Theological Education
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The Practical Reality of Practical Theology
This paper was written collaboratively by postgraduate students and staff at the University of Aberdeen during a research seminar in Practical Theology. Contributors are listed at the end of the piece with a brief summary of their research. Click here for details on studying Divinity at Aberdeen. Introduction The field of Practical Theology (PT) is thriving at the University of Aberdeen. During the postgraduate Practical Theology research seminar in the Autumn term (September to December) of 2022, we, a group of postgraduate students and academic staff, carried out a collaborative writing exercise, seeking to define and understand Practical Theology. This was inspired by our shared reading of Collaborative Practical Theology…
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Doing Theology Through the Feathers: Reflecting on Practical Theology as a Student with OCD
“Why are you researching theology?” the Parrot asks me, as I submit the application forms for my PhD. He is mocking me. I already know everything he is about to say to me. We’ve been here before, he and I. The Parrot is always there – he is the voice that my Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) takes. He is the voice of every doubt, every intrusive thought, every repeating phrase that gets lodged in my mind. He will bring up the fears I have that I’m not religious enough, as though that disqualifies me from studying theology. He will tell me that I can’t sit in that space of doubt…
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“Dear God, I want a unicorn”: A young person’s experience of Faith and Theology
One of my earliest memories is of walking down the driveway with my Dad on the way to church, when I was around three. Since then, I was raised by a religious parent (a Professor of Theology) who encouraged my journey of faith, and a parent who was indifferent to my experience, based on their own agnosticism. As the youngest of three children, I also had the participation of my siblings to observe in church services; watching them take Communion when I wasn’t yet old enough, or being asked to deliver readings to the congregation weekly. These are things that I desired to be a part of, regardless of the…
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Reflections on Dochirina Kirishitan and Foundational Instruction in Christian Practice
Basic instruction in Christian doctrine and practice, whether in the form of a catechism, a class before or after baptism or confirmation, or individual instruction from a clergyperson or layperson at another time, is common in many churches and Christian traditions. Such instruction arguably plays a foundational role in the trajectory of the life of faith for those who receive it. In so far as receiving such instruction is a shared experience of the members of a particular church community, it also serves to shape the character of a church as a whole. Through my university teaching and a travel opportunity, I was recently prompted to think again about the…
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Minifigures and Ministers: Formation in the Church of England
There was a time when a Lego figure was as simple as the plastic person you put in the house you’d built or sat in the car you’d made out of oblong and sloping bricks. There was a time when the great Archbishop Michael Ramsey’s description of a minister in the Church of England as a distinctively full time Christian, ‘the beacon of the church’s pastoral, prophetic and priestly concern’[1] was a fully adequate description. Today however, like Lego minifigures, ministers have evolved to be more diverse than Ramsey’s image. If Ramsey were to comment on ministers today, he would see much that he would recognise; some ministers are that…
