Challenges in Theological Education-Volf

7/28/2019 Challenges in Theological Education-Volf

1/12

ERT (2005) 29:3 , 197-207

Dancing for God: ChallengesFacing Theological EducationToday

Miroslav VolfK E Y W O R D S : Globalization, co ntexual-ization, pedagogy, church, power,trust, love

MY TOPIC THIS EVENING is 'Challengesfacing theological education today'.There are many such challenges, someof which are unique to theological edu-cation and others which it shares withother educational efforts. Because ofconstraints on oiu" time tonight andbecause of the expertise I bring to thistask, I will limit myself to ju st one typeof challenge. I will speak about theo-logical challenges facing theologicaleducation today. In terms of the Pro-gram Conceptualization for this confer-ence, I will undertake primarily to'reground theological education in ourshared biblical and theological com-mitments'.

ChallengesBecause I will concentrate on theolog-ical challenges I will say very littleabout some issues that concern manyof you deeply. To start with the mun-dane, I will say nothing, for instance,about fitiancial challenges, which Iknow must weigh heavily on yourshoulders. How to put food on stu-dents' tables and pay electricity bills?Where will the money come from forfaculty salaries, library books, comput-ers, bxulding maintenance, not to men-tion new programs and new facilities?How to survive financially in economi-cally depressed times when the pres-sures of globalization a re widening thegap between the rich and the poornot just between nations, but alsowithin themand the churches findthemselves, for the most part, amongthe poor.

I will also leave aside institutional

Miroslav Volf (Dr. theol, Tubingen ) is Hen ry B. Wright Professor ofTheolo^ and Director of Yale Centrefor Faith and Culture, Yale University D ivinity Scho ol at Y ale University D ivinity Scho ol and Visiting Professorof Systematic Theolo^ at the Evangelical Theological Faculty, Osijek, Croatia. He forme rly taught at FullerTheolog ical Seminary and is the author of many articles and W ork in the S pirit (OUP, 1991), Exclusion and


2/12

198 Miroslav Volfchallengesan issue whose impor-tance we Christians often grosslyunderestimate because of narrow defi-nitions of spirituality. How do we cre-ate healthy patterns of relationshipsbetween people which contribute totheir flourishing instead of sappingtheir energies and stifling their cre-ativity? How to ensure institutionallongevity, beyond the life-span of acharismatic founder or a particularlygifted visionary? How to rebuild trustand reignite enthusiasm after an insti-tution has been mismanaged for yearsand its staff mistreated, all in the nameof the demands of God's kingdom? Howdo we create workable and mutuallybeneficial cooperative links with otherinstitutions nationally and internation-ally?

I will also say nothing about contex-tual challenges. 'Context' is a muchused but knotty concept. For there aremany contexts relevant for doing the-ology, and it is not easy to tell whereone ends and ano ther begins. The con-text to which I refer here is the clusterof processes grouped under the termglobalization. How does the kind ofknowledge demanded by the globaliza-tion processesknowledge under-stood primarily as flexible technicalknow-how oriented toward innovationand the satisfaction of needsrelateto the kind of knowledge theologicaleducation has traditionally favouredknowledge understood as wisdomdrawn from sacred texts and orientedtoward life in light of the world's ulti-mate future? How do we theologize atthe interplay between local and global,

tances of periphery to the encroach-ments by the centre? How to do theol-ogy in a situation of increasing inequal-ity of power and resources caused byunjust political and economic interna-tional relations?One final item on the lis t of issues Iwill not address: pedagogical chal-lenges facing theological education.Starting with the educationalprocesses, to what extent is the mass-education model appropriate for theo-logical education^whether th at modelis teacher or learner orientedand towhat extent should we work with anappren ticeship model? How to incorpo-rate new technologies into our educa-tional settings? In term s of educationalgoals, how do we m otivate stude nts topursue with intellectual seriousnessthe love of God as well as the knowl-edge of God and God's ways with theworld? How do we transmit a sensethat God is a God not only of the big pic-ture but also a God of detailsa Godwho cares about the finest of the finepoints of an argument because he is aGod of truth, or a God who, as LewisSmedes puts it in his recent spiritualmemoir, likes 'elegant sentences and[is] offended by dangling modifiers''because he is a God of beauty?

