Theology in dialogue with Science of Religion

Theology in dialogue with
Science of Religion
Afonso Maria Ligorio Soares
Theology and Science of Religion not always have kept harmonic relationships
since the latter imposed itself in the academy. After losing its ancient ancilla (Philosophy), Theology is now challenged to fight for space in the multidisciplinary
spectrum of Science of Religion. But is this its due place? Many misunderstandings
are riding such difficult relationship. Hence, before rehearsing possible solutions to
the question, I believe it is wise to adequately delimitate the various angles of such
approach.
Difficult consensuses
On November 6, 1988, The Federal Council of Education (CFE) finally issued a
positive judgement to the acknowledgment of Theology colleges existent in Brazil.
The first institution benefiting from it was the Theology College of São LeopoldoRS. The interesting thing in the decision are the three reasons claimed by the observers in order to justify their vote in favor: a) because Theology is already part of
the Brazilian culture; b) because it would be a countersense not acknowledging
academic titles that are acknowledged abroad; c) because the recent regulation
process of religious teaching will require a great number of teachers: and who will
educate them — the expert from MEC (Education and Culture Ministry) wonders
— other than the Theology colleges?
At the occasion our advisors did not even notice, but, thanks to the third claimed
reason, they had just kindled a fire that is already becoming secular: the confrontation/dialogue between Theology and Sciences of Religion. After all, isn’t Theology
a typically confessional discourse? How, then, can it educate teachers for religious
education if the latter is, by principle, a field of knowledge not bound to any religious institution?
The question is solved only if confessionality is totally detached from what we
normally call Theology. But if we do so, why insisting on the term “Theology”? Why
not simply saying that, in college environment and according to the gauging criteria admitted in modern academy, there is room only for one (or several) science(s)
of religion? Furthermore, a Theology that takes scientific knowledge seriously and
participates in it does not cease to be Theology; but if it renounces to its confessionality, will it still be “theo”-logical?
Any answer to such questionings will not reach consensus, whether among theologians or even less among religion researchers. Hence, it may be interesting to pay
attention, for instance, to what is said by the Dictionnarie critique de Théologie,
edited in 1998 by the Presses Universitaires de France –— something like the University of São Paulo Press among us. We emphasize at least two of its particularities:
1st) it is a college press from emancipated France that affords publishing a Theology
This article was published in the book organized by Frank Usarski, O espectro disciplinar da ciência da
religião [The disciplinary spectrum of Science of Religion]. São Paulo: Paulinas, 2007. pp. 281-306.
The College of Theology of São Leopoldo-RS is now incorporated in the Higher School of Theology (EST),
belonging to the Evangelical Church of Lutheran Confession in Brazil (IECLB).
Ciberteologia - Journal of Theology & Culture – Year II,, n. 15
dictionary. Why does it do so? (A sign of the times?); 2nd) already in the preface, the
work’s director, Jean-Yves Lacoste, clarifies the restricted and precise sense of Theology: “the set of discourses and doctrines that Christianity organized about God
and about its experience of God”. Without denying the existence and rationality of
other practices and discourses on God, the Dictionary reserves the term in question
“to name the fruits of certain alliance between the Greek logos and the Christian
restructuring of the Jewish experience”. In that strict sense, it is hard to mix up
Theology, Philosophy and Sciences of Religion. But perhaps it is easier to incite the
latent conflict surrounding their boundaries.
Certain attempts to define the areas of knowledge here at stake seem exemplary
of that tension to me. It is the case of the suggestion given by Hans-Jürgen Greschat,
an eminent scientist of religion, in the first item of the fifth chapter of his O que
é Ciência da Religião? [What is Science of Religion?] With the accuracy that distinguishes him, Greschat detects an essential difference: theologians are religious
experts, whereas scientists of religion are religion experts. From that affirmation,
the author unfolds the implications of such distinction in a very clear and didactic
fashion. And he does so in such a clear text that he even makes it easy for us to draw
some critiques to his considerations. The main one is that all distinctions work when
we withdraw from the disturbing boundaries that delimit both knowledges; closely
observed, not everything is that plain. But let us see:
1) To Greschat, “theologians research the religion they belong to, scientists of
religion generally occupy themselves with another one that is not their own”. The
theologian aims at “protecting and enriching his religious tradition”; the scientists of
religion “do not perform an institutional service, such as theologians”, “neither are
they commanded by any bishop nor forced to respond to any higher instance”. In
practice, however, one may say that the departure point of the theological affair is
usually a critical question to his tradition of origin, which is not always solved in a
mere “protection” of it. On the other hand, if we can at least allude to Thomas Kuhn
in this point, it would be necessary to acknowledge that the “normal science” also
renders service to some causes, it is submitted to some associations, and depends
on some financings that, not seldom, disturb the progress of knowledge in an extent
often similar to the strictly said religious commotions.
