Abstract
This article deals with a concrete attempt to make socio logy relevant to pastoral action through dialogue with pastoral theology, without falling into the errors of former pastoral sociology.
Four problem areas are identified: the normative character of theology, the fact that theology contains an implicit sociolo gical description of reality, the problems related to the fact that when theologians identify the « essence » of things, they state at the same time what reality « is » and « should be » whereas sociology is not interested in the « essence » and finally the problems related to the fact that theology pre tends to interpret aspects of reality in a prespective of « to tality ».