Beyond stude nts ' experience in col-lege or seminary, how do we transmithabits tha t sustain a life-long intellec-tua l exploration of the love and knowl-edge of God in service of God's world?How do we help stude nts acquire a con-viction that tlieology is done for anencompassing way of life rather than


3/12

Dancing for God: Challenges Facing Theological Education Today 199simply to satisfy intellectual curiosity,earn a living, or dazzle others withfiashes of academic brilliance? How dowe inculcate a sense tha t theology, likemuch of ancient philosophy, is itself away of lifea life of love and knowl-edge of Godso that one is a theolo-gian with one's whole life and no t ju stfrom 9-5?

TheologyAll these challengesfinancial, insti-tutional, contextual, and pedagogi-caland many more, are the stuff ofour daily lives as educators, and noresponsible theological education canafford to disregard them. But there is achallenge tha t comes closer to the coreof what we as theological educators areabout. For the lack of better term, I'llcall it a theological challenge (by whichI mean that it is 'strictly theological',for, given that theology concerns thewhole way of life, financial, institu-tional, contextual, and pedagogicalchallenges a re also theological in theirown way). Put very simply, the chal-lenge which I will explore concerns theplace of God in theological educationand, more broadly, in doing theology.This has always been the mostimportant challenge for a theology tha tclaims to be Christian. The same holdstrue today in oiu: global contex t. A pow-erful dynamic was un leashed by globalmarket processes which makes, toquote Karl Marx' Communist Manifesto,'everything that is solid melt intoair' whole ways of hfe are being per-manently revolutionized, local cus-

only to be quickly replaced by new onesagain. The las t thing theology needs isto be simply pulled into that dyncimic,supporting it or opposing it or tweak-ing it in one or the other direction.Instead, theology needs a vantagepoint outside these processes so it canproperly evaluate them and resist theirtendency to enslave our whole Hves bymaking us beheve that 'its all aboutmoney and power'. Unchecked, theseprocesses wdll drain us of our properhumanity and ultimately destroy cre-ation. Now as much as ever, theolo-gians need to be reminded of the oldadage: the main thing is to keep themain thing the main thing. And themain thing for theology is God.

By definition, theology is speechabout God. I am familiar with the infiu-ential notion that theology is notspeech about God but speech aboutspeech aboutGod. It is an analysis of thereligious language which com munitiesof faith use and practices in which theyengage, p roponents of this view claim.I disagree. I prefer to differentiatemore sharply between religious stud-ies and theology. Religious studies ha sas its object of study, among otherthings, religious communities' speechabout God; theology has God and God'srelation to the world as its object ofstudy . Of course , God is not an item ofthis world, and we can study God onlyindirectly, through created realitieslike the 'fiesh' of God's Son or the'words' of the prophets and apostles.Every good theology will, therefore,incorporate into its tas k a good deal ofwhat rehgious studies is about: reh-


4/12

200 Miroslav Volf

stood, theology does not seek to under-stand God and God's relation to theworld. Its goal is to foster love ofGodcreator, redeemer, and consum-mator of the world, the source of alltruth, goodness, and beauty.

Examine, however, what most the-ologians and theological schools doand you would have never guessed tha tour primary concern was with God.Calvin's comment in the Institutes ofChristian Religion about Christians'relation to 'heavenly immortality' eas-ily applies to theologians' relation toGod. He writes.There is not one of us , indeed, whodoes not wish to seem throughouthis life to aspire and strive afterheavenly immortality.... But if youexamine the plans, the efforts, thedeeds, of anyone, there yon willfind nothing else but earth.^Nothing else hut earth that is alsowhat you will find in the plans, theefforts, and the deeds of most of us the-ologians, and tha t is so even if you dis-regard for a moment the kind of self-centredness in our work tha t we sha rewith other human beings, and thatmakes us seek mainly oiu"selves andour own good in everything we do.If we are of a more pious bent, thepiece of 'earth' you will find in ouractivities will be called the Christianchurch. We work for its numericalgroAvth and institutional development.In relation to outsiders, we defend thefaith and shore up its plausibility; in