2) For Greschat, the scientists of religion enjoy of a potentially unlimited arch at
the time of choosing the religion they will devote themselves to, being constrained
only by their own incompetence. Theologians, on their turn, are “condemned” (our
term) to deeply know only their own religion, opening themselves to others only
in case of necessity. That is true! But it is also true that, after choosing, the scientist
of religion will have his “freedom” diminished, since he cannot be a serious expert
if he continuously chooses new objects to deepen into. Thus, the level of accuracy
and seriousness in research does not seem to us to differ much between a theologian
who previously “knew” which religion he would be studying and a scientist who
already chose the religion he will pursue throughout his entire academic career.
3) Greschat also rightfully notes that theologians study a religion that is strange to
their own faith, taking their own religion as reference. With their criteria, they will
evaluate if the other systems are “closer” or “more distant” from their own tradition.
Ultimately, Greschat says, such procedures hinder a true knowledge of the others’
Lacoste, J.-Y. Dicionário crítico de teologia, p. 9. Its translation and Brazilian edition was financed by the
French Ministry of Culture.
Greschat, H.-J. O que é ciência da religião?, pp. 155-157.
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faith. I agree with Greschat, although we may note here some levels of approach.
It is not that rare that, from an initially prejudiced interest (or, simply, molded by
the Christian paradigm), the very emphasis of Christian Theology on the primacy of
experience (praxis) causes a turn in the game. On the other hand, even if, theoretically, the scientists of religion should research a foreign belief without prejudices,
the question I raise is the same Greschat himself already anticipates: “how much of
that freedom can they bear”? How can one go towards the other with no expectations and no judgement criteria (for instance, without suffering any influence from
the Western denkform)? It is the author himself who admits that “not only religious
prejudices, but also intellectual attitudes may distort the understanding of phenomena researched in the scope of Science of Religion”. In brief: perhaps it would be
fairer for both parties if we admitted that both theologians and scientists of religion
have different ways of casually distorting their object of study.
4) Finally, our author assures that “the faithful of a certain belief [are the ones who
will] inform if we adequately understood that same faith”. Not consulting adepts of
the researched religion testifies against the validity of the descriptions we make of it.
Theologians, instead — Greschat assures —, make their judgement from their own
faith and consider false whatever withdraws from that decisive rule. I believe that in
this point Greschat exaggerates and approaches the theological reflection from the
magisterial decision (a confusion that, in our point of view, implicitly permeates the
entire excerpt we are considering here). In fact, the hierarchical magistery — mainly in the Roman-Catholic case — is invested of such dogmatic power, but the same
cannot be said of Theology as such, whose arch embraces from the Magistery’s official Theology (for centuries called scholastic Theology by Catholics) to constructions
such as the Latin-American Liberation Theology, the Asian Theology of Harmony,
the African Theology of Enculturation or the recent Queer Theology. It is enough to
mention here all the emphasis that contemporary Theology once again attributed to
the subject of the faith experience or the eminence Liberation Theology always ascribed to the poor as subjects of history, and so on. We could also recall renowned
theologians, such as Andrés Torres Queiruga, Edward Schillebeeckx, Roger Haight,
Juan Luis Segundo, Raimon Panikkar, and so many others, who would feel very uncomfortable with the claim that they overlay their judgement of personal faith to the
common faith of people. At least from the point of view of the Christian tradition,
the purpose is precisely the opposite: to translate into theological categories what
tradition calls sensus fidei fidelium, that is, the sense of faith that the whole of the
faithful live in practice without much theorization.
It is understandable, however, the harshness with which Greschat approaches such difficult relation, for there is, after all, a delicate political (more than an epistemological) complication permeating it in most cases, that is, the presence of Theology in universities ruled, financed, and/or
inspired by religious institutions. Besides the statutory obligatoriness that assures its continuity
in the academic world and its support to certain pastoral and missionary strategies of the respective churches — such as the preaching of the Christian social doctrine, for instance —, what is
the relevance of such field of knowledge in a contemporary research centre? Jürgen Moltmann
touches the core of the problem when he asks: “Do we need of a new universal Theology that is
naturally accessible to anyone, whether a Christian or an atheist, a Jewish or a Buddhist? Is such
Theology conceivable?”
Cf. op. cit., p. 156-157.
In the bibliography at the end of the chapter I quote some indicative texts on these approaches and
authors.
Moltmann, apud Neutzling, I. (org.). A teologia na universidade contemporânea, p. 7 (Introduction).
