This presentation outlines and evaluates Don Browning's vision of A Fundamental Practical Theology. The presentation was prepared by Dr Kevin Smith, the Vice-Principal of the South African Theological Seminary.

1. A Fundamental Practical Theology
Don Browning
By Kevin G. Smith

2. Introduction
Don Browning’s book, A Fundamental Practical Theology
(Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1991), is a seminal work on
practical theology in the American context. Every student of
practical theology must have some understanding of Browning’s
approach.
Browning outlines his approach to practical theology in the
Introduction and in Chapters 2-3. We are going to survey those
portions of his book to get a working knowledge of his views on
theology and his approach to practical theology.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

3. Outline
1. Introduction to Fundamental Practical
Theology
2. The Philosophical Foundations of
Fundamental Practical Theology
3. The Four Tasks of Fundamental Practical
Theology
4. Evaluation and Recommendations
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

4. From Practice to Theory and Back Again
INTRODUCTION TO FUNDAMENTAL
PRACTICAL THEOLOGY
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

5. Purpose and Audience
Browning is writing for anyone who has asked, “In what way do
religious communities make sense?” It is for people seeking to
understand how religious communities exhibit practical reason. This
tells us two things about his book:
1. Browning is interested in religious communities more than in
individualistic theology. He believes that communities do theology
and exhibit wisdom, and he wants to know how that works.
2. Browning’s target audience is people who are trying to
understand religious communities and the type of wisdom that
they embody.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

6. Presuppositions
Browning (1991:2) believes that religious communities (by which
he means churches or congregations) are communities of
memory and communities of practical reason.
1. As communities of memory they have history, tradition, and
normative texts that inform their beliefs, values, and
practices.
2. As communities of practical reason, they engage their ever-
changing context in an attempt to remain faithful to the Lord
and relevant to the world.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

7. Philosophies
Browning draws together several key philosophies, basing his
approach on them.
1. Aristotle’s practical wisdom (phronēsis)
2. Gadamer’s hermeneutical theory
3. Habermas’s critical theory
4. Congregational studies
5. Practical theology, the beleaguered sub-discipline
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

8. Browning on the Rebirth “ The field of practical theology has been
of Practical Theology throughout its history the most
beleaguered and despised of the
(Browning 1991:3) theological disciplines. The discipline of
theology itself has had few friends, even
in the church. To admit in academic circles
that one is a theologian has been, in
recent years, to court embarrassment. To
admit that one is a practical theologian
invites even deeper skepticism. To admit
in a major university that one is a
practical theologian has been to invite
humiliation. With the rebirth of the
practical philosophies, practical theology
itself has been reborn.”
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

9. Browning on the Rebirth “With the reemergence of the
of Practical Theology
practical philosophies, there has
arisen a new fascination with terms
(Browning 1991:3-4)
such as practical reason, practical
wisdom, phronesis, practice, praxis,
justice, consensus, dialogue.
conversation, and communication.
This fascination suggests that
Western societies are desperate to
find ways to make shared and
workable decisions about the
common good and the common
life.”
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

10. Approaches to Theology
1. Many theologians define theology “as systematic
reflection on the historical self-understanding of a
particular religious tradition” (Browning 1991:5).
2. “Barth saw theology as the systematic
interpretation of God's self-disclosure to the
Christian church” (Browning 1991:5).
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

11. Approaches to Theology
Browning criticises Barth’s approach for being too one-
directional, theory to practice. It leaves no room for
human understanding, action, or practice in
determining God’s will and purposes (i.e. it is not
hermeneutical in Gadamer’s sense). It also means that
theology is only practical by applying theory to
practice, so practical theology can only be applied
theology in this model. (Barth would be representative
of evangelical theologians.)
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

12. Approaches to Theology
Contrary to Barth’s approach, Browning believes theology must
be practical from beginning to end.
“We come to the theological task with questions shaped by
the secular and religious practices in which we are
implicated--sometimes uncomfortably. These practices are
meaningful or theory-laden. By using the phrase theory-
laden, I mean to rule out in advance the widely held
assumption that theory is distinct from practice. All our
practices, even our religious practices, have theories behind
and within them” (Browning 1991:6).
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

