Public pastoral leaders: The purpose of theological training

Abstract

This article is a follow-up of an article in which I attempted to gain insight into the corporate nature of being called to ministry. The mentioned article was also aimed at discerning the specifics of the ministry of the “public pastoral leader”. While the question is even asked whether theological training is necessary at all, I accept, as point of departure, the critical need for such training. What is of more importance is the discernment of what I call in this article the “teleological core” of theological education. I purposefully chose to explore the contributions of a number of well-known scholars who devoted much of their research to this field: Schner, Farley, Wood, Hough and Cobb, Heitink, Van der Ven and a few others. The ultimate finding is that some consensus about the telos of theological education does exist. The nature of the telos is phrased differently, but the different dimensions identified are indeed complementary. Concepts like “vision and discernment”, “critical reflection” “reflective practitioner”, “hermeneutical-communicative com- petence” and others are discussed as they relate to the core research problem. Attention is also given to the necessity of training a “basic pastor” as well as to the importance of “limited specialisation” in theological training.