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Since we already have Science of Religion to cover the research in religion within our universities, a negative answer to Moltmann is the most spontaneous and frequent nowadays,
even among professional theologians and teachers of the so-called theological disciplines in
confessional universities. After all, what sense would there be for the huge majority of our
college students, so little inured to Christian sensitivity or even to the importance of the study
of religions, to dedicate themselves to a serious, academic theological reflection intended
to be relevant for the people’s quotidian? Is this not a subject matter reserved only to the
initiates in faith? Do the youth contemporary to the Western (post)modern society have time
to lose with axiologies of the past?
The affirmative answer to Moltmann’s questioning is not so simple and obvious,
although it has also strong arguments in its favor. Nevertheless, it must be clear
from the start that it is not a good thing to count with a new harvest of college students who would now come more curious towards the theological art. The students’
greater or lesser predisposition towards themes of ethics and spirituality is a real
concern for our didactic and methodological discussions, but it does not have to
give the tone regarding the pertinence and the place of Theology in the academy. In
the midst of re-enchantments, of new stages in the science-religion dialog, and of
proposals in the Ancient World for a non-religious Christianity, perhaps the exact
question is if we consider it important, in the integral formation of our citizens, to
give room also to the ethical-spiritual dimension. If our answer is ‘yes’, we have the
obligation to pass this legacy on to the new generations and lead them to appropriate themselves of such richness.
What Theology are we speaking of?
Although Lacoste’s above mentioned suggestion is enough to bring focus to this
reflection, I believe it is possible to widen the conceptualization of Theology a bit
further without harming the necessary accuracy required here.10 I begin with an
operative distinction between philosophical and theological labor. Philosophy is
the reflection or speculation about the ultimate Reality that may, or may not, come
to the affirmation of the latter. Theology, on its turn, is the reflection or speculation
about the ultimate Reality that comes from data offered by a certain spiritual tradition — generally, countersigned by a coherent collection of writings — which may,
or may not, come to the adoration of the stated Reality. Although Theology may
question one or more data or their interpretation reaching us through tradition, it
does not question tradition itself, once it admits as a premise of its reflection that
tradition is a consistent donor of sense, that is, a source with reasonable chances of
being true due to going back to a coherent set of referential testimonies which, on
their turn, are linked to a presumed ontological origin.
The distinction, as we may see, is not in the object but in the way of approaching it. Actually, for the sake of accuracy, when it comes to Theology, the most appropriate would be to speak not of a subject that studies a cognoscible object, but
of the meeting-relationship between two subjects (at least, in the parameters of the
Jewish-Christian-Islamic tradition). Therefore, each and every theme that interests
Here I allude to Gianni Vattimo, with his After Christianity. New York, Columbia University Press, 2002; Cf.
also, Vattimo, G. Belief. Stanford, Stanford University Press, 2000.
For this sub-item, I briefly retake what I have already discussed in my work Interfaces da revelação;
pressupostos para uma teologia do sincretismo religioso [Interfaces of revelation; presuppositions for a
Theology of religious syncretism]. In this work I follow mainly Juan Luis Segundo’s presuppositions.
10 Bibliography on this issue is huge. Besides the numerous words in specialized dictionaries, I assign, for
instance: Boff, Cl. Teoria do método teológico; Tracy, D. The analogical imagination; Christian theology and
the culture of pluralism; Libanio, J.B. O lugar da teologia na sociedade e na universidade do século XXI. In:
Neutzling, I. (org.). A teologia na universidade contemporânea, pp. 13-45.
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the human spirit is theologal, that is, it may be focused from the postulate or the
presumed experience of such founding Reality, which is theological in itself.
In that sense, theopoetry — to quote a term dear to Rubem Alves et alii and that
claims some distance from the Aristotelian-Tomist theological reason — is not at all
Theology, but it is so according to the Western theological tradition, as a necessary
counterpoint of the latter. A badly put apophatism (negative Theology, open to Mystery) may be counterproductive and degenerate into solipsism. Its merit is to keep
us constantly in guard against the absolutism of the cataphatic (Theology as an affirmation and/or description of the divine). Having said this, Rubem Alves’ opinion
applies here well, when he affirms, in a good game of words, that Theology is not a
speech on the mystery, but a speech before it. That is, Theology is pronounced from
experience, as for the rest, irreducible to scientific observation.11
To do Theology is to carefully welcome (affective-axiologic dimension) affirmations that the scientific thought — as, in fact, it is its task in the analytical-concrete
dimension — can only receive with coldness and prevention. They are two distinct
and complementary logics in the intertwining of knowledges. From the scientist is
demanded a suspension of judgement, a methodological “atheism” that leaves his
personal belief between brackets. From the theologian is demanded a suspension
of atheism, a methodological “theism” — that leaves his possible personal disbelief
between brackets and presupposes the mystic path or spirituality as conductors of
self-knowledge and intellection of the ontological root of reality.
