Mourning the Un-mournable? Political Theology Between Refugees and Religion

Since the arrival, or the attempted arrival, of millions of refugees in Europe, the performances of the Center for Political Beauty – a Berlin-based collective of artists and activists – have had a huge impact on public and political debates about Germany's migration policies. In this paper, I analyze the performance “The Dead Are Coming” in which the artists buried refugees who drowned in their attempt to enter the European Union. Drawing on Judith Butler's political philosophy of performativity, I assess “The Dead Are Coming” as a “doing” rather than a “describing” of dignity. I argue that the integration of God into the practices of mourning enables both the activists and the audience to resist the differential distribution of dignity in Europe's migration policy. Ultimately, I advocate a re-thinking of political theology in which art learns from theology and theology learns from art in order to promote dignity under de-dignifying conditions.     

How Theological is Political Theology? The Case of Twentieth-Century American Protestantism

ABSTRACT

How theological is political theology? Twentieth century American Protestantism illustrates that the answer depends on more than the extent to which a political theology is theological. For example, Walter Rauschenbusch and subsequent emancipatory political theologians understand theology's political significance very differently than John Howard Yoder and other political theologians influenced by the Radical Reformation. Nevertheless, both groups conceive the Christian gospel as a politics and so concur that Christian theology is essentially political. By contrast, Reinhold Niebuhr interpreted the gospel as disclosure of God's mercy and therefore denied that Christian theology is primarily a politics--for society or the church. Hence, although all three of these political theologies are thoroughly theological, they are not political in the same manner or for the same reasons. Accordingly, in addition to quantitative considerations, ascertaining theology's place in political theology involves discerning how a political theology is theological and why a theology is political.     

From Where Does the Red Tory Speak? Phillip Blond,Theology and Public Discourse

Abstract

This article examines the role of theology in the public discourse of Phillip Blond. For one whose professional and academic training has been in Christian theology, Blond appears surprisingly reluctant to declare the theological roots of his political convictions. It is possible that this is an entirely pragmatic strategy, concerned not to alienate a largely secular audience, although this may be self-defeating if critics suspect some kind of sleight of hand. Yet it also fails to identify the sources of the traditions and practices which will actually inform a renewed political and cultural economy of virtue. Blond's diffidence towards declaring his theological stance contrasts with other traditions such as public theology, which argues that coherent and convincing Christian speech in public must always be prepared to put itself to the test of public scrutiny. Such transparency and accountability implies a respect for, but not necessarily a capitulation to, the insights of secular reason.     

How Does Theology Go Public? Rethinking the Debate between David Tracy and George Lindbeck

Abstract

The possibilities for taking theological ethics ‘public’ have taken on added significance amidst debates over the nature of moral norms. If realist theological ethics can find a public voice, it will enhance the prospects for interreligious ethical collaboration and the place of theology in it. A key question remains whether particular contexts of religious symbols render them meaningful only within communities of ‘origin’, or particularity actually enables broadly compelling meaning or a public voice for theology. At issue in the Tracy-Lindbeck debate are their understandings of ‘public’, their responses to philosophical anti-foundationalism, and their theological presuppositions. While postliberal emphases on the distinctiveness of the Christian community and attention to the ecclesial community complement Tracy's emphases on dialogue and coherence, Tracy's recent methods provide more adequate responses to the challenges posed by postmodernism.     

The Option for the Poor as a Decolonial Option: Latin American Liberation Theology in Conversation with Teología India and Womanist Theology

Decolonial theorists pose a new challenge to liberation theology: Does its formulation of the option for the poor address the coloniality that distinguishes the modern context? This article argues that an option for the poor within theology, as a decolonial option, has to retrieve and deepen two central concerns of liberation theologians’ early articulation of the option for the poor: (1) the commitment to the poor and the way the divine is manifested historically, and (2) the affirmation of the need for social analysis and the need for this analysis to impact the commitment to God. The article draws on Teología India and womanist theology to indicate how these two interrelated commitments within the option for the poor can strengthen the option for the poor as a decolonial option.     

‘Global Capitalism’ vs ‘End of Socialism’: Crux Theologica? Engaging Liberation Theology and Theological Postliberalism

Abstract

This article offers a critical assessment of two political theologies: liberation theology and theological postliberalism, as represented by the writings of Gustavo Gutiérrez and John Milbank. Paying particular attention to the concepts of society and Church, a partial defence of liberation theology is offered in tandem with a critical affirmation of some aspects of postliberal political theology. The discussion is then contextualized historically in relation to the ‘victory’ of global capitalism and the ‘end’ of socialism. I conclude that the renewal of political theology in the twenty-first century will aim to overcome the ironic crux theologica of this article's title.     

From Comparative to Interreligious Theology: Perry Schmidt-Leukel's “Fractal” Version of Pluralism

Perry Schmidt-Leukel has proposed a “fractal” theory to correlate factors which are replicated across religious traditions. His aim is to develop notions of religious and theological pluralism which have become locked into a somewhat sterile conflict with “inclusivism.” A wide range of thinkers from a variety of religious traditions respond to his initiative, some applauding it, others criticising it as being too abstract to do justice to the particularity of religious phenomena. A highlight is Francis X. Clooney's defence of his comparative theology project as an alternative to pluralism. In reply, Schmidt-Leukel generously accepts a number of criticisms while reasserting his proposal that on the basis of fractal theory a truly interreligious theology is possible. It remains to be seen how widely fractal theory applies to concrete religious phenomena.     

