Practical Theology in Church and Society by Joseph E. Bush Jr. (review)

Abstract

The achievement of Joseph Bush’s fine book Practical Theology in Church and Society is to synthesize, integrate, deepen, and render accessible to ministry practitioners a wide range of conversations in practical theology around the work of reflective practice and practical theology. These latter two categories constitute the organization of the book. The first part, on “Reflection on Practice,” considers the conditions of ministry leadership that orient strategies of reflective practice. The second part, on “Methodological Movements,” explores the practice of theological reflection on ecclesial and social contexts that inform continuing pastoral action. Delving deeply into the the rhythms and movements of theological reflection on ministry practice, Bush’s book brings to life the vocation of practical theology for ministry practitioners. Distance is often understood to be a necessary condition of reflection on practice: one needs somehow to step away from or out of the everyday rhythms, patterns, and movements of practice in order to explore its deeper meaning. Bush understands that distance is not so much created by stepping away from or outside of the context of practice as is by the very conditions that contexts of ministry place on practice. He argues that ministry leaders are situated in a “liminal position” with respect to the communities that they serve, standing both inside and outside, both centrally and marginally. Liminal positionality not only renders pastoral authority “ambiguous,” it also gives structure to the work of reflective practice in ministry. Pastoral leaders who develop critical awareness of their own social location better position themselves to query a faith community’s social and cultural location through formal and informal modes of inquiry. Liminality opens up opportunities for ministry leaders to notice, analyze skillfully, and respond to a range of practices and patterns that give shape to faith communities: practices of hospitality and welcome that yield clues to how a faith community understands itself in relationship to broader social and cultural contexts; patterns of intra-community communication that invite intentional cross-cultural communication within the faith community and beyond; and space in which to view and respond to congregational culture through structural, symbolic, political, and human resource frames. The book’s second part turns to the question of what makes theological reflection on practice “theological.” In the chapters in this section, Bush develops a theological reflection matrix with two primary axes, the poles of one being “reflection” and “practice,” and the other two being “society and Christianity.”