Theology: The Science of the Intangible?

In A Handbook of Theological Terms Van A. Harvey writes; “theology involves a systematic and rational clarification of Faith through the use of technical concepts and logic.”  Having established that our beliefs color our view of every experience, that everyone’s perception is unique and different, to be fair, it seems that these technical concepts and logic should be subject to the same scrutiny as Faith.

Through whose lens have come the criteria for the concepts and logic with which we are to systematically and rationally clarify Faith?  What color was it?  Would I agree with it if I knew?  I’m sure there are many different concepts, forms of logic, and systems that can be applied to the study of Faith.  Each one of them with their own biases and flaws according to someone else with a conflicting yet just as valid concept, logic or system.

 How do these systems, etc. gain acceptance?  Do a group of people (and who were they?)  just get together and decide?  How?  By consensus?  (I think that’s how the platypus was created.)  Is it just the way it’s been done, FOREVER?  Is it a popularity contest?   So many questions and only 3 years to answer them.  Welcome to theology.

As a nurse I have a somewhat scientific mind that that requires hard data with graphs and percentages to come to conclusions about things.  I find myself wondering how one applies technical concepts and logic to something as intangible as Faith. (Oh yeah, that’s what this course is about.)  Don’t get me wrong, I’ve yearned for a logical, rational clarification of Faith but what hit me as I contemplated this blog is that theology is truly the study of MY Faith, through MY lenses.  It’s the only way it can be as it seems we can never be completely objective in this in the realm of the intangible.  I came to school with the hope that I would be given one clear solid answer from “out there” somewhere,  only to find that while I will be given wonderful tools, the excavating is mine to do and the answer is not out there but deep inside me.

I keep coming back to my current embedded theology that God is an experience, very subjective, very personal.  Perhaps it’s THE experience.  Perhaps just experience.  Any way you look at it the systematic analyses of God and Faith is  a challenge.  There’s little that is quantifiable or verifiable except within one's own experience.

Yesterday I was in a rose garden and was literally smelling the roses.  I love the smell of roses.  I can tell you about it all day long but I will never be able to get you to have the same sensory/emotional experience that I had. Even if you smelled the rose at the same time I did your experience of it wouldn’t be the same.  How much more difficult it is to describe let alone analyze my concept of God.  Apparently it can be done as hundreds of students have gone before me and went on to graduate.  I look forward to the challenge.