Thus, it is Theology’s task to deal — I use this verb in the double meaning of being interested in and fighting against — with the mystery of myself and the other:
the world, the human being, the gods — the “relevant other”, as R. Alves says in his
work O enigma da religião [The enigma of religion]. If myth is the fancying of the basic questions concerning the possible meanings of human existence and if religion
is a privileged conveyer of myths — understood here in the sense of “transcendent
data” (J. L. Segundo), that is, data received by means of referential testimonies and
not empirically and fully investigated by the message’s receptor12— then, by assuming my belonging to a certain community, even if it is the post-modern “community
of those who reject belonging to any community”, I am assuming and introjecting
its constitutive myths. To retell them is to make narrative Theology. To translate them
into other conceptual categories and/or to the new generations — without beclouding its internal coherence — is to do strictly said Theology.
In sum, Theology is the art of reaffirming the victory of some values — which,
exactly for that, are absolute in the order of the is-ought, but not falsifiable in the order of the being — when translating them into new significants, more accordant to
the pupil’s reality or the subject of the experience of meaning. Needless to say, this
supposes previous knowledge of the addressed reality and effective dialogue with
it. Thus, in Philosophy the theologian will always have a welcomed journey partnership revealed in the art of questioning the translations done, whether based in
the acknowledged complexity of the translated real (realistic emphasis), or from the
obvious limitation of our cognoscitive-linguistic mechanisms (idealistic emphasis).
11 Here I make a punctual remark to Alves’ critique when he opposes theo-poetry and theo-logy. I do not intend
to deny theopoethics — in fact, I am an enthusiast about it — in the terms that, for instance, Karl Josef Kuschel
proposes it, that is, as a “branch of academic studies turned to the critical-literary discourse about God, in the scope
of Literature and literary analysis, from the theological reflection present in the authors” (Ferraz, S. Teopoética:
os estudos literários sobre Deus. In: _____. (org.). No princípio era Deus e ele se fez poesia. Inédito. p. 11.).
12 Soares, A.M.L. Entre o absoluto-menos e o absoluto-mais: teodicéia e escatologia. In: _____. (org.)
Dialogando com Juan Luis Segundo, p. 175-214.
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University and modernity
Well then, does the conceptual clearing suggested above equals to saying that
there is an assured space for theological discourse next to the propositions of a Science of Religion? Do our words not reinforce science’s pretension of getting rid of
all theological thought once and for all, relegating it to the condition of a confessional discourse useful to the faithful? Or is there any chance of us seeing theology
and science tolerating each other in the academy, in the fashion of non-interfering
magisteries (MNI), according to the suggestion of Stephen J. Gould13 and others?
Perhaps — this is my conviction — it is even desirable that science (of religion)
and Theology, although mindful of their autonomy, mutually collaborate in order to
widen the light upon this formidable human invention sometimes called religion.14
The meeting between Christianity and Aristotelianism, celebrated in the foundation of medieval universities, decisively impels what later will be acknowledged as
modernity. After all, the very term that nominates such medieval invention — “university” — reveals the explicit intension of opening itself to scholars from the whole
Christendom and thus approach reality from all sides. It was just a matter of time
until the modern’s typical claim for autonomy matured and we had a new Promethean wave in the West.
Inácio Neutzling15 offers an interesting review of the main interpretations proposed for what is really innovative in modern civilization. Basically, positions are
divided into two large groups: those who see modernity as a formidable transformation of the traditional theological categories, though without denying them by
principle; and those who claim the modern project actually caught a glimpse of the
self-establishment of all significations proposed for the cosmos and the human life
up to then.
For the former, being modern may replace the trans-historical legitimation of
power for its immanent legitimation, that is, the State (Carl Schmitt’s political reading); or it may be the secularized transposition of the biblical-Christian conception of history, that is, the divine design and the economy of salvation, in terms of
progress and historicity (Karl Löwith’s historicist reading); or still the assumption of
the gnosis’ category, whose essence is the message of salvation through knowledge
as a proper initiative of the human being (Eric Voegelin’s theological-metaphysical
reading). If that is so, Neutzling concludes, modernity would be nothing else than
the radicalization of medieval questions, translating the dogmas of old into the great
later political utopias: a society that eliminates all alienations and accomplishes the
divine in the life we live.
If the advocates of the second group are right, modernity should have been the
first non-religious civilization of history and owes its success to the victory of Christianity as the “religion of the exit of religion” (Marcel Gauchet) by sowing the seeds
of separation between the political sphere and its religious legitimation. Moreover:
modern novelty does not consist, as the members of the first group believe, in resaying a theological content in a mundane fashion, but it contemplates the historical appearing of the emptiness of sense generated by the collapse of traditional an13 Gould. S. J. Pilares do tempo. [Rocks of ages. New York, Ballantine Books, 2002.]
