around the three articles of the creed. In his Large Catechism Martin Luther says the first article describes the nature, will and work of the Creator God. What kind of being is God? What does God do? How can we praise or portray or describe God in such a way as to make God known? The questions from daily life of these global voices might be: Why does God permit children to be orphaned? How does one portray God in an airport waiting room to a man from the French Embassy and a woman from Israel who is “no longer religious”? We confess that God preserves our bodies and souls, protects in time of danger, guards from every evil (Luther’s Small Catechism). What does that mean in various Lutheran churches around the world? From Cameroon to Concordia College, God provides companionship of family and the church. But, if there is one Creator God, why is there thirst one place and flood another? Can we trust God to be a protecting, providing God?
Christological questions arise daily. In Luther’s explanation to the Second Article (Large Catechism) he taught that the entire Gospel we preach depends on the proper understanding of this article that is so rich and broad that we can never learn it fully. And so we must learn it anew every day, contextually. Ministering in Christ’s name we are privileged to be with people as they die even as we grieve, because after Christ suffered, died and was buried, he rose again, swallowed up and devoured death. Questions remain: Why does a woman die at age 20? Why did she die now and not ten years from now? And in hearing the story of a rescuing God, we ask, “Why doesn’t God save all the refugees? Why was this person rescued and not another?” Why HIV AIDS? Theological questions are there and they are real.
In the Third article we confess that we believe in the Holy Spirit without whom we could not ever know anything of Christ or believe in him. This treasure is no longer hidden, buried, but now may be put to use and enjoyed (Luther’s Large Catechism). In the story of choosing the young people for training we think of the Spirit, seeking and selecting. Who is to determine who is fit or unfit? The questions are of discerning gifts and what ministry needs to be done. And in the midst of rush, stress, and worry, the Spirit can still enlighten—teach–others through us, even when we need a sister or brother in the faith to remind us the Spirit is at work.
Although the Creed can help us systematize issues concerning the Triune God, the experiences cannot be simply labeled, and thus separated by article. Doing theology inductively is not nice and neat. The “first article” issue of the man from Cameroon portraying God in an airport lounge also raised a “third article” question of how we encounter one another of different faiths, particularly when they may have false assumptions about us. How do we enter into brief or sustained dialog? In these existential lives are significant theological questions and insights.
In working toward being a global learning community in ecumenical and interfaith settings, and even within the Lutheran communion, we sometimes make assumptions about each other:
A woman from the global south: “I didn’t realize that people from the West talked about daily life in relation to their faith. I thought they always did theology from the top down.”
A man from the global north: “I’ve always been hesitant to really share the mundane stresses of my life because our issues seem like nothing compared to suffering others go through.”
But in doing embodied theology at a personal, contextual level, we are able to be the body of Christ at a new level with stronger connections, learning from one another across what otherwise might seem to be insurmountable barriers
Alan Lai, a Chinese Canadian says, “There is an inseparable nature of theology and teaching methods. In my social context in multicultural Vancouver people from all over the world meet. In order to engage in multicultural-international community in learning, we need to be attentive, to honor and recognize the diversity. Teaching and learning is not about applying whatever theologians have decided. How we relate (talk) to people who are different from us is itself a theology!”
We need to continue to collaborate on integrative theological formation carefully, respectfully, and accountably. In so doing we will continue our Lutheran traditions with integrity and, by the power of the Spirit, people will be transformed for ministry in the world.
[1] Kiki’s thesis has recently been published. Gwayanweng Kiki, A Community Praxis Training in the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Papua New Guinea.. (Koln, Germany: Lamabertg Academic Press, 2009) [2] See Norma Cook Everist, “Transformed for Daily Life: Ministry of the Baptized” in Everist and Craig Nessan, Transforming Leadership: New Vision for a Church in Mission (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2008), 198-212; and Norma Cook Everist, “Learn to Share Christ in the Languages of People’s Daily Lives” In Everist, ed, Christian Education as Evangelism (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007), 122-133. [3] The words of Kahesi as well as subsequent global voices are those of participants at the Lutheran World Federation global consultation, “Theology in the Life of Lutheran Church: Transformative Perspectives and Practices Today” held in Augsburg, Germany, March 25-31, 2009, and from subsequent e-mail correspondence with these people. [4] For a full description of the visit and questions asked, contact ncookeverist@wartburgseminary.edu. Some stories of visits to congregations appear in Norma Cook Everist, Open the Doors and See All the People: Stories of Congregational Identity and Vocation (Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress, 2005) [5] Norma Cook Everist and Nelvin Vos, Connections: Faith and Life, (Chicago: Evangelical Lutheran Church in America), 1997. This four-unit, six-session each, adult curriculum using Marin Luther’s Large Catechiam, included visits to places of vocation of the participants. [6] Einar Billing, Our Calling, trans. Conrad Bergendoff (Rock Island: Augustana Press, 1958), 5.