13. Summary of Browning’s Approach
This is how Browning sees the process of theological reflection
unfolding.
1. When we encounter a crisis, we begin to ask questions about our
theory-laden questions.
2. We take time to describe our practices, so that we can understand
the questions raised by the crisis.
3. We take our questions to our normative Christian texts, and start
a critical conversation between our practices and our traditions.
The two re-interpret each other.
4. We develop, defend, and deploy new interpretations of our
normative texts, thus affecting our tradition and our practices.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

14. Summary of Browning’s Approach
The fundamental difference between Barth and Browning:
1. Barth’s approach studies theory (God’s revelation in
scripture and in Christ), and then applies its findings to
practice. It has a theory-to-practice movement.
2. Browning’s approach moves from practice to theory and
then back to practice. He says, “it goes from present theory-
laden practice to a retrieval of more normative theory-laden
practice to the creation of more critically held theory-laden
practices” (Browning 1991:7).
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

15. Summary of Browning’s Approach
Browning is not proposing a model of practical theology, but a
vision for doing theology as a whole. He believes all theology is
fundamentally practical, and must follow a practice-theory-
practice design. He proposes that all theology requires four sub-
specialities or sub-movements.
1. Descriptive theology
2. Historical theology
3. Systematic theology
4. Strategic practical theology
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

16. Types of Reason
Browning makes use of some Greek words that we need to know:
1. Pronēsis: Practical reason to think through real-life problems to
answer the critical questions: (a) What shall we do? (b) How shall
we live?
2. Theoria: Purely theoretical reason seeking to answer the
dispassionate questions: (a) What is the case? (b) What is the
nature of things?)
3. Technē: Purely technical reason seeking to answer the how-to
question: What are the most effective means to a given end?
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

17. Diagram of Browning’s Model
Browning holds that practical reason has an overall dynamic, an
outer envelope, and an inner core.
1. Overall dynamic: the reconstruction of experience (because
inherited interpretations are breaking down).
2. Outer envelope: the fund of inherited narratives and
traditions (practical reason is tradition-saturated).
3. Inner core: the present experience and praxis of a faith
community.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

18. Purpose: Reconstruction of Experience
Reflection Outer envelope:
inherited narratives
Inner Core: present
experience
Action
Action
Reflection
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

19. Exploring Practical Wisdom and Understanding
THE PHILOSOPHICAL FOUNDATIONS OF
FUNDAMENTAL PRACTICAL THEOLOGY
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

20. Practical Philosophy
Browning’s vision of practical theology is grounded in the rebirth
of practical philosophy (phronēsis).
1. Research universities focus on theoretical knowledge
(theoria) that is applied to solve human problems by means
of technical reason (technē).
2. Practical philosophy or reason embraces critical reflection
regarding the goals of human action, engaging with the past
(tradition) and present (practice) to answer the questions:
What shall we do? How shall we live?
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

21. Radical Implications
• Browning argues that viewing theology through the lens of
practical philosophy leads to the conclusion that all theology
is practical theology.
• “The sub-specialities of descriptive theology, historical
theology, systematic theology, and strategic practical theology
become movements within a fundamental practical theology”
(Browning 1991:36).
• All Christian leaders are constantly doing practical theology
through dialogue or conversation.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

22. Gadamer’s Thought
• Gadamer is a philosopher trying to establish a firm
philosophical foundation for the human and social sciences,
disciplines which study the meaning of human actions (e.g.
history, philosophy, psychology, sociology, and law).
• Gadamer believed that all human understanding is acquired
through dialogue or conversation. He believed that it is both
impossible and unhelpful to be neutral or objective. We
achieve understanding by entering into a dialogue in which
we both acknowledge and use our pre-understanding to
achieve understanding.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

23. Gadamer’s Thought
• Gadamer is proposing a hermeneutical approach to research.
We reach an interpretation by engaging in a critical conver-
sation. We reach an interpretation that is influenced by our
pre-understanding, and which does not claim objective or
final authority.
• In Gadamer’s approach, application is not something that
enters the conversation at the end. The entire conversation is
shaped by practical concerns that emerge from the current
situation.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

