Public Theology: Toward a Christian Definition

Abstract

Public theology is a phrase that has been used both descriptively (like Bellah's civil religion) and prescriptively (so that public theology is an attempt to recommend policy prescriptions seen through the narrative of faith). After a survey of the evolution of the phrase, I concede that most contemporary theologians use the phrase in a prescriptive way. Many using public theology in a prescriptivist way do so out of a revisionist theological framework. This is problematic because the majority of Christians are much more traditional in their theology. Building on a distinction between “process” and “content” in Christian ethics, the article argues for a particularist account of public theology that is shaped by liberation theology and yet still committed to conversation in a pluralist society.