Theological Reflection: Methods

Over the past fifteen years, as interest in postmodern approaches to knowledge has grown among pastoral theologians and practitioners, there have been lively discussions about methodology. Articulating one's method, described by Jennings (1990) as third order reflections can be likened to the work of navigation; such discussions chart the course of where pastoral theology has been and where it is going as a discipline. Indeed, the bibliography of articles and chapters on pastoral theological method, from Hiltner's (1958) Preface to Pastoral Theology, to Browning (1983), Poling and Miller (1985), Hunter and Burck (1990), Ramsay (2004), and Marshall (2004), provides important historical markers for defining who pastoral theologians and practitioners are and what they do. Such methodological discussions have become even more pressing given the burgeoning interest in spirituality and health, an arena where many psychologists and health practitioners show an alarming theological naivete by limiting themselves to using first order religious language and premodern approaches to religion.