relation to insiders, we offer a commu-

nal ideology, an interrelated set ofclaims which express our comprehen-sive self-understanding. If we areinclined toward social activism, theearth you will find in our activities isthe wider world, graced with goodness,truth , cind beauty or wrecked by injus-tice, deception, and violence. We cele-brate the world's virtues as well asanalyse the causes of the world's woesand heal its wounds in the light ofGod's purposes with the w orld.

As 'chiu'ch theologians' we serveecclesiastical communities; as 'publictheologians ' we serve political commu-nitiesand God gets left out of the pic-ture, more or less. We do make refer-ences to God. We even claim that weare guided by God's designs for thechurch and the world. But often, it doesnot take even a mind trained in theschool of the great masters of suspi-cionLudwig Feuerbach, Karl Marx,Friedrich Nietzsche, and SigmundFreudto notice that we use God toachieve our own ecclesiastical o r poUt-ical ends rather than aligning theseendswith the pu rposes of the M aster ofthe Universe. A careful look at what wedo, will show that we evenoh, themother of all absurdities!^try to craftthe Crafter of all reality better to servethe ends we have in mind.

In an age so obsessed with 'making'and 'producing,' the greatest challengefor theologians and theological educa-tors, is to keep God at the centre ofwha t we do. If we succeed here, w e'llsucceed, even if our efforts get stifledby lack of ftmds, obstructed by inade-quate pedagogy or lack of sensitivity to


5/12

Dancing for God: Challenges Facing Theological Education Today 201ers, institution-builders, cultural ana-lysts, and teachers. Why? Some tenyears ago, my own theological teacher,Professor Juergen Moltmann, gave asgood a reason as one can give in theopening lines of his key-note addressbefore American Academy of Rehgion:'It is simple, but true , to say that theol-ogy has only one , single problem: God.We are theologians for the sake of God.God is our dignity. God is our agony.God is our hope.'^ We theologians areeither like Moses, ascending MountSinai to m eet with God so he can speakof God and God's designs for the world,or we are no theologians a t all!

But what does it mean to keep God atthe centre of our efforts? Let me exploreone answer by examining the centraltheological categories of 'trust' and'love' and hnking them to God. Before Istart, two explanatory remarks are inorder. First, I will begin 'with a piece ofearth'human trust and human love.My purpose, however, is to use them tofocus our attention on God, their ulti-mate object. Second, I will start withfailures of tru st and love. This m ay sug-gest that we can know what properobjects of trust and love are by examin-ing the point where tru st and love breakdown. But that is not so. Under certainconditions, negatives can prepare u s forthe positive; in and of themselves theydo not lead to it, however. We under-stand failures of trust and love ade-quately only when we know their properobjectwhich take s u s back to the cen-trah ty of God in our hves as persons offaith and theologians.

Trust and LoveWhat do we trust? In what do webeheve? My question is not, 'What dowe say that we trust?' Most of us willblurt out the right answer withoutmuch thinking: we trus t God. My ques-tion is rather, 'What do we actuallytrust?' The answer seems to be thesame today as it was centuries ago inthe thne of the great Church fatherAugustine. We tru st in power. Individ-ually and collectively we seek to am assand dem onstrate power, because powerseems to open all doors. In the City ofGod, Augustine called this desire libidodominandilust to dominate, andnoted th at the city of this world, which'aims a t dominion' and 'holds nations inenslavement', is itself 'dominated bythat very lu st of dominion'.*

When one is captive to power, onemanipulates and exploits, and the vic-tims are the powerlessthe poor, theold, and the very young, the unborn.Augustine beheved that the lust todominate is th e mciin characteristic notonly of the earthly city but also of itsruler, Satan. In the treatise on the Trin-ity he w rote,

