Five Kinds of Theology

Dr. Winn Griffin

Dr. Winn Griffin, author of “God’s EPIC Adventure” and long time member of the Vineyard Movement, recently blogged about the five kinds of theology practiced in the church today. In reading over the types, I was stuck on how accurate these types were and how many folks are fall into the wrong type… =?

The Five Types:

  1. Folk Theology – “A theology void of critical reflection and embraces simplistic acceptance of beliefs that are built around clichés and legends…Folk theology can be seen in every religion, denomination, and among those who do not consider themselves a part of a denomination. Spiritual piety and intellectual reflection are seen as antithetical to one another. Folk Theology is often experiential and pragmatic; the criteria for true belief are feelings and results.”
  2. Lay Theology -“The difference between folk theology and lay theology is reflection. Lay theology begins when a person starts to question the simplistic, superstitious, and childish (which is different than child-like) beliefs of folk theology. While lay theology may lack sophisticated tools, it begins to put the mind into action and thinks about issues.”
  3. Trained Theology – “The difference between lay theology and trained theology is that trained theology is developed by the active pursuit of some training in theology. It is more reflective than lay theology.”
  4. Professional Theology – “…a vocation that uses advanced tools to think and reflect about theological issues and how they relate to the present world. Professional theologians use critical thinking as a matter of course.”
  5. Academic Theology – “…highly speculative, philosophical, and is often aimed at a dialog with other theologians. It may be disconnected from the church and often has little to do with Christian living.”

In case you are wondering, both Dr. Winn and I think that the ‘wrong’ types of theology fall at the extreme ends: folk and academic theology. While opposite in views, they both miss the point that theology is the study of God that is put into practice in our daily lives. Blindly accepting things or studying just to study both remove God from one’s personal life and are worthless.

Which bucket would you place yourself into?

For me, I would probably fall into the ‘trained theology’ bucket as I have been actively reflecting and pondering all types of stuff for the last decade or so. 🙂

2 thoughts on “Five Kinds of Theology”

  1. I would guess that I am in the bucket of trained theology but there may be areas that I am in Lay Theology because I haven’t thought about those areas or have not taken to look at those area. I know I can credit LETU for getting me to trained from lay though.

  2. “I know I can credit LETU for getting me to trained from lay though.”

    Agreed! LETU and, more specifically, Dr. Batts were the genesis of my move from simply living to thinking through my faith and life in Jesus.

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