Theological Method

This course provides a critical study of resources and challenges for advanced work in theology and ethics. The contribution, critique, and challenge of contextual, constructive, liberative, feminist, postcolonial, womanist theologies to each other and to Western theological methodology will be examined. This approach to the study of theological method will give specific attention to how the recovery and use of non-traditional sources of God-talk and moral life (prayers, songs, story, etc.) are creating new theological paradigms. How traditiona1 sources of theology (scripture, tradition, reason and experience) are interpreted, through the lens of different cultures and contexts of oppression and social relations of domination and subordination, will also be explored. It investigates how methods matter for the formation and adjudication of Christian theology, practices and moral agency in specific global and local contexts. Emphasis on self-reflexive, dialogical and collaborative skills in research and scholarship.