Structures of Sin, Cultures of Meaning
Social Science and Theology
by
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The intersection between theology and the social sciences, specifically sociology, has been characterized on the one hand, as one of alliance, and on the other, as one of conflict.1 Some theologians have invited the social sciences as servants, if not partners, inside the tent, while others would exclude them as goats in the yard.2
It has to be pointed out at the outset that the engagement between theology and the social sciences has primarily been on the part of theology. Theology and ethics insofar as they also deal with the human and the social need empirical insights from the social sciences. The sociological imagination, a child of the Enlightenment, has traditionally been deployed to critique religious and theological explanations. Moreover, the social sciences valorize empirical research and critical skills, and abjure competence on ultimate or transcendental questions. Recently, however, “the age of extremes” that is the twentieth century3 has provoked some sociologists into normative and ethical reflection.4 Moreover, the postmodern revivals of religiosities and ethnicities go beyond the traditional limits of the sociology of religion and have considerable import for the construal of the relation between theology and ethics, on the one hand, and the social sciences, on the other. The doctrinaire oppositional stances, especially on the part of the social sciences, may no longer be appropriate, but the terrain remains contested.5
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About the Book
With the inductive and historicist turn in theological method, the social sciences have become an important handmaid of theology. The intersection between theology and the social sciences, however, has been characterized, on the one hand, as one of alliance, and, on the other, as one of conflict. Structures of Sin, Cultures of Meaning seeks to advance the dialogue and the collaboration between them.
Social science considers religion primarily as a social institution and as a cultural system. The first part of the book explains what a social institution is, why religion is a social institution, and elaborates on its implications for theology in such areas as the bureaucratization of religion, the formation of structures of injustice, the preferential option for the poor. The second part elucidates on what a cultural system is, why religion is a cultural system, and its consequences for theology in such areas as religious identity and community, Christian ethics and formation, evangelization and inculturation.
The social structures and cultures of the past impinge on those of the present to create the challenges of today and the possibilities for tomorrow. People make history and do theology in the circumstances created by social structures and cultures of meaning.
About the Author
M. D. Litonjua is professor of sociology at the College of
Mount St. Joseph, Cincinnati, Ohio. Originally from the Philippines, he taught
theology at the Ateneo de Manila University. He has Licentiates in Philosophy
and Theology from the University of Santo Tomas (Manila), a Ph. D. in Sociology
from Brown University, and an M.B.A. from the University of Missouri at St.
Louis. He is the author of Liberation Theology: The Paradigm Shift. He
has also published in Theology Today, the Journal of Hispanic/Latino Theology,
Studies in Comparative International Development, Chicago Studies, and
Philippine Studies.