A conversation between a youth worker, theologian, artist and poet

I started a twitter conversation last night and I wanted to try and capture it here. I kicked it off with….

…..Feeling a big disconnect between the practice I am engaged in and most of current theological thinking I am reading :(?0 replies 0 retweets 2 favorites ?

@UrbanFriar
where’s the disconnect?

Richard Passmore ?it feels like the practice is ahead of the literature and but still drawing on old paradigm literature orthodoxies? – too much synthesis rather than new conceptual frameworks practice feels beyond Hegels dialectic approach?????

simon sutcliffe
I get you. I keep coming across folk looking for something new/different but no-one quite knows where it’s coming from.?

Richard Passmore maybe need more action research approach that has a freedom beyond the current academic rigour so doesn’t get pulled back?

simon sutcliffe ? so where do we look? I’ve tended in the last few years to head towards Po-Mo philosophy. But still not satisfactory.? or a theology that is not church sponsored nor flows from the corridors of academia.??

Richard Passmore to the poor, excluded, the community and each other?
?
simon sutcliffe What would be such a theologies purpose and why would it be written/painted/sculpted …??

Richard Passmore for the emancipation of the thinkers held captive by academia;) towards fullness of life for humanity?

simon sutcliffe agree with emancipation – free me!! 😉 Have u read Revolution by Brand? He could be our new Cyrus??!!?

Richard Passmore no but on my Christmas list. I think the occupy approach has a lot to teach us??

simon sutcliffe completely agree – raises the question ‘what makes it THEOLOGY?’ But that’s a Q I’d like to attempt to answer.
??
Tim Watson ?@BeatLiturgist I want to favourite this whole thread!?

Ric Stott ?@RicStott yep, me too. Really important and invigorating questions here, thank you???

Richard Passmore ? I think yP have taught me that in community g-d is manifested and theology is embodied rather than discussed- theocardiology??

simon sutcliffe ? we should organise a symposium kinda thing.

Richard Passmore it is nice to be in the warm after cold wet detached ywrk just wish we were all in pub somewhere?- May 26th -30th StreetSpace is hosting our annual gathering we could do campfire symposiums?

simon sutcliffe I still can’t escape from theology as a communicative act. So it can be manifest and embodied but it is also per formative.??

Richard Passmore but isn’t that part of the issue why is embodied theocardiology not a commutative act ??

simon sutcliffe ?It can b but then it also has 2 have a space 4 hermeneutics/interpretation so theology recovers a need 4 others & alterity?

Richard Passmore it is formative both to me and the YP but the liberation that comes with it takes us beyond traditional formative norms?. Maybe not because the interpretation is language bound and hermeneutics too rooted to academia which why liberation is missed?

simon sutcliffe ? the theology u & the YP do is a gift to us all, but we can do nothing with the gift till it is given/performed 4 all 2 c??

Richard Passmore ? Thankyou & humbled but that’s the power of the story and weakness of definition it dies if disconnected from local/practice 1/2?

simon sutcliffe not necessarily language but definitely a public expression. And a corporate response.?

Richard Passmore 2/2 which is why we need the artists and poets like @RicStott and @BeatLiturgist?

simon sutcliffe ? completely agree. Which is why I don’t think it’s theology per se. But it’s performance.?

Richard Passmore ? maybe somewhere inbetween a constructive iconology?

simon sutcliffe ? exactly – so theology as a public act encapsulates our human condition of Otherness ?

Tim Watson ?@BeatLiturgist and the artists and poets need to hear and see the workings of the front line. The embodied gifts.?

Tim Watson This is the most exciting thread. Campfires are go.?

simon sutcliffe (Re Constructive Iconology) -that would be well worth exploring I’m looking at the idea of theology as irony where u create a new vocabulary b’cos the vocabulary they inherit is bankrupt 4 the current context. V Po-Mo. But it creates space for const. Iconology??

Richard Passmore yes yes yes I have played with theology as disinformation so g-d can be found!!!!! Love it?

simon sutcliffe ? we need that campfire!?

simon sutcliffe I’ll bring some wood! (And a few bottles).?

Richard Passmore (re constructive iconology) ?which in part how I ended up with this pic.twitter.com/VScCmkSi3m??

Ric Stott ?@RicStott ?I don’t have much to add to all this via twitter but I do really want to paint some pictures!???