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Bringing methodology and theory closer: Development and challenges in South African homiletics. The homiletic landscape in South Africa is rich and varied. In this contribution, we attempt to paint with broad brushstrokes this landscape. We write as practical theologians with a shared love for homiletics, but also with an interest in doing what we preach in terms of research and teaching. Put differently, we argue in the light of existing literature that there should be congruence between theories we advance, and methodologies we employ. We dwell on themes such as decolonisation, justice and reconciliation, poverty and inequality that are characteristic of our homiletical landscape. We conclude with the thought that as Christianity in South Africa grows and preachers increase in number, so do the opportunities for empirical academic involvement in preaching. However, the occasion also poses a challenge for academics engaged in homiletics, namely, to practise what they preach by bringing theory and method in a closer relationship. Contribution: The article engages current homiletical research in South Africa by means of a literature study, specifically highlighting the challenges and opportunities posed to the discipline of Homiletics within a postcolonial South African context, and at ecumenical faculties of Theology. These challenges and opportunities are especially important for a discipline such as Homiletics in South Africa with its strong Protestant and Reformed roots, to reflect on future methodologies pertaining to research and teaching.

Congregational studies: A rapidly developing field of study. Congregational studies are not so simple to define. This may be related to the relative novelty of the discipline, but also to the variety of people who practise it and the equally wide range of angles to the field. The purpose of this article is to look at various stages in the development of the field of congregational studies in the South African context, and more specifically within the Dutch Reformed Church over the past 50 years. The phases can be described as follows: the initial church-building phase, followed by the phase where the dynamics and identity of faith communities came into focus, and then by a phase in which the focus shifted to congregational studies specifically within the African context and greater focus on the empirical investigation of congregations in the form of various modes of congregational analysis, as well as the advent of a missional approach to congregations. A further and ever-evolving phase is the move towards a more aesthetic perspective of the field, known as a theo-dramatic approach. Together with the last phase, we just entered what I would call the post- COVID-19 phase. One can see massive changes in congregational ministry since the COVID-19 virus started to spread in South Africa. Overnight, ministers and church boards had to adapt to online modes of being and doing church and I am very sure this will be an enormous shift. In future we will certainly speak about church before and after COVID-19. Intradisciplinary and/or interdisciplinary implications: This article looks at congregational studies from a historical perspective and reaches the conclusion that it is still a relatively young and developing discipline that can benefit from an aesthetical approach to the field. This challenges the traditional perspective that congregational studies are only interested in the analysis of congregations. This scientific approach strengthens newer hermeneutical interpretations of congregations. The fields involved are congregational studies, sociology and ethnography through the lens of critical qualitative research.

We are busy celebrating 500 years of reformation and one of the basic convictions of the reformers was that we know to (W)whom we belong. During the student uprisings that we experienced in 2015 and 2016, it became clear that the notion of ‘belonging’ was deeply contested. Students still experience that black people are socially, economically and psychologically abused by the white systems, including university campuses. In empirical research conducted in 2016 with colleagues from five other faculties, these feelings and experiences of exclusion, of not belonging and of injustice among theology students and even some lecturers, were confirmed. This led to the basic research question focused on the subject field for which I am responsible at the Faculty of Theology: how do we work together as lecturers and students to help create such spaces of human dignity in the training of students who are busy preparing for ministry practice in a postcolonial African context in which they experience belonging? This article endeavours to provide an answer to this question. Intradisciplinary and/or interdisciplinary implications: The empirical part of the research was conducted by colleagues from five different faculties including Arts and Science, Engineering, Law, Education and Theology. In that sense, the research was not only intradisciplinary but also interdisciplinary.

