A Universal Core? (1)
In speaking of contextualisation, there are (rather simplistically) two trends of thought:
1) The gospel consists of a "static universal core", a series of articulations which is time insensitive and perennially unchanging. The contextualisation project is simply about enfleshing this core with a cultural facade for the facilitation of communication and understanding. The core, essentially, does not change.
2) The gospel consists of a "dynamic universal core", a series of articulations which is time sensitive and perennially changing with the development of our theological understanding. The contextualisation project, whilst being about the cultural expression of this "dynamic universal core", is also about allowing the enfleshment process to provoke us to re-examine the legitimacy and relevance of the universal core. This means that the universal core, by its sheer dynamic nature, is vulnerable to being modified, changed, eradicated, retained, or reaffirmed in accordance with that deemed necessary.
I suspect that the "emerging" people are those who are more ready to embrace the second of the two approaches, and not just anyone is willing to sit well with this methodological vulnerability.
But anyone who is seriously going to engage his/her context authentically would almost immediately see that the second of the two is probably the only way by which one can be authentically contextual in his/her theological methodology.
Editor's Note: This post was first posted as a comment in the following blog entry.
Comments (2)
I'd like to think that there is such a thing as a universal truth that is unchanging, and that we as limited beings are constantly learning through God's revelation the different pieces or aspects of that universal truth--one that we will never be able to fully grasp on this side of existence.
Perhaps my view may be interjected somewhere in between the first and second trends of thought you proposed (understandably, in simple terms). :-)
Posted by jb | March 20, 2007 9:59 AM
Hi jb,
I happen to agree with your view that there's most probably an "exhaustive set" of propositions about metaphysical reality, but that it's beyond the finiteness of our human minds.
This is why it becomes a problem when theological thinkers become overly and unnecessarily dogmatic about what they believe they know - because this assumes too much.
I'm not, of course, saying that we can't know anything, but that our knowledge of anything can never be exhaustive. Also, we can never assume that we might not have been slightly mistaken about some of our dogmas. The space must always be open for re-examination, discussion, and mutual correction if necessary.
Posted by sk | March 21, 2007 10:16 PM