14 But that does not mean that the theologian-natural person is an indispensable presence in the teaching
board of academies. It just seems to me that it is not the case of excluding his/her production by principle.
15 Cf. Neutzling, I. Ciência e teologia na universidade do século XXI; possibilidades de uma teologia pública:
algumas aproximações [Science and Theology in the university of the 21st century; possibilities of a public
Theology: some approaches]. In: Atas do II Simpósio Ciência e Deus no mundo atual, Unisinos, 2004. In
this section I fully depend on this text.
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swers (Hans Blumenberg). The conditions are placed so that the modern individual
can emerge, the ultimate fundament of his own being and his world.
It does not seem so absurd to admit that both streams are right in the extent that
they capture real movements started in the West throughout the last centuries. And
in both cases, the theologian is expected to take a stand, in case he intends to have
a role and relevant word in the centers of knowledge and power.
Neutzling synthesizes three different attempts of approach between Theology
and science. First, a dialogue between pure science and scientific Theology was
sought, but it did not go very far given the common lack of philosophical basis.
The interaction between science and religion also seemed auspicious, although it
brought a limit right from the start: scientific experience is based in observation and
objective and repeatable experiments; religious experience is subjective and not repeatable. Finally, nowadays it has been more common to relate science and ethics
— we have only to look at the Ethics Committees in universities. What is the difficulty here? Neutzling leans on J. Moltmann in order to countersign his argumentation: reflections of ethical type always come much after the scientific research, for
the typical ethos of science and technique’s progress has a dynamics of its own which is one of the
factual and fictitious, of the usable and illusory. And it is such a strong pressure that it neutralizes and
empties any ethical commitment in the use of scientific power. The optimism of progress is not replaced by pessimism, but by fatalism that, substantially, does not allow alternatives of an ethical kind.16
In sum, the forms of concordism that aim at a direct correspondence, without
mediation, between a passage from the Gospel and a scientific knowledge, whether
it is an ontological, epistemological, or ethical concordism, are not enough.17
Theology in a new Areopagus
“New”, here, is emphatic. In fact, the Areopagus of university is not that new, but
the conditions under which Theology is now interpellated make new signs of the times
evident. The limit of the three dialogue attempts reviewed by Neutzling, and that in
the view of this Jesuit theologian are tributary of the Newtonian scientific paradigm, is
perhaps the previous shyness to which contemporary Theology has been reduced, defenestrated from its old condition as the queen of sciences into the plebeian situation of
having to fight for some room and a place in the sun in the field of knowledges.
The phenomenon is verifiable, even ad intra, in the efforts made by the Catholic
hierarchy, mostly since the middle of the 19th century, in order to oppose to modernism and the theological liberalism. A certain theological rationalism intended to
defend Christian dogmas as if they were empirically scientific or, ultimately, deductions absolutely consequent of self-evident principles. Such strategy, also known as
apologetic Theology, ended up by rousing another extreme vision, in the line of the
“weak thought”, that intends to withdraw the theological dimension into the leisure
area of our universities and further research centers. Hence we would be in the
boundaries of discordism, that is, of the hypothesis that science and Theology speak
of two completely different orders of reality (from the ontological viewpoint) or that
they are hermetically separated discourses (from the epistemological viewpoint) or,
still, that they are independent when it comes to ethical choices. Thus, the conflict
is dissolved through the complete separation of these two fields.18
16 Moltmann, op. cit., p. 31.
17 Lambert, D. Ciências e teologia, pp. 67-113.
18 Neutzling, op.cit., pp. 81-94.
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For Neutzling, however, the mistaken atmosphere of tension between Theology
and science may be extended as the university itself is called to test new ways of
approach, of teaching, and of research according to the paradigm of transdisciplinarity.19 A public Theology, in the patterns J. Moltmann uses the expression, could
be a good clue, according to Neutzling, in order to assure Theology its due place in
university. For that, both authors point to the same pre-conditions of the theological
discourse:20
• Theology has only one problem: God. It neither is nor intends to be an objective science, but it presents itself as an existential knowledge;
• the Christian theology is always the theology of the Kingdom of God. Thus, the
public theology can only be a constitutively public discourse in favor of the
public Gospel of the Kingdom of God;
• as public discourse, Theology needs institutional freedom before the churches, and militant fundamentalism cannot withdraw it from such scope; equally,
it pleads its place in the space of sciences, in spite of the attempts of militant
secularism to silence its voice;
• once public, Theology is exposed to the critiques of anyone and can only
count with the truth of its content when attempting to make itself convincing.21
Its presence in university, however, should neither be reduced nor mixed with
the proprium of Science of Religion, still less should it be framed or sponsored
by ecclesiastical knowledge.
