Practical Theology

Practical Theology is the theory of Christian religious practice. Practical Theology explores Christian religion at the point where it becomes visible: In situ, in concrete practice within private and public life, in practical forms in the church as an institution as well as in those forms beyond church boundaries, in the types of activities of committed churchgoers and in the behaviour of non-churchgoing yet religious-minded people. To reconstruct and interpret such day-to-day phenomena, Practical Theology makes use of very different theological and non-theological theoretical approaches, whereby findings from psychology and sociology are equally as informative as insights from linguistics, ritual theory, ethnography, theatre theory, and other areas of cultural studies.

Our Practical Theology courses are devoted on the one hand to typical subtopics based on everyday pastoral work in practice, on the one hand. They and cover the theory of preaching, of liturgy, christening, confirmation, marriage, funeral, pastoral care, welfare, and church theory. On the other hand, the courses approach religious practice from a cross-disciplinary perspective: “Religion and Space”, “Aesthetics and Art”, “Happiness, self fulfilment and the Art of Living”, “The Art of Film in its Religious Facets”, “Semiotics as a Key to Understanding Religious Practice”, amongst others.