Theological Education in an Era of Globalization: Some Critical Issues
By Rod Dreher
Rawlings School of Divinity
CLED 720: Biblical & Theological Foundations of Education
Genevieve Hamer
July 5, 2022
[1] This essay is a critical appraisal of theology and theological education in an era of
globalization and its implications for the preparation of leaders for the church in North America.
I approach the topic from the perspective of a theological educator and former academic dean
who has taught in theological institutions in Asia and the United States. As a former executive in
the Department of Theological Studies, at the Lutheran World Federation in Geneva, I have had
the privilege of getting acquainted with challenges facing theological education in seminaries
and institutions from around the world in different cultural contexts. I draw on those
experiences to reflect about theological education in today’s globalized world. I am aware that
the effects of globalization may have different implications in secular (religious) education in
colleges and universities but the critical issues I raise may be relevant to them as well.
Preliminary Observations
[2] First, the theme implicitly or explicitly assumes the phenomenon of “globalization”
affecting societies and cultures around the world. What this phenomenon means, how it is
defined, the structural, cultural and economic effects of it on societies, positively or negatively,
in different geographical regions of the world is the subject of scholarly debate and analysis in
many disciplines, including theology.[1] I will limit myself to some broad remarks on the subject
and skip over much of the debate surrounding globalization since, I presume, most of us are
familiar with it. What has become increasingly clear to us is that the globalization has
contributed to a heightened awareness of global interconnectedness and the globalization of
knowledge. What the implications of our knowledge of globalization are for theological
education is my primary focus.
[3] Second, it is unavoidable that in an essay of this nature one has to make certain
generalizations. As we all know that all generalizations are false! I will be using certain general
categories, such as “global North”, “global South,” “Western,” “non-Western,” etc., for
analytical purposes only in order to differentiate or point out certain perspectival differences. I
am quite aware that my employment of such binary or polarized approach is not only
problematic but also loses its discursive effectiveness in an interconnected world and may seem
counter to the basic thrust of this essay. I want to acknowledge this problem and the limitations
of this approach at the outset.
World Cup and American Exceptionalism
[4] I began reflecting on this presentation while watching the World Cup Soccer or
“Football,” as it is known around the world, in July 2014. It dawned on me that if there is a
unique symbol of globalization, it is football! Some 200 plus nations are members of FIFA and
the World Cup is the largest televised event ever, globally watched in real time! The game is a
unique expression of global solidarity, friendship and interconnectivity. The growing popularity
of soccer in the United States, surprisingly, drew the ire of a political columnist. Ann Coulter, a
right-wing columnist, wrote an online piece attacking soccer saying that its acceptance
represents a “moral decay.” Soccer is a foreign game, wrote the columnist, embracing it means
accepting the metric system or the socialized health care as universal. Its appeal to
disproportionately young and immigrant populations, especially in “Blue States” undermines
“American exceptionalism,” decrying that we are becoming like the rest of the world![2]
[5] I cite this provocative critique of soccer to illustrate that awareness of global
interconnectedness, mutual interdependence through modern means of transportation,
communication, social media, new technologies, the growing influence a capitalist economy,
consumeristic culture around the world, and the phenomenon of the globalization of World
Religions are self-evident, provoking tensions and conflicts in most societies. While there are
good reasons to celebrate the shrinking of our world into a global village bringing with it
enrichment of cultures and the globalization of knowledge and sensitivity to the diversity of
cultures and worldviews, there are also equally good reasons to fear the negative effects of this
phenomenon. Positively speaking, globalization has deepened our awareness of and sensitivity
to the interdependence of people and societies around the world. Negatively, it contributes to
the homogenization of cultures by repressing local and cultural identities, erosion of social and
cultural values and exacerbating nationalism, tribalism, ethnic and interreligious conflicts.
[6] Christian theologians are aware that the church too has played a major role in this
process, both as an agent in and a product of globalization through its missionary engagement
around the world, especially in the modern era. The growing expansion of Christianity world-
wide, especially in the Evangelical and Pentecostal manifestations, is part and parcel of this new
phenomenon. The intensification of the globalization process in recent decade however has
forced us to rethink our engagement with this reality with respect to theology and theological
education. Robert Schreiter, years ago, wrote about “global flows” and “local logics” and
identified four global flows: liberation, feminism, ecology and human rights.[3] These four
flows, in his view, are important global/universal concerns that transcend geographical and
cultural boundaries. To this list, I would add interreligious/inter-cultural engagement as another
important theme that has emerged as an universal issue.