24. Browning on the Browning says that Gadamer has
hermeneutical nature
of science underscored the hermeneutical
(Browning 1991:40) and practical nature of all science.
Gadamer has “helped us
understand how all cultural
[human and social] sciences and
many if not all natural sciences
can best be understood as
dialectical movements from
traditions of theory-laden
practice to theory and back to
new theory-laden practices.”
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

25. Gadamer’s Thought
Effective History Biblical Interpretation
The events of the past shape We cannot approach the
present historical conscious- biblical texts neutrally. They
ness. The past lives in the are already part of our world-
present, which is a product of view. They influence the
the past. Our present inter- questions we bring to them,
pretations are products of our and the questions we bring
past experiences. influence the answers we see.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

26. A Critical Correlational Approach
Correlational Critical
The approach “correlates the Theology is “a mutually critical
confessional beginning point of dialogue between inter-
theology with questions pretations of the Christian
shaped both by faith and by message and interpretations of
other aspects of our cultural contemporary cultural
experience” (Browning experiences and practices”
1991:46). (Browning 1991:46).
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

27. A Critical Correlational Approach
• Paul Tillich proposed a simple correlational approach, a one-
way conversation in which experience raises questions, and
theology provides answers.
• David Tracy proposed a critical correlational approach, a two-
way conversation in which our interpretations of the Christian
message and our interpretations of the present situation
interpret each other. They influence and shape each other!
• Don Browning embraces Tracy’s critical correlational model,
which he also calls the revised correlational model.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

28. David Tracy’s Definition of
Practical Theology
“ Practical theology is the
mutually critical correlation
(Tracy 1983:76)
of the interpreted theory
and praxis of the Christian
faith with the interpreted
theory and praxis of the
contemporary situation.”
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

29. The Four Sub-Movements
THE FOUR TASKS OF FUNDAMENTAL
PRACTICAL THEOLOGY
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

30. The Four Sub-Movements
1. Descriptive Theology
2. Historical Theology
3. Systematic Theology
4. Strategic Practical Theology
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

31. 1. Descriptive Theology
• The task of descriptive theology is to describe
the theory-laden practices that give rise to the
practical questions which generate theological
reflection.
• Descriptive theology analyses the cultural and
religious meanings that surround our religious
practices.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

32. 1. Descriptive Theology
• Descriptive theology uses a hermeneutical
methodology. It is a dialogue between the
researcher and the subjects; he brings his pre-
understanding into the dialogue with their
actions, meanings, and pre-understandings.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

33. 2. Historical Theology
• “Historical theology asks, What do the normative
texts that are already part of our effective history
really imply for our praxis when they are confronted
as honestly as possible?” (Browning 1991:49)
• In other words, in this step we bring the questions
raised by our descriptive theology to the word of
God. As open-mindedly as we can, we ask what the
scriptures really teach concerning our questions.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

34. 2. Historical Theology
• For Browning, the normative texts include the
scriptures and other Christian classics. Each faith
tradition determines what it considers to be its
classical or normative texts.
• Therefore, Browning’s historical theology covers the
traditional disciplines of biblical studies, church
history, and the history of doctrine.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

35. 3. Systematic Theology
Browning’s understanding of systematic theology is different to
an evangelical view of it.
• Systematic theology is an “effort to investigate general
themes of the gospel that respond to the general questions
that characterize the situations of the present” (Browning
1991:51).
• Through a correlation of descriptive and historical theology,
systematic theology seeks a fresh interpretation of the
Christian faith relevant to the present situation.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

36. 3. Systematic Theology
Systematic theology endeavours to answer two key
questions (Browning 1991:51-52):
1. Theological: What new horizon of meaning is
fused when questions from present practices are
brought to the central Christian witness?
2. Apologetic: What reasons can be advanced to
support the validity claims of this new fusion of
meaning?
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

37. 4. Strategic Practical 1. How do we understand this
Theology concrete situation in which we
must act?
Questions direct
thinking, and they 2. What should be our praxis in
usually arise from this concrete situation?
real-life problems that
require action. 3. How do we critically defend the
Strategic practical norms of our praxis in this
theology seeks to concrete situation?
answer four questions, 4. What means, strategies, and
culminating in theory
rhetorics should we use in this
of action.
concrete situation?
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

