I’m currently working on an article for the Journal of Christian Studies about the nature of catechesis—that is, how Christian children and converts are educated regarding the faith they are committing to (historically, in preparation for baptism). I’m including here some thoughts I’m developing for that article, specifically three theories for what catechesis is or how it ought to be done. These are not exhaustive of church practice and probably not even the majority, yet they represent powerful trends in evangelicalism today. They are each attempts to shape the Christian in some way. The first of these reflects common practice among congregations whereas the subsequent two, as I will define them, are preferred more by theologians and educated types.
The first of the popular approaches to catechesis is affective. This approach emphasizes spiritual experiences and a feeling of connection with God or the community. While far from catechesis in the traditional sense (that is, it does not involve explicit teaching), it serves the same function as typical catechesis of cultivating Christians by emotionally committing them to the Body. It opens them up to the divine and makes easier the statement, I want to dedicate my life to this. Congregations who adopt this approach might be identified by their focus on aesthetics—on lovely music and closed eyes. But less superficially, they might also be identified by their commitment to concepts like discipleship and intentionality or practices like quietness and meditative prayer, for it is in these things that the Spirit is given the proper room to work.
The second approach is doctrinal, and the idea is that we must hone the content of what is being taught. To some extent this has always been the primary approach to catechesis: you put young Christians in classes and you teach them what they need to know. However, some theologians have increasingly been convinced that indoctrination ought take its cue from high-church traditions, centering on Nicene and Chalcedonian orthodoxy or establishing doctrinal boundaries by an historical rule of faith. That is, rather than stick to how your tradition has always told the story or to its distinctive doctrines (for the Churches of Christ, that might be something like the five-finger exercise, reading the Book of Acts, and maybe talking about autonomous polities and a cappella singing), churches might teach the story of Scripture by starting with the Apostles’ Creed and emphasize the importance of the Rule of Faith for reading the Bible. Where this trend emerged from in the Churches of Christ is difficult to say—it surely has something to do with the historical primitivism in our roots, the impressive work of Everett Fergusson, and the wave of Ivy League-trained scholars in the midcentury—but what emerged is a growing interest in calling Bible things by—in addition to Bible names—orthodox, historical, and ecclesial names.
Deeply related to the doctrinal, and in some ways a synthesis with the affective, is the liturgical approach. Again popular among those in the academy, this model suggests that we should retrieve the sacred significance of the central rituals of our Christian worship. Such an approach involves both a shift toward a more sacramental understanding of the ordinances of baptism and the Lord’s Supper as well as an adoption of formal practices in a clear shift toward a high-church model. Therefore, most of the markers of this model are found within the service itself, relying more on read or recited language rather than extemporaneously delivered words, deliberately structuring rituals and worship to resemble mainstream Christian and historical practice, and specifically trying to evoke a sense of mystery and communal identity. Telltale signs of this model are the call and response after Scripture reading “The word of the Lord”/“Thanks be to God,” the recitation of a creed, and really just an overuse of the word “ancient.” The hope is that such activities will both bodily or experientially shape the Christian even as it implicitly indoctrinates them with orthodox Christian teaching.
A particular aim of the doctrinal and liturgical approaches is the training of ministers. The hope is that these liturgical practices and doctrinal foundations will provide the necessary groundwork for continued service and a faith sturdy enough to provide scaffolding for congregants. More cynically, I suspect that affective experiences are too fleeting to provide that groundwork, and so something stronger and more sophisticated—to which, the ancients seem up to the task—is needed. In any case, it should strike us as immediately odd that the teaching directed at ministers, for whom the ideal is an ongoing commitment to their tradition, is a way of doing things that—while in theory might be from the same vein, but in a very obvious sense—is foreign to them. Moreover, I am skeptical that these approaches, as valuable as they are (and I hope they’re valuable because I teach them to my students), accurately reflect how people learn about a community and are brought into a community.
There’s much more to be said here—and really I haven’t said much of anything—but consider this a teaser for the full article, in which I attempt to wrestle with the meaning of catechesis and how churches should approach it in light of these various trends. Expect to see something here.