The essential flaw of the devil'sperversion made him a lover ofpower and a deserter and assailantof justice, which means that menimitate him all the more thoroughlythe more they neglect or evendetest justice and studiouslydevote themselves to power, rejoic-ing at the possession of it orinflamed with the desire for it.'What do we desire? What do we


6/12

202 Miroslav Volflove? Again, my question is not, 'Whatdo we say that w e love?' If asked , w e'drecite the great commandment: 'Youshall love the Lord your God w ith allyour heart, and w ith all your soul, andw ith all your strength, and w ith allyour mind; and your neighbour a s your-self (Luke 10:27), implying that th isis, more or less, w hat w e do or at leaststrive to do. My question rather is'What do we actually love?' We Live in aculture that above all desires to pos-ses s. Posse ssion s offer pow er andpromise happiness. And y et by piu-su-ing the d esire for possessions w e findourselves caught in a futile and melan-choly squirrel w heel: the faster w e runto acquire more, the faster the w heel isturning and the desired endhappi-nessremains out of reach. We doamass more and more possessions.But possessions, no matter how manyw e have and how posh they are, nevergive happiness; they are hke child ren'stoys interesting w hile they are new .Some of us refuse to run in thesquirrel w heel and d esire to give our-selves to others w ithout hold ing back.We find fulfilment in loving others achild, a lover, a community. Like Mar-garete in Soren Kierkegaard 's retellingof the story of Faust, w e feel that w elove ad equately only w hen w e achievethat s tate of selflessness of w hich reh-gious thinkers, philosophers, andpoets so eloquently speak, and 'com-pletely disappear' in the beloved.' And

yet, in our sober mom ents w e hesitate,know ing w ell tha t d isappointment isinevitable and th at w e w ill end upsquandering ourselves. So we oscillatebetw een calculating and hold ing backon the one hand and abandoning allmeasure to give oin^selves completelyon the other. In the first case w e areleft w ith a gaping hole of unfulfilmentas w e find ourselves alone in our w orldof self-centred calculations. In the sec-ond case, w e risk an unbearable con-tradiction in our very identity becausetha t to w hich w e have given ourselvescompletely can at any time be yankedaw ay from us.

Most of our society's problemsfrom economy and politics to acad emy,from rehgion and family to friendshipand courtshipare traceable to mis-placed fai th and misplaced love. Fromthe corporate executive w ho seeks herow n w ealth at the expense of employ-ees, chents, and shareholders, to theprofessor w ho fabricates find ings inpursuit of the infiuence and prestigetha t come w ith acad emic acclaim, tothe church lead er w ho chooses thesecurity of silence over the r isk of call-ing a colleague to account for hisoffences, to a lover pained by the lossof w hat w as to her d earer than the veryselfso many of the problems thattrouble us as persons, communities,and nations stem from our trustingpow er and d esiring either to acquire orto give ourselves to finite th ings.

6 See, for insta nce , Soren Kierke gaard , Trusting GodAt the heart of w hat Christian faith is


7/12

Dancing for Go d: Challenges Facing Theological Education Tod ay 2 0 3lovenot jus t to profess that God is theobject of our trast and love, as the cor-rect 'Sunday School' answer, but toorder our lives around tru sting and lov-ing God.When we trust God rather thanpower we will place the exercise ofpower in proper relation to justice, sothat power serves justice rather thanjustice being sacrificed to power. Wewill find the motivation and streng th toprefer losing power by doing what isright to possessing power by doingwhat is wrong. To trast simply inpower, I have suggested earlier byquoting Augustine, is satanic. This isnot to say that power as such is evil,but tha t it must be subordinated to theGod of justice, in whom w e ultimatelyplace our tra st . Will we ourselves suf-fer injustice if we give precedence tojustice over power? We might, but God,who is no t only ju st b ut a lso all-power-ful, will ultimately guarantee tha t jus-tice will be done to those who do right.God will not let the perpetrator eter-nally triumph over the victim whowould rather be wronged than dowrong.