[7] The global flows identified above are gradually being woven into theological reflections
and literature produced in recent years. In addition, theologians in the West have begun to pay
attention to theologies emerging from non-Western cultures in light of the demographic
shifting of the Christian concentration to the Southern hemisphere. The disestablishment of
Christianity in Europe and the gradual decline of allegiance to the Christian faith in North
America are some factors that have forced theologians to look at World Christianity for insights
and inspiration.
The assumption of self-sufficiency of Western theological reflection has been radically
questioned by theologies emerging from the global South. Theological texts, especially in
constructive theology, lack credibility these days if they don’t recognize the shifting Christian
demographics or fail to engage with theologies emerging from the majority world. Thanks to
the conversations on globalization and theological education initiated by the Association of
Theological Schools (ATS) beginning in 1980’s,[4] theological curriculum too has begun to
reflect the changing face and perception of “Christianities” from around the world and the need
to form and educate leaders who are prepared to face a globalized context. Most theological
schools and colleges these days offer courses in World Christianity, World Religions, interfaith
dialogue and other elective courses in contextual, ethnic specific, postmodern and post-colonial
theologies. The cultural, ethnic, racial and national diversity encountered in classrooms in North
America has also forced theological educators to engage with wider global perspectives.
[8] In adopting a new strategic direction on global awareness and engagement, ATS
recently noted: “Western theological education cannot think of its own scholarly work as
sufficient at this time without engagement in the scholarship and strategies for theological
education in the majority world, nor can it assume that it is a good steward of its significant
resources and educational practices without making them available in appropriate ways in the
broader efforts of world Christianity.” [5] This recognition that global realities significantly
impact theological education in North America has enormous implications for theological
schools in North America. Theological schools, especially those with an international faculty or
students, in varying degrees have already begun to rethink their curriculum in the face of global
realities. While incremental changes are afoot there are some significant issues that still need
to be addressed if theological education in North America is responsive to global realities. I
would like to articulate five interrelated issues for our consideration.
The Latin Captivity of the Church
[9] One my professors in India often spoke about the “Latin captivity” of the church,
echoing Luther’s “Babylonian Captivity of the Church.” He of course came from the Eastern
Orthodox tradition and had good reasons to voice his protest. That phrase perhaps best
captures the state of theology in the globalized world. Both theology and theological education,
notwithstanding our newly developed global awareness, invariably privilege European and
Euro-American traditions over other theological perspectives. This is true not only in North
America but also in the majority world or the global South. A vast amount of theological
literature produced, published, promoted and archived in the world comes from Europe and
North America and exported to other countries.
All most all scholars who write or edit books on “World Christianity,” “global theology” or
missiology reside in the global North and their writings are often filtered through Western
epistemic frameworks. Only a small number of writers from the majority world are widely
known in the West, few are able to get their works published in the West and their voices and
contributions are often introduced and mediated by white scholars. The exception being the
works of Latin American liberation theologians published in English in the United States. The
dominance of Western scholarship in theological literature tends to skew an authentic global
engagement. Theological knowledge or knowledge production in academic theology continues
to be concentrated in Europe and North America. This imbalance in the availability of
theological resources is a significant barrier for global engagement in theology and theological
education.
[10] Excellence in theological education in most parts of the global South is also influenced
by the accrediting standards and best practices originating in North America or England. An
unintended consequence is that educational values and standards from the global North are
often exported to the global South and seldom in the opposite direction. The clamor to obtain
Western accredited degrees in the global South has led to extension education sites in Central
America, Asia and Africa by North American Evangelical institutions.
Having served as a Commissioner for Accreditation in the ATS, I have often protested
against this growing invasion of North American theological institutions in other parts of the
world for undermining the authority of regional accrediting agencies and context based
education. Distant education programs offered through Western intuitions may indeed serve a
need in places where theological education is unavailable or scarce but in places like India
where there are more than 350 seminaries, American seminaries invading with their online
offerings baffles me. One cannot help but think of it as a new form of theological colonialism!
[11] I must also note that while partnership arrangements between theological institutions
between the North and the South have the potential to contribute reciprocal learnings, the
imbalance in economic resources makes it often one-way way traffic, from the North to the
South, except for a limited number of transnational exchanges of students and faculty. The
popularity of travel seminars and other exposure programs (“Christian tourism”) in recent
decades has been helpful in broadening the horizons of understanding for students and faculty
in the West (not necessarily for the hosting countries and institutions.) I am skeptical, however,
whether such programs significantly transform the seeing and reading of global realities and
the construction of new theological discourses and interpretation of texts from alternate
perspectives.