• finally, Moltmann and Neutzling see public theology as an attempt to put
theological thought in the university’s frank, open, plural, and transdisciplinary
dialogue. The common house of such meeting between faith and reason is
wisdom and its scope, the building of a culture lover of life.
In sum, public theology overcomes the restricted space of (ecclesial) communities of faith and turns to the common good of the whole society by means of a
critical reflection and the public defense of the scientific activities’ freedom and
responsibility. In the spirit that made Liberation Theology famous, Neutzling points
out that his ultimate criterion of judgement is the threatened life of the poor and of
all the weaker living beings — a criterion which is not rare among the great wise
and mystics of mankind.22 Hence, it proposes itself to critically analyze society’s
religious values, understanding them not as the views of private persons, but as
ultimate certainties of social and personal nature, pre-rational presuppositions and
pre-critical issues that are susceptible to questioning. It is the case of the religious
traditions of a society and the contributions they convey to society, for the common good or common bad. Theologian will then have the task to stimulate public
confrontation between the various communities of faith and religion, and with the
non-religious, secular or post-secular world.
Theology’s social relevance and college environment
An inevitable consequence of that stand is that the interest in the social ethos’
19 With a different proposal, but insisting on the articulation between sciences and Theology, cf. Lambert, D.,
op. cit., pp. 94-113.
20 Neutzling, op.cit., pp. 14-19.
21 Speaking of the Catholic University, John Paul II said its purpose is that the Christian mind may achieve, as it
were, a public, persistent and universal presence in the whole enterprise of advancing higher culture […]”.
Apostolic Constitution on Catholic Universities, n. 9. Apud Neutzling, op.cit.
22 Nisker, W. Sabedoria radical. [Essential crazy wisdom. Berkeley, Ten Speed Press, 2001.]
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moral values overcome the emphasis of the very Christian moral and the ethos of
the faith community itself. Several religious communities living in multi-religious
societies and in a globalized world will find a common space to represent their differences. All the other forms of secular life will also be contemplated by this new
theological sensitivity, once life is understood here as central concept in the basis of
which the speaking of God must give evidence of itself, but upon which every form
of atheism must also be measured — that is, religiosity and secularity should serve
common life, in case we agree that mankind and planet Earth should survive.
Thus, to propose a public theology implies a new theological architecture that
keeps up with the ecological revolution of our society and with an ecological “reformation” of modern man’s religion that rearticulates transcendence and immanence of God. It only makes sense speaking of Theology in university, in dialogue
with the other sciences, being among them that which focuses on research on religion, if we have in mind the good of society. College theology cannot hide that, in
the end, it is a knowledge enlightened by faith, in a cordial dialogue with all other
knowledges, which, aiming at a society reconciled in justice and in love, firstly calls
the members of the ecclesial community to assume their social responsibilities, and
then extends the invitation to all mankind.23
If what we have said so far about public theology makes any sense it is because
there is no other alternative to the theologian: either his word will have some relevance in the Areopagus of the 21st century or it will not even be worth mentioning.
Christian Theology is a courageous stand, based in biblical revelation and ecclesial
tradition that experiences the classical interaction between faith and reason. Obviously it is not a full word on themes that really interest the present society. Certainly
it can and should come out modified from the academic debate, the ecumenical
dialogue, and the interreligious interchange. But, undoubtedly, its claim to be heard
in the political world and in the academy is legitimate.
In the Brazilian college environment, namely in the community universities,
the last four decades represented a significant advance in terms of the theological
reflection’s social relevance. Thanks to Liberation Theology, much of what could
have been refused as pious ecclesiastical speeches without any concrete incidence
turned out to reveal, through the theologians of that school, as a legitimate — although often branded as inopportune and disconcerting — contribution to the common good born out of the experience of faith.
In such context, theologians of liberation dared to dialogue with scientists and
intellectuals foreign to the Christian community, leaning only in the intuition that
justice and social peace come first. Besides, a proof that the Liberation Theology’s
role is far from being depleted is the growing vigor of movements such as MST (the
Landless Workers’ Movement) and the repercussion of the World Social Forum.24
Hence, the contribution of the many human knowledges is welcomed in order for
the college science to acquire still bigger competence, concreteness, and updating.
That is the real test Neutzling was talking about above: once public, Theology is
exposed to critique and contributions of whomever, and it cannot hide itself under
the argument of authority.
23 Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace.
24 Literature akin to that theological school is still in production. Recent examples of are: Soares, A. M. L.
Dialogando com Juan Luis Segundo; Grenzer, M. Análise poética da sociedade; Richard, P. Força ética e
espiritual da teologia da libertação.
