How ought/must/can one pursue theology? From where you are.

This question has several important answers, all of which help me to see more clearly, all of which strengthen my hand, all of which help me to be more faithful.

Tonight's answer:  You can only pursue theology from where you are.  [Tonight's answer is dedicated to Shane Goodwin.]


You are in the middle of things (in media res)!  You are already on your way.  You are not at an utter beginning, nor can you get there.  Your thoughts, assumptions, background, tastes, talents, etc., are already in play and moving.  You have been shaped by your culture, your family, your past, your micro-sub-culture.  Yes, you can dig some of that up and examine it, but that, too, is a process that starts from where you are.

You are the age you are.  Yes, Mozart had composed x operas, y symphonies, and z piano concerti by the time he was your age, AND YOU HAVEN'T!  So what?  You haven't written the books and articles you wanted to write, you haven't mastered German, French, and classical Greek the way you think you should have by the age of 12.  So what?  Not only will fretting NOT change your yesterdays, it gets in the way of accomplishing things today.

God has given you today, this hour, this moment.  Taste and savor.  Give thanks.  Relax.  This moment, this NOW liberates you into his love.  It liberates you into loving your neighbor.  It may even liberate you into writing a paragraph that describes God in a way that will lift the spirits of your neighbor or friend.

Find a leaf, a rock, a glass of water and behold the beauty and grace of God's handiwork in it, behold his love for you in it.  See it for the personal and amazing gift that it is.  Then, then, in contemplating the delicate and yet ferocious love of God for you, you may be able to point to it and say to your neighbor, your friend, "See?  See!  God loves.  Christ is risen indeed!  God is with us!"  The Bible, the Church, the comments of the saints will help us articulate this.  But we need the immediacy, the freshness, the humility, the peace of seeing ourselves not as universal but as local.  Our theology cannot be always-and-everywhere, because only God is that.  Our theology must and can only be here-and-now, pointing to this God who, although universal, is also here-and-now-with-us.

Look at this.  Isn't it amazing?  Electrons on a screen - -who would have thought it?  God loves.  Christ is risen indeed!  God is with us!