When we love God rather than pos-sessions, we will place possession ofgoods in proper relation to love ofneighbour. To love possession, I havesuggested with the image of the squir-rel wheel, is futile and melancholy. Thisis not to say that possessions as suchare evil, so that we all should simplygive away everything we have or con-tinue to possess it with bad conscience.Instead, we are called to share with ourneighbours, because we are created by

goods and our lives for othe rs.Love of neighbour cannot stand onits own, however, untied to love of God.For if love of neighbour excludes God itwill either cancel itself by turaing intoselfishness (if we are calculating) or itwill destroy u s (if we deliver ourselvesto the mercy of the finite and thereforeinherently unreliable objects of ourlove). The only way to ensure th at wewill not lose our very selves if we giveourse lves in love to others is if our lovefor the other passes through God, ifwe,as A ugustine put it succinctly and pro-foundly, love and enjoy the other inGod. Listen to what Kierkegaard, adeeply Christian 19th century philoso-pher, has to say about the matter:

No, the one who in love forgets him-self, forgets his suffering, in orderto think of someone else's , [the onewho] forgets all his misery in orderto think of someone e lse 's, [the onewho] forgets what he himself losesin order lovingly to bear in mindsomeone else's loss, forgets hisadvantage in order lovingly to thinkof someone else'struly, such aperson is not forgotten. There isone who is thinking about him: Godin heaven. Or love is thinking abouthim. God is Love, and when a per-son out of love forgets himself, howthen would God forget him! No,while the one who loves forgetshimself and thinks of the other per-son, God is thinking of the one wholoves. The self-lover is busy; heshouts and makes a big noise andstands on his rights in order to


8/12

204 Miroslav Volfthinking of him, and tha t is why theone who loves receives what hegives.'From one angle, the main goal of

theology is to be a guardian of humantrust and desire. First, theology needsto make plausible that God is theproper object of human t ru st and love.Theologians need to show how andwhy it is tha t if we trust and desire Godwe will find both personal fulfillmentand be a source of blessing to commu-nities, institutions, and eco-systemsaround us. Second, theology mustundertake a critique of misplaced tr us tand desire. Theologians need to showhow and why it is that if we trust inpower and desire either simply toacquire finite things or to lose our-selves in them, we and the communi-ties, institutions, and eco-systemsaround u s will be the losers.

PressuresOur failure as theologians to keep Godin the centre of our work may be but aconsequence of our lack of tru st in Godand love of God. Though we readilyaffirm that God is the source of all goodand that therefore t ru st in God and loveof God are alone wholly salutiuystcinces of human beings, we don'tquite beheve our own words.

As theologians we find it hard totrustGod. At the experiential level, Godhas a hab it of not showing up when weneed God the most. We place trust inGod, and God lets us downour childis killed by the neghgence of persons

who befriended him (as my brother,Daniel, was killed a t the tender age offive), we are mistreated by ouremployer when we are most vulnera-ble, our small community, placed a t theintersection of greater powers' clash-ing interests, gets run over, all thewhile those who don't believe in God,let alone trust in God, prosper andthrive. God, as Professor Moltmannput it in a speech from which I alreadyquoted, is not only a theologian's dig-nity and hope; God is also a theolo-gian's 'agony.'Pressin-es not to trust God comefrom the academic cu lture in which wework as well. The cultural ehteespe-cially in the modem West has, on thewhole, not been friendly toward reli-gion. In a recent tex t about theology asa discipline, philosopher NicholasWolterstorff has noted four prevalentattitudes, not always consistent witheach other, toward religion in the con-temporary culture. 'Rehgion is wither-ing away, religion is causally inert, reli-gion is coercive, rehg ious behef is irra-tional: those have been dominantthemes in how the cultural ehte in themodem West has thought about reh-gion.'* As it happens, these attitudestoward rehgion are increasingly calledinto question, even in the academichigh culture of the W est. And yet theirdetrimental effects on theology con-tinue unabated.