Ciberteologia - Journal of Theology & Culture – Year II,, n. 15
An example of an effective dialogue between Science of
Religion and Theology
In order to be convincing, Theology can depend only on the truth of its contents.
This is the challenge placed to confessional universities, which are always mindful
of being a privileged place for the exercise of the Christian thought: they should join
those who still fight for ethics and citizenship and did not allow themselves to be
domesticated yet by the logic of indifference.25
The experience of the Pontifical Catholic University of São Paulo has been exemplary in that sense. A sign of the civil resistance in the “years of lead”26 of the
military dictatorship, it faced the last decades always in the forefront of the social
movement and attentive to the demands of society. With all the inevitable difficulties and contradictions of such a bold process, it has shown that it is possible to ally
the evangelical faithfulness and the advancements of contemporary society, without
eliminating none of the two wings of the human spirit, neither faith nor reason.
The activities developed in PUC-SP through the Theology and Sciences of Religion Department and by its Program of Post-Graduated Studies in Sciences of Religion in teaching, research, and extension are a typical example that it is possible
an updated, committed, and encultured translation of classical theological thought
in our college environments, namely in the so-called community universities. Here,
Science of Religion — which by no means cannot fulfill the role of a crypto-theology — has the assured autonomy to investigate the religion phenomenon from
various angles, attaining the results and the new hypothesis enabled by its scientific
ability.
For that reason, the confrontation between Theology and Science of Religion is
not inevitable. Therefore, there is no difficulty of principle in answering affirmatively to the question previously raised by the eminent theologian J. Moltmann. Yes, it
is necessary to rewrite a new universal theology that is accessible, in a natural fashion, to any person, whether a Christian, an atheist, a Jewish or a Buddhist, a spiritist
or an initiated in Candomblé.27 And that because, unfortunately, the Theology that
is still being taught in the several ecclesiastical colleges and institutes of Theology,
although having already made huge advancements in contents, still resents from the
vice of speaking only to its household public, therefore, not being able to express
itself in a really contemporary language.
Moltmann questioned us if a universal and naturally accessible Theology was
conceivable, that is, if we could aim at an actual academic reflection that needed
neither to disguise itself as Science of Religion in order to be taken seriously, nor
be supported by the ecclesiastical power in order to have some social and political
weight. Our affirmative answer is twofold. On the one hand, schools of thought
such as that of Liberation Theology demonstrate the viability of competent studies
that aim at transforming social reality with the power of spirituality. On the other
25 I allude here to J. Gray’s work, Straw dogs [London, Granta, 2002]. Gray is perhaps the most renowned
guru of the post-modern indifference of the present time. An intelligent counterpoint to Gray is the work
by T. Eagleton, After theory [Cambridge, Basic Books, 2004]. To Eagleton, contemporary thinkers need to
seriously reflect again on love, evil, death, morality, religion, and revolution, leaving aside the post-modern
conformism.
26 The period between 1964 and 1985 of the Brazilian history was popularly known as the “years of lead”
(“anos de chumbo”) due to the military dictatorship that followed the 1964 Brazilian coup d’état. (TN)
27 “Who can still stand these weary Theology books?”, asked an annoyed teacher concerned in finding some
didactic material accessible to the students of Introduction to the Theological Thought, an obligatory
discipline of every graduation course in PUC-SP.
10
Ciberteologia - Journal of Theology & Culture – Year II,, n. 15
hand, experiences such as that of PUC-SP clearly show that a new theological language, adequate to the interlocutors of the new generation, is not only conceivable
but has already started in the quotidian practice. But it will be hollow if it is not
willing to learn from Science of Religion.
Conclusion
We can finally attempt a very schematic closing of the discussion. The generating question proposed to us by the organizer of this work, Prof. Frank Usarski — to
whom we thank for the invitation and the challenge, that forced us to revisit and
deepen this thorny theme — could be synthesized the following way: in the specter
of the science(s) of religion, what role does Theology play or what role could it play?
What is Theology’s contribution to the studies of religion? What is the best interaction to be intertwined between them?
We have already suggested that the relations are complex and it seems that, for
now, there is only one possible pragmatic solution. Thus, an open conflict between
Theology and Sciences of Religion has actually happened, still occurs now and
then, and is even understandable when historically contextualized. But we do not
see the benefit the interested parties reach in case they keep promoting it.
The mentioned solution of the “non-interfering magisteries” is definitely pragmatic. It is often activated when it is convenient not to lose the covering of the
institution that supports a certain course or college. Therefore, it seems to us that
an open conflict in confessional universities is very unlikely — in public universities we do not even have an issue, given the absence of the theological interlocutor
and, in some places, even of the scientist of religion. But there are also confessional
higher education institutions that are not interested in publicizing too much their
theological presuppositions (which borders nonsense). However, it is hard to imagine an authentic theological thought that is satisfied, in the long run, with “non-interference”.
