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What Is Constructive Theology?
Histories, Methodologies, and Perspectives
Edited by: Marion Grau and Jason Wyman
Series: Rethinking Theologies: Constructing Alternatives in History and Doctrine
248 Pages
- Hardcover
- ISBN: 9780567695154
- Published By: Bloomsbury Academic & Professional
- Published: October 2020
$115.00
The question asked by the title of the edited volume What is Constructive Theology?: Histories, Methodologies, and Perspectives is a question I, as a doctoral student in constructive theology, have heard countless times from people at all levels of theological literacy and education. Edited by Marion Grau and Jason Wyman, this book offers three chapters on the overall scope and methodology of constructive theology, four chapters on particular areas of interest for constructive theology, and three chapters on postcolonial directions for constructive theology. The volume goes beyond the US roots of constructive theology, extending into international conversations. It uses specific cases to show how a constructive approach differs from systematic or dogmatic varieties of theology. In doing so, it builds on Wyman’s previous book that had traced the historical roots, evolution, and definition of constructive theology (Constructing Constructive Theology: An Introductory Sketch, Fortress, 2017).
Wyman’s opening chapter in this new volume echoes the themes of his earlier book, while emphasizing the significant diversification of constructive theology during the 21st century, diversification that is on display in the chapters that follow. It is a bit jarring, though, that the chapter opens with the claim that every major theological school, divinity school, and seminary in the US has at least one “constructive” theologian on its faculty (2). Perhaps constructive theologians should reflect on why this is not actually the case and why other (systematic, dogmatic, etc.) modes of theology remain appealing to so many institutions and theologians.
This is followed by a chapter from John J. Thatamanil connecting both divine and human activity to the work of constructing theology. Thatamanil shows how theopoetics (especially in the work of Catherine Keller) has enacted this approach, one that moves beyond choosing either divine or human action as primary in the work of theologizing. Next, volume co-editor Grau takes up the issue of mythos and logos in theology, demonstrating the wide variety of approaches that constructive theologians have used in reconstructing mythos: classical, historically conscious, hermeneutical, political, and liberationist, among others.
The middle four chapters take on diverse tendencies within constructive theology. Heike Peckruhn writes on the role of the body in theology, calling for a shift from only asking questions of whether/whose/which bodies are involved in theology to more attention on how bodies are involved in constructing theology. Shelly Rambo addresses the roles of authority, liberation, and witness in constructive biblical hermeneutics, focusing on the “afterlives” of biblical authority that make biblical texts still relevant even when the authority of institutional religion has faded. She argues that constructive theologians need to address the affective resonances of biblical texts in light of their ongoing cultural and somatic significance. Holly Hillgardner shows how postmodern and postcolonial thought have brought ethical concerns to the fore in comparative theology, using case studies from Hindu-Christian theology. Anthony Reddie describes how black theology can be done in participative and experiential modes that are thus constructive.
In the final three chapters, Laurie Cassidy relates settler colonialism to Johann Baptist Metz’s notion of “dangerous memory,” Lawrence N. Nwankwo reflects on popular religiosity and money in the Nigerian theo-political context, and Judith Gruber construes constructive theology as apologetic or “answering” in the form that Paul Tillich had described. These three chapters all resonate with Rambo’s call for constructive theological engagement with cultural realities beyond those of formal institutional religion.
Because the chapters in this volume are so thoughtful and representative, they capture a glimpse of the state of constructive theology. Taken together, they demonstrate the interdisciplinary and activist emphases that Wyman had outlined in his 2017 book as central to constructive theology. They engage both with disciplines beyond theology and with concrete problems in the physical and socio-political realms. The mood of these chapters, however, moves beyond liberal or even radical optimism toward explicit pessimism about redemption or utopia. More than one author in this volume connects the fragmentary nature of constructive theology to the impossibility of a final or conclusive political or eschatological triumph. Thus, they implicitly reject the future-oriented visions of many previous socially engaged theologies, such as social gospel or liberation theologies that had pointed toward a future society marked by justice and equity. This is a difficult position to hold. It may be honest, but it is not likely to inspire social or political action to the extent that those earlier forms of socially engaged theology had.
Relatedly, it is also unclear what the institutional constituency of the more theopoetic forms of constructive theology found in many of these chapters may be: neither denominations nor universities nor society as a whole are clamoring for creative wordplay, at least not to the extent that they are willing to pay people to create it. This particular mode of theologizing thrives on puns and involves an implicit refusal to make overly concrete claims about present reality and future outcomes. Even if that is intellectually justifiable, it is not difficult to imagine that institutions that fund theological work are hoping for more substantive outcomes.
I would suggest that Reddie’s chapter on participatory exercises in black theologizing and Nwankwo’s chapter relating popular religiosity to governance in a particular state (Nigeria) offer some of the more efficacious ways forward. By connecting to concrete present social realities, they offer substantive engagements with forms of religiosity that are not limited to either linguistic games that mostly have appeal in academic contexts or to structures of institutional religion. I would also suggest that the relative absence of the natural sciences and of more quantitative branches of the social sciences from this volume is unfortunate. Constructive theology can live up to its promise by contributing to public policy and human knowledge through such interdisciplinary engagement. On the whole, it would be helpful for constructive theologians to more consciously assess the tenuous viability of their constituencies in church, academy, and society.
This volume offers an accurate picture of the current state of constructive theology, including its strengths and weaknesses. The contributions are all thought-provoking and ably refer to relevant literatures (although the presence of at least twenty typographical errors was distracting). We can be grateful to the editors and authors for helping us to answer the question posed in the title, while pressing toward renewed modes of theological construction that respond to our moment.
Stephen Waldron is a PhD student at the Boston University School of Theology.
Stephen WaldronDate Of Review:August 10, 2022
Marion Grau is Professor of Systematic Theology, Ecumenism and Missiology at MF Norwegian School of Theology, Religion and Society, Norway.
Jason Wyman is Adjunct Professor at Manhattan College, USA.