This post was written by Patrick Rist on April 22, 2008
In our last posting, we mentioned what Ken Myers calls “Adverbial Christianity” – the notion that so often the world dictates the nouns of our lives, while Christianity is brought in so that we can pursue these pre-established goals “peacefully,” or “graciously,” or “honestly,” and the like.
This is an anemic vision of the Christian life, but it is quite often the status quo for believers in academia. The way out of it is not easy – there are not any quick fixes. But surely we can all affirm that we have been called to something higher, something better, and that faithfulness means at least trying.
It is in that spirit that I’d like to offer some thoughts on how to begin the process of integrating one’s scholarly work with historic Christian thought. On one hand, it would be hard to improve upon Paul Gould’s essay, “The Two Tasks Introduced: The Fully Integrated Life of the Christian Scholar,” in The Two Tasks of the Christian Scholar, but what I’ve been considering would probably be considered prolegomena (even to Gould’s prolegomena).
§ At the most basic level, integration means thinking theologically about one’s academic discipline. This presupposes that theology, and the Bible upon which valid theology is based, actually has something to say about things other than “religion” and “spirituality.” The Bible is not a science textbook (as we are so often and so tiresomely reminded), yet it presents itself as a true and accurate account of the world and the human condition. Therefore, unless we are willing to buy into a truncated, impoverished view of truth, we must take the Bible and theology seriously and allow it to speak into our understanding of our scholarly endeavors.
§ Once we take this step, then the hard work really begins. It is my belief that Christian scholars, whatever their discipline, should become lay theologians to the best of their abilities. There are far too many “Christian scholars” who are Christian by virtue of their confession but not by virtue of the “Christian-ness” of their scholarship. Scholarship that is thoroughly Christian is the product of much analysis (and judgment) of the reigning paradigms in a given discipline, not a little Christian jargon spread over the top like mayonnaise (and that goes for amorphous, often inane verbiage about “justice,” too).
In order to do this sort of analysis, it seems to me that Christian academics should begin to humbly learn theological categories. This is a process of replacing one’s mental furniture with new concepts – and training oneself in a different style of thinking.
It would seem that this would be a better preliminary step than going directly to books written by Christians in one’s field – if there are any. Having grounding in theological convictions would enable one to better ascertain the validity of what another Christian has written, and also to recognize the positive contributions that they are making.
§ Finally (at least for today’s post!), a key part of the integration process that is so often ignored, or at least left unstated, is reflection. What we have been describing – the serious study of theology, the replacing of mental furniture, the analysis of the presuppositions of one’s field – these are not things that can be simply checked off a “to do” list. These are ongoing, difficult projects, which require strenuous mental effort and time – time to digest, assimilate, and perhaps harmonize what one is learning. And only after lengthy reflection can one hope to actually produce something as a result.
I must state it boldly: There can be no integration without reflection. If you find that you are simply too busy, too “pro-active” to take the time to reflect, you may think that you want to do integration, but you’ll have to be satisfied with the adverbs.
|