Both our experiences w ith God andthe attitudes toward rehgion of ournon-Christian academic colleagueshave made some of us hesitate to place


9/12

Dancing for God: Challenges Facing Theological Education Today 205God in the centre of our efforts. More'conservative' ones among us haveretreated into the fortresses built withthe hcird stone of rigid orthodoxy. Fun-damentalist parrots tha t we sometimesare, we a ct as if ju st repeating old for-mulas will make them tme and some-how alive. More 'hberal' ones amongus have tied their fortunes to what isfashionable in academic circles. Wehave become ersatz philosophers,ersatz cultural critics, ersatz sociolo-gists, ersatz psychologists, ersatzwhatever, hoping that giving a bit ofrehgious garnish to the dishes pre-pared perfectly well with secular ingre-dients will somehow make our workrelevant. As fundamentalist parrots orersatz intellectuals, we have kept atarms length the unpredictable andsometimes terrifying hving God whoalone is the source of all goodandmade ourselves as theologians prettymuch inconsequential. Even more,these strategies are self-destmctive:as dogmatic parrots we are agents ofour faith's self-banalization; as ersatzintellectuals, we are agents of its self-secularization. In either case, we haverobbed the Christian faith of its powerand relevance.

Loving G odAs theologians, we find it hard to loveGod. You can tell whom a person lovesby examining whom she seeks toplease and with whom she spendstime.

Whom do we theologians seek toplease? You may think that theolo-

ter to us more than anything else whatGod might think of oiu" work. And yet,more often than not as we speak orwrite we think to ourselves: 'VOiatwillour colleagues say? How will this ortha t interest group react? How spiritedor how long will l i e applause be? Howwill our book do on ama20n.com rcink-ings hst? W ill it get this or tha t aw ard(preferably the cash-loaded Grawe-meyer award!) ?' We speak and write toget approval from an audience, toimpress reviewers, to satisfy 'cus-tom ers'. As it says in the Good Book offalse teachers , we are tickling the earsof our hearers (2 Timothy 4:3). Popu-larity and its rewards ta ke precedenceover God's delight. If we continuedown this path, we'll soon be theolo-gizing the way some elected officialsgovem in westem democracies: bypolling religious preferences of ourconstituencies.

With whom do we as theologiansspend our time? Do we take time toextricate ourselves from the hustle andbustle of everyday hfeacademic andotherwiseand meditate on God,aided by Scripture and the great spiri-tual masters of our tradition? To bepersonal, Ifind t hard to create a spaceuntouched by the demands of my tiieo-logical career and other responsibili-ties to attend to the One in whom I 'hveand move and have my being' (Acts17:28) and for whose sake I claim to bea theologian. Surely this m ust be fool-ishness, on par w ith any other we couldimagine!

In The View from the rou;er TheodoreZiolkowski has explored the signifi-


10/12

206 Miroslav Volfously spiritual refuges.' ' For them'tower' was both an antimodernistimage and a micro-ecology in which topursue 'the opposition to urban tech-nological world of modernism'.'" Astheologians, we need not follow theirantimodernist stance, as if modernitywere a particularly odious epoch in thehistory of humanity. But we should fol-low them into tow ers.

Every theologian should have a'tower,' a space slightly above theworld (or, if one prefers to think in tem-poral term s, a time to pursue non-con-temporaneity) . True, towers have theirown dangers and temptations. But along religious tradition has associatedspatial elevation with the presence ofGod and with visions of un ity of heavenand earth, destroyed by the Fall to thedetriment of the earth. Jesus wasn'tonly taken to the high m ountain by theTempter; he went also to the mountaintop to hear the divine voice and betransfigured. In our age, still way toomodem age, some might see such with-drawals from the world in order toencounter God as a sign of religiouslimacy. For, as Peter Sloterdijk has putit, 'modernity is an age in which noth-ing but the world may be the case'."But theology will lose its soul if the-ologians neither get transfigured inGod's presence nor gain a glimpse ofsome future unity of heaven and ear th.

