My last post in this series discussed good experiences I had during my first year of graduate studies at Boston College (and a couple of courses at St. John nearby). In the month since I wrote that post, I have written two other posts that were not a part of this series. I think that is in part because this next one is supposed to be about some negative experiences I had in Boston, and I really do not enjoy speaking of negative things too much. Nevertheless, negatives are impossible to avoid; we press on.
My first negative experience involved courses I did not take. Hence, they were only negative in the sense that they raised concerns about what other people were teaching and learning. Again, that's somewhat unavoidable in a field like this. But these are the specific ones that affected me.
Boston College is part of a consortium that allows students to take classes at other universities that are also parts of the consortium. One of the other Universities is Harvard, which is just north of Boston in Cambridge. I thought it would be really interested to take a course at Harvard, simply due to the schools reputation. So, I eagerly perused the course catalog at Harvard for courses in theology and religious studies. I was quite dismayed when literally none of the course titles or descriptions appealed to me in any way shape or form. That was a let down. At Harvard and to some extent at Boston College there were courses that seemed to be primarily based on some secular ideology rather than on properly theological research. For instance, Harvard had a course on "Feminist Christology" and Boston College on "Feminist Ethics" (taught in the depart of theology, not philosophy or political science, which would have made more sense, and would have been less alarming). From an intra-theological perspective, those titles don't make a whole lot of sense, since the natures and person of Christ and ethical principles should be the same no matter whether your male or female. It would have been different if it were a Christological understanding of women or femininity, or Catholic moral theology of women's issues, or something to that effect. My main objection was that they were using secular socio-political movement as a governing principle and were trying to reshape the theology to fit therein. That was worrisome to me. (As an aside, I get worried when I see conservative Catholics do similar things, prioritizing their socio-economic and political views over theology and simply declaring from the outset that the Church simply ought to butt-out. So I have been known to chastise both sides for basically the same kind of error.)
My second example is fairly small, but it got me thinking. One of my professors (who will remain nameless) gave us a rather understandable direction "to avoid sinking into popular piety" when writing our papers. Of course, I understood that it was meant to convey the need for intellectual, academic rigor in researching and writing. In itself, I did not have a problem with it, per se. Yet, at the same time, something inside me rebelled to a degree. There can be a danger of 'over-sanitizing' theology, making it too 'scientific' and hyper-rational to the point where it becomes cold and calculating. (Some may argue that this is exactly what neo-scholasticism did when it came to the manualist tradition.) There is the concomitant danger that theology separated from piety is untrustworthy. Theology can only truly be done in prayer. It deals with God and man's relationship to God. It is meant to enhance our knowledge of the One we love so that we may love Him more. This cannot be done without piety. To my mind, there is too little piety many theological schools. I'd rather have too much piety than too little, if I have to choose between those dangers. Again, yes, academic honesty and careful investigation is helpful, but it ought to be accompanied by prayer and lead towards right praise (orthodoxy) and a holier life. Otherwise, it is pointless.
My final example came in the form of a public lecture by the then theologian Roger Haight, S.J. He gave a talk called: "Catholic Pluralism on Religious Pluralism: Karl Rahner and Edward Schillebeeckx." After contrasting the two theologians, Haight declared his option for Schillebeecks. Now, I have not studied Schillebeeckx much, so I will not purport to speak to the accuracy of Haight's portrayal of his thought. All I can say is that I very much disagreed with Haight's position, which he attributes to Schillebeeckx. Essentially, Roger Haight said that, if a non-Christian ends up in heaven, it has nothing to do with Christ. Now, from a Catholic and generally Christian perspective, that is heretical. He pretty much flat out said that if a Buddhist went to heaven, Jesus did not save Him, and the Buddhist is saved completely apart from Jesus. (A few years after this speech, I learned that--after six years of giving Haight the opportunity to explain how his thought could be brought into the bounds of acceptable Catholic theology, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, under Ratzinger's leadership, removed Haight's ability to teach as a Catholic Theologian. This was over his book "Jesus, the Symbol of God.")
As part of the Q&A following the speech, someone asked Haight why he chose Schillebeeckx's position. His response was that it made Inter-religious Dialogue easier. As troubling as that position was to me in itself, it was a conversation I had following with a classmate of mine that raised further concerns. I mentioned to her after the lecture that his reasoning was problematic. Making dialogue easier is does not make a position true. I expressed my thought that dialogue should be conducted out of mutual respect and a common search for truth. Both sides are searching for truth and in recognizing disagreements they come together to share their thoughts in order to learn and hopefully lead towards truth. Her reply was flatly: "I don't think the purpose of dialogue is truth." That was it.
I started to realize more and more that people were going to graduate school to get degrees in order to push their ideas as "theological," even if it was not the actual study of theology that led to the thoughts. It was a power grab. People were more concerned about pushing an agenda than learning and discovering and sharing truth. I find that disturbing, even if it is no longer surprising to me, since it is actually quite commonplace. Just watch any news channel. The odds that there is open dialogue comparing ideas and discussing them towards a solution is almost zero.
That wasn't an isolated incident, and I began to see more clearly the tendency towards what I call "anti-theology": the desire to use one's "credentials" to help conform the Church and her teachings to the world rather than to be an advocate of the Church and her teaching to the world in order to transform the world towards God's truth. The former is anti-theology; the latter is the proper aim of theology.
In short, those experiences helped me further clarify what I did not want to become as a theologian and what I wanted to help other people avoid in their own theological journeys. That's all for now. God bless!
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