“Only a God Can Resist a God.” Political Theology between Polytheism and Gnosticism

ABSTRACT

Sovereignty – based on a claim to irresistible authority – and “speaking truth to power” (or parrhesia) are evidently opposed and yet they seem to have a strange affinity with one another, at least if one follows Foucault’s last lectures on this motif of political philosophy. This article revisits Hans Blumenberg’s reconstruction of the meeting between the German poet Goethe and the French emperor Napoleon as an example of a parrhesiastic encounter between philosophy and tyranny. The article situates Blumenberg’s discussion of Goethe’s pantheism and polytheism in the context of his ongoing polemic with Schmitt’s conceptions of sovereignty and political theology. It argues that while both Blumenberg and Schmitt seek to offer responses to the Gnostic rejection of worldly power, a reading of Goethe in light of the discourse on parrhesia or frank speech lately revived by Foucault allows for the articulation of republican response to Gnosticism.     

Müntzer,Taubes, and the Anabaptists: Emancipatory History and Political Theology

ABSTRACT

The radical apocalypticism of the sixteenth century mystic and revolutionary Thomas Müntzer has served as an enduring resource for the political left, from early investigations by Engels and Bloch to the recent works of Alberto Toscano and Wu Ming. In one of his lesser-studied works – the 1947 dissertation Occidental Eschatology – Jewish philosopher Jacob Taubes places Müntzer at a key juncture in the history of eschatology, first by situating him at the end of the Reformation period, and then by connecting his revolutionary apocalypticism to the critiques of Hegel leveled by Marx and Kierkegaard. This study aims to give a new perspective on Taubes as a philosopher of history, first by showing potentially surprising connections between Taubes’ Occidental Eschatology and the historiography of Anabaptism, and second by making suggestions about how Taubes’ distinctively emancipatory philosophy of history might contribute to thinking about time and history within contemporary political theology.     

The Violence of Poverty: Theology and Activism in an “Age of Austerity”

ABSTRACT

Faith groups are in the front line of the struggle to defeat poverty in breadline Britain. Given their roots in local communities Churches and Christian NGOs are well-placed to challenge economic policies that have resulted in the spiraling of food poverty, homelessness, personal debt and child poverty. By framing poverty as a political choice, a form of structural violence and systemic sin this paper brings peace studies and political theology into a constructive dialogue. In the face of ongoing “austerity” the paper demonstrates that poverty represents a clear and present danger to the social fabric of the UK and argues that only a re-imagined interdisciplinary theology of liberation can provide academics and activists with the tools needed to defeat systemic poverty and the cultural violence upon which it rests.     

“The Pull of Love”: Mutual Love as Democratic Virtue in Niebuhrian Political Theology

Although Reinhold Niebuhr's account of democracy aims to protect marginalized communities by restraining sin through the diffusion of power, the conceptions of sin and love that inform his political theology have anti-democratic consequences for members of these communities. I address this inconsistency by revisiting his under-developed idea of mutual love and clarifying his account of sin. Mutual love occupies crucial terrain between agape and justice for Niebuhr, and therefore enables moral agents to achieve democratic goals. Given the nature and importance of mutual love, I clarify Niebuhr's account of sin by making his position on “self-love” more moderate than it often appears.     

On Ambivalence and (Anti-)Normativity (or,Theology as a Way of Life?)

ABSTRACT

This essay argues that queer theory’s ongoing reflection about its own disciplinary identity yields insights that could benefit contemporary political theology. Exploring how internal discussions and debates on the queerness of queer theory can serve as an instructive analogy for similar conversations about the “theologicalness” of political theology, this essay proposes two potential insights that can be gleaned. First, political theology should continue to draw on and do theology, but it should not worry about venturing outside the bounds of what is presumed to be the theological. Theological reflection develops from, and also engenders, communicative and critical expressions, which are deeply important theological modes of political theology, central to its identity even as they appear at times to broaden or stray from it. Second, political theology should look more to politics, broadly understood as the various ways of ordering human life and the utilization and manifestation of power in that structuring, for the theology it offers. In these ways and more, this essay concludes, political theology, like queer theory, is both theory and praxis, a body of knowledge and way of life.     

Leopards and Invisible Calculators: Violent Incorporation,Political Theology,and Kafka’s “Leopards in the Temple”

ABSTRACT

This essay reads Kafka’s aphorism “The Leopards in the Temple” together with some of the concerns of political theology to think about visibility and agency, the sacred and the profane, the violence of incorporation, and the field of political theology itself. Methodologically, it brings literary studies and political theology into richer engagement without consuming one into the other, either as mere illustration or as gloss. The condensed power of Kafka’s aphorism draws us right into the midst of questions about the dangers of consumption and incorporation, as well as the possibilities for meaningful interaction between these fields of study.     

羡慕? 嫉妒? 恨?

葡萄是酸的,还是甜的?吃到的人说是甜的。想吃并认为自己也能吃到的人说是甜的(或者即使吃不到葡萄,但可以吃到其他美味的水果)——这是羡慕。想吃却担心吃不到的人说是酸的——这是嫉妒。想吃却根本吃不到的人会说是苦的,