Finally, we believe in the possibility of a creative solution, open to mutual collaboration — although sometimes tense — between Theology and Science(s) of
Religion. They reciprocally serve as useful delimitations to the advancement of reflection. Sciences of Religion offer Theology colleges the same they divulge for
the whole of the scientific community, that is, a strict knowledge that offers the
theologian a shock of reality and a more refined erudition he/she will benefit of in
his/her reflections on faith, revelation, and dogma. Furthermore, the study and the
insight offered by the religious plurality (traditional religions, new religious movements, modalities of syncretism, etc.) air the theological ideas (of a certain religion)
arousing new questions to critical reflection on the faith lived by people. Besides,
almost all Theology colleges foresee auxiliary disciplines in their curricula, such as:
Psychology of Religion, Philosophy of Religion, Sociology of Religion, etc.
Theology also has much to offer to a program of studies on religion — and it
would be reckless to simply ignore its point of view. One may say that there is
one actual theological contribution and another made explicit in the intention of
theologians. Therefore, regardless of the real purposes of the theologian and of the
hierarchies of his/her original religion, Science of Religion receives from Theology,
gratuitously and first-handedly, the product of its religious tradition’s thought, the
fruit of specialized reflection from the faithful of its own tradition. We quote above
a smart observation by Greschat, where he defends that it are the faithful from a
certain belief who inform us if we understood their faith correctly. “To consult the
Ciberteologia - Journal of Theology & Culture – Year II,, n. 15
11
adepts of a researched faith”, Greschat says, “is a security test that allows the differentiation of valid and non-valid descriptions from the viewpoint of the religion’s
history”.28 Well then, if Greschat is right — and we believe he is —, then the scientist of religion also needs to listen (in the cases such character exists) to the faithful-with-specialized-knowledge from the religion being studied (in the West, he is
generally called theologian).29
Theology works as a useful delimitation to the advancement of scientific knowledge about a certain religion. Focused in its own spiritual tradition, Theology tests
— if it is a good Theology — the inner coherence of such tradition to the limit
without avoiding insidious problems, without changing religions when arriving at
the inevitable blind points of the received tradition and without giving way to easy
hybridisms.
In sum, the specialized results of a great spiritual tradition have no reasons for
being discarded a priori. In that sense, the word “Theology” serves such construct.
In a wide sense, also Judaism and Islamism fit in the term. And as other traditions
are formulating their own constructions from within — or as we go on learning to
recognize and interpret the already existent constructions that we ignore — there
must be space for them in the studies of religion area.
Up to here we have spoken of an actual theological contribution to the Sciences of Religion that is independent from the theologians’ real pretension. There is,
however, a contribution that theologians intend to offer to society — obviously including the university: a reflection of an ethical profile. Public theology’s proposal,
which we hope was sufficiently explained above, fully explains the confessional
quality of theological thought and assumes the onus of the public confrontation of
its presuppositions, escaping easy concordisms.
Liberation Theology, instead, has built a sui generis career. It left the universities,
claimed a non-academic character, served as a means to draining the scientific
production in benefit of society, and ended by marking an important trench in university itself. Its innovative praxis has generated a differentiated public interest in
Theology, attracted “non-initiates” to its study, and privileged (in its second stage)
new individuals (women, black, indigenous, young) who, on their turn, brought
new issues (gender, ethnics) and new priorities (suspension of judgement on “popular theologies”; recognition by the Ministry of Education, professionalization) into
the scope of practice and reflection.
These are only examples of the healthy contribution Theology can still offer to
the academy. The important thing, however, is to keep the trenches that delimit
the different knowledges open and keep exercising our creativeness in search for a
better knowledge of religions, which can only profit from our apprenticeship in the
dialogue.
28 Cf. op. cit., p. 157.
29 Greschat is right when he appeals to the verdict of the faithful from the religion being studied. But we hope
he is not suggesting that the scientist of religion should, therefore, discard the theologian’s viewpoint (which
is a modality of faithful). Saying that the “theologians have their own means to distinguish what is ‘real’ and
what is ‘false’ in the area of religion” since “for them, faith itself — and not other people — is the decisive
norm” (Greschat, op. cit., p. 157) does not render the theological testimony less important or more partial
than the that of the common faithful. Besides, if inquired about it by the scientist of religion, the common
faithful will quite probably say that his faith is, at least, truer than that “of other people”. In sum, affection
for one’s own faith/spiritual tradition does not dim the deposition.
12
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