Using the COVID-19 pandemic as fresh lenses to generate a thicker analysis of four research theories on discipleship within a Reformed congregation
Tragedies can potentially betray some of our true colours. The COVID-19 pandemic has created a unique pastoral matrix and dynamic. This has had significant implications on the expression of congregants’ identities and frames of meaning-making. The usually gathered congregation was disoriented, traum...
| Published in: | Practical theology |
|---|---|
| Main Author: | |
| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
|
| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
Routledge, Taylor and Francis Group
2021
|
| In: |
Practical theology
Year: 2021, Volume: 14, Issue: 1/2, Pages: 58-71 |
| RelBib Classification: | CB Christian life; spirituality KDD Protestant Church RB Church office; congregation TK Recent history |
| Further subjects: | B
scattered congregation and data interpretation
B Reformed discipleship B Covid-19 Pandemic |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Summary: | Tragedies can potentially betray some of our true colours. The COVID-19 pandemic has created a unique pastoral matrix and dynamic. This has had significant implications on the expression of congregants’ identities and frames of meaning-making. The usually gathered congregation was disoriented, traumatised, as well as physically ‘scattered’ and ‘disembedded’ during the lockdown season. This dynamic has enabled me to have a fresh appreciation of my research into discipleship in a Reformed congregation, where I am the ordained minister. I had carried out a congregational study on evangelistic discipleship before the pandemic. I have used the disruption caused by the COVID-19 pandemic to reread four initial research assertions about discipleship: covenantal, gathered, vicarious, and pragmatic. This re-reading is anchored on five pastoral observations, regarding isolation, fellowship, gifts/ skills, prayer, and the human–Divine relationship. This revision of data analysis has re-clothed, nuanced and expanded my initial data interpretation. The ethnographic approach acted like a pair of fresh eyes and a critical friend. It has enabled me to reread ordinary identities in extraordinary circumstances. |
|---|---|
| ISSN: | 1756-0748 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Practical theology
|
| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1080/1756073X.2021.1874647 |