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Oh dear oh dear oh dear. Revision is so difficult. I mentioned that the other day, didn’t I. But it is. It’s hard. It’s like…trying to unknit a bit of a sweater and then knit it up again. It’s like trying to pick through a large pot of chili or minestrone, picking out grains of rice of a particular length. It’s like trying to re-weave a broken spider’s web. It’s like trying to take individual crumbs out of a piece of bread without having the piece of bread fall to bits. It’s – it’s – it’s –
Pause for prolonged scream and bout of self-administered hair-pulling.
I’ve been staring at this same paragraph at intervals for an hour or more. I have to re-write it, and somehow I can’t summon the strength. I’m weak, I’m feeble, I’m a poor wandering erring mortal. I think I’ll convert to Catholicism.
Or maybe not.
The one thing the new pope stands for is hierarchy, and the resolute suppression of anything like democracy within the church. In particular, the opinions of educated lay people are to be shunned – a loathing which is heartily reciprocated. The only time I ever saw him, at a lecture he gave in Cambridge, some of the theology faculty boycotted the event in protest against his treatment of inquiry within their discipline.
Of course, the question immediately occurs to me, what kind of ‘inquiry’ goes on in theology? What kind of ‘discipline’ is theology? But maybe that’s a damn-fool ignorant question. Maybe there really is real inquiry. Maybe there is good empirical evidence for theology, and I’ve just never heard of it. To me it sounds like inquiry in Peter Panology, or Spockology, or Dr Whoology. But then I’ve never studied theology. (Though I did once take a course in Church history, when I was at university. Taught by a priest, too. That was odd…) But leaving all that aside, it’s interesting that theologians find Ratzinger anti-inquiry. If they think so, what would the rest of us think, I wonder.
The fear of change can make perfect sense. If you believe that the Catholic church can only maintain its hold on human minds by force and fraud, then electing the man who used to run the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith – the bureaucratic guarantor of Catholic doctrine – is a natural thing to do. The road to the top in the Kremlin, after all, used to be through the KGB. But to follow the same logic is an odd process for faithful Catholics.
Hmmmyes and no. That’s part of the nature of Catholicism, after all. That’s why Luther ended up knocking it all over instead of just reforming it. It really is about central authority and being told what to believe. That’s not to say it’s not possible to be a Catholic and ignore all that, because of course it is. (Those Catholics feel a bit queasy right now, I gather.) But it does mean that the Vatican is what it is, and not something else. It’s not an anti-hierarchical type organization, pretty much by definition. If it’s anti-hierarchical it might just as well pack up the stoles and incense and break camp. Being anti-hierarchical ain’t what it’s there for.
I wish Ratzinger would drop in to say hi and revise this paragraph for me.
‘Of course, the question immediately occurs to me, what kind of ‘inquiry’ goes on in theology? What kind of ‘discipline’ is theology’
I’ve often wondered the same myself. It’s not like any new evidence is forthcoming. Or for that matter any evidence at all which kind of makes theology equivalent to debating which suite Santa should wear at Christmas.
I’ve never understood how one can get a degree in it either. It to me is literally a BS degree.
Of course the modern theologians use lots of naturalism to explain things.
There’s not much room for inquiry if you regard the Bible as literal truth – but plenty if you regard it as the ragtag layer upon layer of legends written down over a millenium which it is. You’d be dealing with such things as traces of polytheism in the Old Testament, or extricating the two creation stories in Genesis from each other. That’s a big part what theology to my understanding (my father is a Roman Catholic theologian) consists of. Were I not to have some doubts about the existence of God, I might actually consider studying it, later, when I have time and money.
Of course, there’s no inquiry, or theology, in the religious convictions behind the Left Behind novels, say.
Well, there’s no new “evidence” in most philosophy either. That’s probably what theology compares itself to. Of course, the whole theological enterprise proceeds from a completely unwarranted (to me, at least) assumption–that there’s some Majorly Awesome Dude in the sky who not only made the universe but wants us to believe certain very particular things and behave in a certain very particular way. But once you grant that, then supposedly you are free to use your reason to deduce all the implications thereof.
So this Ratso character, it turns out, is a my-way-or-the-highway kinda guy when it comes to theological speculation? Quelle surprise.
This whole debate here reminds me of the passage in Catch 22 between Yossarian and a women he’s just slept with. Paraphrasing: he starts attacking God and she gets very upset. He comments that she doesn’t believe in God, to which she replies that “That’s not the sort of God I don’t believe in”.
“Of course, the question immediately occurs to me, what kind of ‘inquiry’ goes on in theology?”