9 Theodore Ziolkowski, The View from theTower. Origins of an Antimodernist Image(Princeton: Princeton University Press,

Dancing for GodIn an interview about her movieFrida a movie about indomitability,courage, and sadness in the life of theM exican painter Frida Kahlo itsdirector, Julie Taymor, told a storyabout her visit to Bali many yea rs ago,as a young artist. One day she wasalone in a secluded wooded area at theedge of a clearing, qu ietly listening tothe distant music of native celebra-tions. Suddenly there stepped onto theclearing thirty to forty old men dressedin the full splendour of warrior cos-tumes with spears in their hands, andstarted to dance. Nobody else wasaround, and, hidden by the deep shad-ows of ancient trees, she could observethem dance for what seemed an eter-nity. Suddenly she had an epiphany ofsorts. She pu ts it this way:

... they danced to^nobody. Theywere performing for God ... Theydid not care if someone was payingfor tickets, writing reviews, theydid not care if an audience waswatching, they did it from theinside to the outside and from theoutside in, and that profoundlymoved me...To Taymor, these dancing w arriorsbecame symbols of non-commercial-ized ar t guided primarily by the artist 'sinner vision rather than being captiveto the sensibilities of its potential audi-ences. To her, they stood for authen-ticity, unspoiled by the desire for popu-larity. To me, they became symbols of

theology undertaken above all for thesake of God and an indictment against


11/12

Dancing for God: Challenges Facing Theological Education Today 207importantly, doesn 't it bespeak a basicmistake about the nature of tlieology?Presumably theology is done to thebenefit of the world, not of God. Goddoesn't need theology; if anybodyneeds it, it is our fellow human beings.How can one communicate effectivelywithout taking into account the needsand sensibilities, linguistic habits andcultural preferences, of the people towhom one is speaking? With theologyit is not like with prayer. Hypocriteslove to stand and pray in public placesso tha t they may be seen by others; trueChristians, Jesus taught, go to theirrooms, shut their doors, and pray insecret. You should pray the way Bali-nese old men danced^with no hum aneye watching. But you should not dotheology like that. When you pray, youspeak to God; when you theologize, youspeak to fellow human beings.There is a major difference betweenBalinese dancers and theologians.Unlike those dancers, theologiansessentially address people. We inter-pret the world for them in the hght ofGod's designs; we reflect on how toalign our lives and our world withGod's purposes; we seek to motivatethem to find fulfilment and be a bless-ing to the world by trus ting and lovingGod. What we say as theologians andhow we put it cannot be just a matterof movement 'from the inside to theoutside', to use Taymor's phrase. Weare 'pastors,' and must be sensitive tospecific needs and situations of our'parish', whether th at is the church orthe w orld. Neither in the way nor in th e

just have God on our minds.Yet the analogy to Balinese dancersappHes. .As we are speaking and writ-ing for our fellow human beings, we aredancing for God. A god for whom onecan dance only when one is not dancingfor people, must be a false goda godshut up in his own sphere and pursuinghis own interests unrelated to the well-being of creation. This is not who theTriune God is , the Father, the Son, andthe Holy Spirit. God is the creator andan unfaltering lover of creation; humanbeings and their world arc God's sphereand inte rests. It is impossible to dancefor this God to the detriment of cre-ation. A dance pleasing to God will con-fer blessing upon creatures. Indeed,given tha t God is the source of all cre-ation's good, only a dance that pleasesGod will make creation flourish.

A few months ago I was on a spiri-tual retreat in the hills of Vermont,New England. At the end of the retr ea twe prayed for one another, each foreach. I will never forget the prayer amusician offered for me. He asked Godtha t as a theologian I would 'play to theaudience of One'. Now that's a chal-lenge^to play as theologians to Godand give it the b est we have, our mostrigorous thoughts, our best creativity,our most sustained discipline, and ourundivided attention. As I heard theprayer uttered over me, I was deeplyattracted and frightened at the sametime. Do I have the courage, I won-dered, really to play as if God, the loverof creation, were the only one listen-ing? I soon discovered that a differentname for my timidity was a failure to


12/12

Documents

Challenges in Theological Education-Volf