Explorations in Ecclesiology and Ethnography (Studies in Ecclesiology and Ethnography)

by Christian B. Scharen

The understanding of the real church as an empirical reality means that the church should be investigated with all available methods and perspectives, especially those offered by the social sciences (because the church is a social phenomenon!). Such research should be undertaken by the social sciences themselves (results from such research should be critically evaluated by theology), and by theology itself. Without the use of social-scientific methods and perspectives, theology tends to make use of ideologically formed stereotypes when describing the church, based on limited personal experience. Implicit and explicit pictures of the church used by theology should be based on unbiased descriptions based on all the available data.