Public Theology

What is Public Theology? What is public theology? If you’ve been following this column perhaps you’ve read something like this ad nauseum: Public Theology is conceived in the church, critically reasoned in the academy, and offered to the wider culture for the sake of the global common good. I like this description because I believe that some doctrinal loci within systematic theology–especially our theological understanding of the dialectic within human nature between the imago Dei and the propensity for sin–can be illuminative for understanding repressive social structures, political tensions, and the worldwide outcry for justice. With this in mind, I would like to acknowledge an anniversary that’s probably not on your calendar. Six years ago on October 23, 2016, Jayme R. Reaves [whom I don’t know] posted a succinct and accurate description of Public Theology. He answered our question — what is public theology? — this way. “If theology in its most basic sense is the study of God, then...