In an exclusive interview for Catalyst Live in Reading, renowned theologian Walter Brueggemann spoke about greater honesty, the purpose of preaching and thesentence he wishes he’d written differently.
The Catalyst Live audience in Reading enjoyed a taste of Professor Walter Brueggemann’s theology through an interview with Rev Mark Ord, Co-Director of BMS World Mission’s International Mission Centre, filmed exclusively for Catalyst Live ticket holders.
In the interview, Professor Brueggemann explored the purpose of preaching in a world of constant demand, where everyone says they don’t have enough time. “I think what preaching wants to do is to create open spaces where those pressures are not defining,” he said.
Having that breathing space is, according to Brueggemann, “elementally important to human possibility”. He argued that failing to allocate time for this, in practices like Sabbath, leads humans towards fascism.
In response to a question on his famous belief that the only way to find God is ‘in, with or under the biblical text, and nowhere else’, Brueggemann admitted that that claim had got him into quite a lot of trouble.
“It’s probably a bit of an overstatement,” he said, “but it was my attempt to say that there is something very peculiar and very distinctive about this text. It’s so Jewish, and Jewishness, theologically, is a resistance to all of our smooth logic… This was an attempt to say that we ought not to domesticate this text to fit our ordinary reasoning, because it simply doesn’t work that way.
“I often wish I had written that sentence somewhat differently,” Brueggemann said. “It’s caused me a lot of trouble.”
Responding to an audience question on encouraging the prophetic in churches, Brueggemann called for greater honesty in the Church.
“I think that we tend to live in an illusionary world that operates by euphemisms,” he said, “so we do not call things by their right name, and we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. I think the Church ought to be the place in town where honesty is practiced.”
Catalyst Live ticket holders can see the full interview, which also explores modern-day exile, revising our notions of God and the dangers of generalisations, here.