Introduction to Religious Studies
RS 200 01 & 02, Fall 2007
Review Sheet Notes for the Third & Final Exam
Regis College, Regis University
The following notes constitute a study guide for the final exam, but are not comprehensive for every thing on the test. You are responsible for the content of the readings even insofar as the readings say more than these notes.
This includes:
Daniel Migliore’s essay, “The Task of Theology,” (always!)
Key language: theology, the object of theology, the situation of faith, mystery and problem.
The selection from An Introduction to Third World Theologies by John Parratt.
Parratt’s essay is divided into five (5) major sub-headings: The Christian World—a Demographic
Shift, The Colonial Legacy, Anthropological Poverty, A New Approach to Christian Theology, and A New Theological Epistemology. Understanding Parratt’s article would require that you understand the main point of each of these sub-headings, with a particular emphasis on the things we discussed in class. That is, the nature the demographic shift, the colonial legacy, and anthropological poverty. Further, Parratt argues, in the final two sections, that the perspective of people doing theology within the Third World is different from that of those in the West (or the so-called First World). This clearly relates to Migliore’s discussion of the importance of the
“situation of faith” for theology.
Elsa Tamez, Good News for the Poor,
In her essay, Tamez makes the argument that the Gospel is Good News for the Poor, and she goes to great lengths to define both the nature of the “good news” and of the “poor”. She uses biblical texts from the prophets, and from the gospels (especially the songs of Mary and Zechariah (pg.
191), and the beatitudes, to argue for these. In doing so, she is critical of the “rich” when they try to say they are “spiritually poor” and so can benefit from the promises of the Gospel without any challenge to or change in their status as “rich”. Rather she argues that “The accumulation of wealth is incompatible with Christianity, since any accumulation of possessions is at the cost of the very poor” (193). You should understand what and why she argues the way she does (her situation, the biblical mandate for such an idea), and also be able to respond to her argument.
Archbishop Oscar Romero’s Faith and Liberation (FTS, # 67)
Romero was the Archbishop of San Salvador in El Salvador in the early 1980’s. This reading is a speech he gave at a University in Belgium on the occasion of receiving an honorary doctorate there. In other words, he is speaking to a community like ours – a first world, university community. In his essay, he too, operates under a series of sub-headings which organize his ideas. Again, Romero is speaking from his situation, the situation of his people, in Salvador.
What is that situation? And how does the Gospel function in that time and place. What is the good news to the poor? He says important things like: “I am going to speak to you simply as a pastor, as one who, together with his people, has been learning the beautiful but harsh truth that the Christian faith does not cut us off from the world but immerses us in it, that the church is not a fortress set apart from the city.” (FTS, 308). From there he goes on to talk about the political dimension of the Christian faith. What is he talking about? What does Romero want his audience to hear and understand from his, and his people’s, experience of the church and of the world. What does it mean, for example, that “[e]xperiencing these realities, and letting ourselves be affected by them, far from separating us from our faith has sent us back to the world of the poor as our true home. It has moved us, as a first, basic step, to take the world of the poor upon ourselves” (FTS, 310)? Further, what does it mean, to Romero, to commit to the defense of the

poor (312), or to be persecuted for serving the poor (312-3)? And, finally, what, for Romero, is the relationship between the Church and politics?
The essays by African & Asian theologians gives us other perspectives from another part of the world where Christianity is growing.
John Mbiti, “The Encounter of Christian Faith and African Religion”
Mbiti engages several questions (again organized by useful sub-headings) including the relationship between the concerns of Africans and Europeans/North Americans. While in the north, our concern may be with secularity (the death of God), in Africa, as Mbiti argues, God is not dead. In other words, African Christians have different questions and concerns, problems and possibilities. To prepare for questions about Mbiti’s essay, consider what he discusses under the heading “A God Already Known” (200). Why is it so important to him that God is not only to be found in biblical history? What, according to Mbiti, is the relationship between God and the peoples of Africa? How does, what Parratt called the “colonial legacy”, effect theology and
Christianity in an African context?
Mercy Amba Oduyoye “The Value of African Religious Beliefs and Practices for Christian Theology"
Mbiti quotes from an African theological conference, which wrote that “[i]n Africa the traditional religions are a major source for the study of the African experience of God. The beliefs and practices of the traditional religions in Africa can enrich Christian theology and spirituality”
(Mbiti, 203). Oduyoye’s essay proposes a number of ways that African religious beliefs and practices can do just that. She proposes 10 aspects of African belief and practice that she believes can contribute to developing a distinctively African Christianity, and which can also contribute to Christianity in general. What are these key practices? Are there ideas, or practices that seem to show up in more than one of these beliefs and practices. I’m thinking, for example, of the way the theme of community seems woven through several of them. How do the practices and beliefs that Oduyoye describes differ from our own? Based on Oduyoye’s descriptions, how might we learn from African Christians about the meaning of the Gospel?
C. S. Song, “Theology and Asian Culture”
Song gives us a brief glance at some of the realities involved in the growth of Christianity within communities in Asia. As we discussed in class, there are some important and challenging differences between the world view of Eastern and Western civilizations. Namely, the nontheistic character of most Eastern religious traditions, and what that means for understanding the world and the nature of the good and evil, etc. Song argues that Christianity needs an opportunity to grow within the context of very different spiritualities (where “[s]pirituality is the totality of being that expresses itself in ways of life, modes of thinking, patterns of behavior and conduct, and attitudes toward the mystery that surrounds our immediate world and that beckons us on to the heights beyond heights, to the depths below depths, and to the light beyond lights” (295)). He emphasizes the need to develop a “third-eye”. This third-eye can bee seen in the art of different spiritual contexts. He contrasts the anguished Christ of Italian Renaissance art with the tranquil Christ of a Japanese artist, who depicts a sibui Christ . What does it mean that Christ can be, and has been, depicted in so many ways and in so many cultures. Be sure to read footnote #9 for a definition of sibui .
The exam will have three parts: I) identification questions, and 2) short answer (2-4 sentence answers) questions, and 3) an essay question. The questions are driven by the content of each reading.
You will be asked to compare or contrast different ideas.