Probably mindboggling questions like “How to keep a long dead ‘god’ alive?” It must be challenging to pick up on mystified historic sociopolitical innovation and place it in a contemporary frame. Regression must be a very tempting alternative.
“But it does mean that the Vatican is what it is, and not something else. It’s not an anti-hierarchical type organization, pretty much by definition.”
Just so. Authority is intrinsic to the catholic construct, as a natural consequence of paternalism. It sets the tone for the entire opus. Sheep following the shephard, father knows best, children to be seen and not heard, etcetera.
The Catholic Church may be hierarchical as hell – but that doesn’t immediately reflect upon theology as such. The Catholic attitude to scripture is, as far as I understand, a lot _less_ constrained than the Protestant, at least the Calvinist one – creating a lot of room for the same kind of inquiry classicists, historians, and philologists do.
And there are quite some Catholic groups, the Jesuits for example, who basically ignore anything emanating from the top of the hierarchy.
It’s worth remembering that Catholics are willing to argue that the Bible is, in effect, a real mess–hence the need for an authoritative interpreter. Moreover, there’s far more flexibility about the question of what’s inspired and what isn’t. I’m really only up on 19th-c. Catholics, but Newman wasn’t the only one who argued that you didn’t get Christianity from the Bible (hence the danger of simply sowing the Scriptures among all and sundry, as the evangelicals did). So there’s paradoxically more room for changing interpretations–Newman’s argument, for example, that science might ultimately prove that things taken to be “revelations” really weren’t–and, as is potentially the case w/Benedict XVI, less room.
Thanks, Edmund. That’s why I threw in various stipulations such as maybe I’m just ignorant. I actually meant them! I wasn’t a bit sure I knew what theology actually is – I was going by what I take the literal meaning of the word to be. Rough and ready etymology, sort of thing.
But I wasn’t so much attacking it, I don’t think, or rather I do think, as asking what kind of inquiry it is.
“It proceeds from a viewpoint that there are good reasons for believing in God (including the ’empirical evidence’ of the natural world, which is of course posited as created)”
Perhaps it boils down (as so often) to what is meant by ‘God.’ How one defines the word has an effect on how good one takes the reasons to be.
Or perhaps it just boils down to the difference between design and order.
Or perhaps I need to get out more.
‘It’s worth remembering that Catholics are willing to argue that the Bible is, in effect, a real mess–hence the need for an authoritative interpreter.’
Thats the problem with them, they are still men and instead of actually being authoritarian interpreter’s in search of truth they just trumpet what was taught them in cathechism.
No real ‘thought’ per se, unlike in the Protestant religions where you are free to read and choose for yourself–which as I see it makes more sense–each finds his own path.
What’s in a name? On the status of “Theology” as a discipline, it is interesting that many academic departments, which once had that title, now call themselves “Department of Religious Studies” or sometimes with greater clarity, “Department of the Study of Religions.” This is true of many Catholic, as well as secular institutions. Perhaps this is just PC of them, in line with “Asian Studies” replacing “Oriental Studies,” but it is definitely the case that many faculty members of Religious Studies departments (and even conservatively named Theology departments) are atheists or at least not practicing any religion and yet remain interested in studying religions from various approaches – philological, sociological, historical, anthropological, etc. One sure way to piss off an expert in ancient Greek mystery religions, a Sanskritist who studies the Vedas, or a sociologist of current day millenial cults is to call her a theologian! By the way, I am neither an expert in religious studies nor in theology. I do know that the proper study of religions can teach students not only the diversity of religions, but their frequent cruelty and oppressiveness. For young people who have taken their traditional religious upbringing for granted, that can be an enlightening lesson, indeed.
‘”Department of Religious Studies” or sometimes with greater clarity, “Department of the Study of Religions.”‘
Yeah see that I can perfectly well understand. I know what comparative religion is, what history of religion is, etc. But I think of theology as being something different. As the study of ‘God’ as opposed to study of religion. But from what Merlijn and Edmund say, maybe I’m just wrong – that in practice that’s not what theologians do. But then again if theology proceeds from a viewpoint that there are good reasons for believing in God – then that is different from history of religion and comparative religion, which don’t.
I’m a bit confused now. I wonder what theology really is, and if there even is an agreed definition. If some departments have changed their names, perhaps there isn’t.
I’ve always thought of it as a branch of philosophy that proceeds from a completely untenable assumption (sort of like what Heidegger does).
OB of little faith (in thyself)!
Yeah, Karl – or Leibniz and his monads or Schopenhauer and his Will or Plato and his Ideal Forms. I don’t think critiquing theological studies on the basis that they start from something irrational is any philosopher’s strong suit…
Good thing I’m not a philosopher then.