It’s All Theology

In seminaries of every denomination, there are courses on theology. These courses usually involve reading dense books with excruciating complex sentences as a means of discovering how to state more clearly what one believes. It’s enough to make you wonder why one would want or need theology.

It helps to back up a little bit and remember what theology is and what it is not. Theology just means “words, ideas, thoughts concerning God.” Sure it has come to mean the academic study of things divine, but that’s not all theology is or is meant to be. Our ideas of God are too important to our own lives to allow theology to be relegated to a tough-to-study seminary course.

There is another method of doing theology. It comes from realizing that everything is theology. All our thoughts. All our actions. Everything we do says something about what we think of God.

Take some easy thoughts and actions first. I decide not to go to church this Sunday morning. That is a theological decision, even if I am not the pastor. Yet, if I have strep throat, the decision not to go is based on the theological conviction that God understands why I am not joining with others for worship. Showing love of neighbor through not spreading the sickness matters much more in this case.

What if I decide to go canoeing instead of going to church? That decision is also theological. For some people, there are what they consider to be good theological reasons for opting for the paddling trip. For the rest of us, we forget that the decision has anything to do with what we think of God.

When I cut someone off in traffic in a rush to get to a meeting, that action is also theological. When I chew someone out, that action is theological. All of our actions say something of what we believe to be true about God.

What about those who do not believe in God? Atheism is in itself a theological position. The decisions an atheist makes based on their belief that there is no God are equally related to their theology.

The gift in this is to see that religion is not some subset of your life. You can not relegate what you think of God to an hour on Sunday morning. All of your actions speak of your words, ideas, and thoughts concerning God. It’s all theology.

This realization can give an extra filter in considering whether to do something. If you are struggling over any decision, ask yourself what is the theology of this? If I say yes to this decision, what does it say about my belief in God? If I say no, what would that mean about my beliefs?

It would be easy to miss the point here and think I propose that God has some cosmic stake in whether you opt for French fries or go for the onion rings with that hamburger you are ordering. The point is more that trying to eat well as a part of caring for your body as a gift from God may be the underlying theology behind a seemingly irrelevant choice.

Another equally theological stance would be to be completely indifferent to how you care for your body. That too would show something of your belief in God.

We don’t need to wrestle with every little decision as a matter of vast theological import. We could rather attempt to be a bit more reflective and note that God will not be relegated to one area of our lives. Our creator is much more interested in us than that.

Everything you say and do speaks of your relationship with God. It might be easier to ignore that fact. Easier to retreat to the idea of theology as something for dense academic writing full of long words and convoluted sentences. But even that decision is theological. It is to decide that God should be relegated to professionals. I don’t find that concept in the Bible anywhere.

What I find in the Bible is that theology is for the amateur, the outsider and the outcast included. God is more concerned about the stuff of your daily life than in mildewed books gathering dust in some seminary library. What you do with the knowledge that all your actions speak of your belief in God is up to your theology.

            (The Rev. Frank Logue is pastor of King of Peace Episcopal Church in Kingsland.)

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