Opening the field of practical theology: an introduction

Opening the Field of Practical Theology: An Introduction. Edited by Kathleen A. Cahalan and Gordon S. Mikoski. (Maryland, Plymouth UK: Rowman & Littlefield, 2014, Pp. 332. 34. 00. ) This new edited collection is so much more than a series of essays. It delivers richly, effectively, and quite literally on the promise of its title, by embodying the methodology, variety, and creativity of the theological discipline it represents in its organizational framework and structure as well as in its contents. The editors make a bold and pedagogically invaluable move in their introduction. They choose to begin not by presenting their own broad generalizations about the field, out of which specifics will emerge in subsequent essays, and to which these specifics will have to answer. Instead, Kathleen Cahalan and Gordon Mikoski present a modest descriptive sketch of the discipline of practical theology, outline key elements and defining concerns that have emerged out of the diversity of this field, and immediately invite readers to create their own schemata for organizing the subsequent chapters. This allows the wide variety of voices and standpoints that follow to do the work of opening the field themselves, by constructing a complex and nuanced picture of practical theology from below, in keeping with perhaps the most salient methodological feature of this theological approach. The individual essays themselves benefit greatly from the editorially-imposed structure that shapes each contribution around the history, norms, foundations, contexts, and conversation partners for each approach. This enables the contributors to present invaluable introductions to key figures, useful summaries of principal strategies, clear engagement with particular sources of authority, and manageable bibliographies. The weight given to each organizing category, and the balance between them, necessarily varies within each essay. The reader thereby encounters a wide variety of subtly distinctive expressions of the breadth of current practical theological thinking and method, while benefitting from a consistent built-in critical apparatus that enables orientation to the field, comprehension of its diversity, and clear comparison of approaches (together with necessary critique). Perhaps most importantly for students, the strong orienting framework of the entire work makes it possible for the reader to find his or her own reflective self-location within a complex discipline. At the same time, the structure shared by the individual essays does not stifle the distinctive voices of the authors, many of whom helpfully locate their disciplinary and denominational commitments within their own life-stories and emerging identities. …