Epistemic Colonialism
[12] Asian American post-colonial feminist theologian, Kwok Pui-lan, has coined the phrase
“epistemic colonialism” as a characteristic of much of Western theological scholarship. Scholars
in West still harbor assumptions that “western” theology is normative and represents the
“universal,” while all other theologies—African, Asian, Black, Hispanic, and so forth, are
contextual, perspectival and limited.[6] The way theology has been taught and transmitted in
the past but also even at the beginning of the third millennium has paid insufficient attention to
theological diversity in our world nor is it inclusive. The hidden assumptions of most Western
theologies, not to mention denominational or confessional theologies, marginalize voices and
theologies from other cultural contexts. Theological voices from non-Western contexts are
often suppressed as being “contextual,” meaning relevant only to that context and not
elsewhere, as a way to undermine the credibility, if not the legitimacy, of such interpretations!
[13] While most of us, if not all of us, would acknowledge that all theological reflections are
contextual and yet the way we teach and write about theology tends to imply that our
particular understanding of theology is applicable to all people and at all times. Justo Gonzalez,
in an oft quoted passage from his book Mañana, laments that one of the fallacies of traditional
Western philosophy and theology is the confusion of the universal with dominance.
“North American male theology is taken to be basic, normative, universal theology, to
which then women, other minorities, and people from the younger churches may add their
footnotes. What is said in Manila is relevant for the Philippines. What is said in Tübingen,
Oxford or Yale is relevant for the entire church. White theologians do general theology, black
theologians do black theology. Male theologians do general theology; female theologians do
theology determined by their sex. Such a notion of “universality” based on the present unjust
distribution of power is unacceptable to the new theology. If the nature of truth is…both in its
historical concreteness and in its connection with orthopraxis, if follows that every valid
theology must acknowledge its particularity and its connection with the struggles and vested
interest in which it is involved. A theology that refuses to do this and that leaps to facile claims
of universal validity will have no place in the postreformation church of the twenty first
century.”[7]
[14] Most male white theologians are acutely aware of the hidden claims to “universality”
and the limitations of their theological production and many have tried to rectify it by adding a
few paragraphs or a chapter on theologies from other cultural contexts at the end of their book
or insert a few names or footnotes to make it look more inclusive. References to theologies
from the non-western world are often included in theological texts, I sometimes think, not
because they offer valuable insights but for their ornamental value! Anyone wanting to do
theology in a global context today must acknowledge the fallacy of the “universal,” and
critically evaluate post-enlightenment preference for constructing grand “global” narratives and
consciously move in the direction of an intercultural dialogical engagement attentive to the
voices, agendas, testimonies and contrary experiences of people from other parts of the world.
This dialogical engagement, I hasten to add, is neither a rejection of the inherited
theological/confessional traditions nor does it imply the primacy of the “indigenous,”
“contextual” or “local” over against theological articulations from traditional centers of
theological inquiry in the West. I also do not mean to imply that we should now reverse or
replace Western universalizing claims to theological knowledge with non-Western systems and
perspectives as a form of “post-colonial revenge.” Global theology today calls for a “new
universality,” not in the modernist sense, but in the sense of a “new catholicity,” to use Robert
Schreiter’s phrase, that draws on the diversity, richness and plurality of theological perspectives
emerging from the church around the world.
NOTES
[1] Robert J. Schreiter, The New Catholicity, Theology between the Global and the Local
(Maryknoll, Orbis, 1997); Craig Ott & Harold A. Netland,eds. Globalizing Theology, Belief and
Practice in an Era of World Christianity (Grand Rapids, Baker Academics, 2007); Robert Evans
and David Roozen, eds., The Globalization of Theological Education, (Maryknoll, Orbis, 1993).
[2] See, Ann Coulter’s column in http://www.anncoulter.com/columns/2014-06-25.html
[3] Robert Schreiter, The New Catholicity, pp. 15-27.
[4] Published in four issues of ATS publication, Theological Education (1986-93)
[5] ATS, Colloquy Online, April 2014
[6] See, American Academy of Religion program unit on “Teaching Theology in a Global and
Transnational World,” https://www.aarweb.org/publications/spotlight-on-theological-
education-march-2014. Some of my observations are drawn from presentations and discussions
at the AAR program named above.
[7] Justo L. Gonzalez, Mañana, Christian Theology from a Hispanic Perspective (Nashville:
Abingdon Press, 1990), p 52
[8] Gustavo Guiterrez, A Theology of Liberation, rev ed., (Maryknoll, Orbis, 1998) 11).
[9] ATS Colloquy Online, April 2014
