What Is Theology? What Is Orthodox Theology?

Abstract

Abstract Simply linguistically, it is easy for theology to be classified among other -ologies—biology, geology, sociology …—as the study of God, risking reducing ‘God’ to a human concept. Orthodox theology has often avoided this, not least by the fortuitous fact that in the diaspora few ‘theologians’ initially had a professional ‘theological’ training (though soon put ‘right’). Philokalia introduced caution by seeing theology as a way of life. What could characterize Orthodox theology? Focus on the Paschal Mystery of the Death and Resurrection of Christ, a sense of the importance of the apophatic … but academic theology? theology in the academy? If theology has a place there, that place will not be justified by assimilation to other academic subjects, which will only emasculate it. Perhaps most fundamental is the cultivating of an attitude of thanksgiving, eucharistia, in a world that is God’s, created, guided, and redeemed by Him.