38. 4. Strategic Practical Theology
• The fourth question deals with communicative
action in service of the gospel, the traditional
focus of the final stage of practical theology.
• The traditional operational fields of practical
theology are still present, including liturgies,
homiletics, education, care, and social action
ministries.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

39. Summary
1. Descriptive theology provides a thick description of religious
and cultural practices.
2. Historical theology directs the questions that emerge towards
the normative texts.
3. Systematic theology correlates generic features of the
Christian message with generic features of the present
situation.
4. Strategic practical theology establishes the norms and
strategies of concrete practices in light of analyses of concrete
situations.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

40. So what do we make of Browning’s vision and model?
EVALUATION AND RECOMMENDATIONS
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

41. Practice-Theory-Practice
• Browning helped to established practice-theory-
practical as the standard design for practical
theology. He made a strong case for using a
practice-theory-practice model.
• Evangelicals can certainly use the practice-theory-
practice design. Much evangelical theology uses
this approach to its advantage.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

42. Practice-Theory-Practice
• In my opinion, Browning overstates his position in insisting
that all theology must follow the practice-theory-practice
design.
• Insisting on a practice-theory-practice approach may be
compelling for liberal theology, where is there is no normative
revelation from God and empirical research is the primary
source of knowledge.
• However, for evangelicals a theory-practice approach remains
a serious option, since it is well suited to expounding the
implications of God’s self-disclosure for modern contexts.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

43. Hermeneutical Approach
• Browning advocates a hermeneutical approach to
theological reflection. This implies that we recognise
our pre-understanding and accept that all our
conclusions are tentative interpretations, and do not
represent the final word on the matter.
• I wholeheartedly concur! All theology, and to some
extent all science, is hermeneutical in this sense.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

44. Critical Correlational Approach
• Browning advocates critical correlational methodo-
logy. Our interpretation of scripture (and tradition)
guides the reformation of our practice, but similarly
our interpretation of practice guides the re-
interpretation of scripture.
• I partially concur with this, although I think it runs
the risk of giving praxis greater weight than we give
scripture. Our exegesis of scripture must be primary,
although we know our experiences influence it.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

45. Descriptive Theology
• Browning argues that theology begins with a thick
description of present theory-laden practices, which
raises questions for theological reflection. His model
allows the thick description to use empirical
methods, but does not require it.
• I like Browning’s balanced, open approach towards
the need for empirical research. A thick description
of praxis can be an excellent starting point for doing
theology, but often a ‘thin description’ is sufficient.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

46. Historical Theology
• Browning believes we must take questions raised by
our praxis and experience to our normative texts,
and that this process should include biblical exegesis,
church history, and the history of doctrine.
• Yes, I agree! All theology should include these
elements in its process. My approach to exegesis
would, of course, differ from his because of our
different theological convictions.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

47. Systematic Theology
• For Browning, systematic theology is exploring the
correlation between themes from the Christian message
and our interpretation of theory-laden practices and
experiences. Its objective is to develop and defend fresh
theological syntheses for the new context.
• As an evangelical, I find this vision of systematic theology
inadequate. Systematic theology must synthesise all that
God has revealed in the scriptures and state the
relevance and implications of his revelation for our
context.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

48. Strategic Practical Theology
• The four questions that Browning proposes
that the strategic sub-movement must answer
are excellent, and provide a good guideline for
the movement from theological formulation
to a theory of action in a concrete situation.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

49. Conclusion
Don Browning’s book remains a seminal work in the field of
practical theology, and has much to teach all theologians.
His contributions with respect to the two practical portions
of practice-theory-practice model are excellent, as well as
his case for a hermeneutical, critical, correlational, and
dialogical approach to all theology, is helpful. His
perspectives about how to do the central theory formation
portion of theology is inadequate from an evangelical
perspective, and needs to be adapted.
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology

50. Thank you for studying this presentation.
THE END
Don Browning, A Fundamental Practical Theology