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Calvin as “practical theologian”: the contribution of a theodramatic paradigm In order to ask the question about the role and place of a specific discipline (in this case Practical Theology), one must realise where one comes from. This article seeks to answer the question about the role of Practical Theology within the field of theology in conversation with some perspectives offered by the sixteenth-century reformer, John Calvin. It is argued that Calvin lived in a century that scholars regard as one of the golden periods in which the world of the arts and theatre flourished. Hence Calvin’s age was characterised by a dramatic vision of human existence and such a vision also had an impact on his own theological thinking. Against this backdrop, the article engages the question of the role and place of practical theology by proposing a theodramatic approach in which the possibilities that the notion of “re-dramatisation” holds, come to the fore.

The images of the mirror and the window offer useful per- spectives when we consider renewal in public worship and preaching. This article focuses specifically on renewal in preaching. Are our sermons often simply a mirror reflecting what is happening in society? Shouldn’t our sermons rather be a window offering new views, new perspectives on God and the world, that is views that can help us to live creatively and imaginatively in a time of tremendous challenges for the church and believers. This article investigates the metaphor of hos- pitality as a possible mechanism for renewal in preaching and helping us to see through the window.

In June 2007, I had the privilege of attending a Healing of Memories workshop lead by Father Michael Lapsley, one of the founder members of the Institute for Healing of Memories. The purpose of the workshop was to help the predominantly white members of a middle class Dutch Reformed congregation in the Northern Suburbs of Cape Town and the predominantly coloured members of a congregation of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Elsies River on the Cape Flats, to share their stories of the past with regard to apartheid with each other. Apart from the stories that were told and the sharing of experiences about the apartheid history that took place, I was struck by the way in which Father Lapsley conducted the workshop. There was a deep compassion for all the participants as was embodied through the way in which he treated each of us with respect. But apart from his cordiality in leading the workshop, one could sense a deeper source of compassion, a source revealing a compassionate understanding of God�s presence amidst the violence and turmoil in our broken world. The aim of this article is to reflect on whether one could speak of something like �compassionate leadership�, and to take a closer look at the relationship between compassion and God images in the life and work of Michael Lapsley. Special attention will be given to the way in which he exercises leadership through his many involvements related to his own personal story of trauma.Intradisciplinary and/or interdisciplinary implications: This article presents literary research on the notion of compassionate leadership as a specific kind of leadership. The results indicate that the leadership of Father Michael Lapsley does indeed portray features of this kind of leadership. The research can become the source for finding new strategies for religious leadership.

When explaining vulnerability as a theme for the conference of the Societas Homiletica, the organisers referred to two ways in which the concept can be interpreted. On the one hand, it can refer to preachers themselves as vulnerable people, subjected and accountable to other people. On the other hand, it can refer to the fact that preachers are often called to preach about difficult and challenging aspects of life and faith. In this sense, preachers speak on behalf of those who are vulnerable and in need of attention. In this contribution, both understandings are at play when the researcher takes a closer look at the sermons that were preached as part of a project known as the �The sermon of the layperson� in Stellenbosch, South Africa, during September and October 2013. An analysis of the contents of these sermons, as an exercise in �preaching from the pews�, shows that they were preached on behalf of vulnerable people. In the process of analysis, it also became apparent that the preachers were themselves examples of vulnerable theological leadership in the sense that they were �lay people� and therefore not in positions of official authority within faith communities. All of the preachers were however quite influential in their own areas of specialisation and professional life, and therefore, their sermons also communicated hope amidst situations of vulnerability.

A Postliberal view on the sermon Over the same period that homiletics has enjoyed a resurgence, mainline Protestant churches have been in decline. The multiplication of preaching theories and resources has taken place alongside a growing concern about the life and future of the church. Despite all the theories and resources many local pastors know something is lacking in their preaching. They've tried inductive preaching, story preaching, dialogue sermons, and homiletical plots. While these new methods have been exciting for the moment, many preachers sense something is still missing. It will be argued that it is partly due to the absence of thorough theological reflection.

When the front of the church begins to resemble a stage and the preacher, musicians and other leaders act like performers whilst the congregation takes on the role of an audience, then something is wrong with worship. But not only with worship: something is wrong with the church. A church longing to be missional � that is, a church in which all Christians are participants in the mission of God � needs to express that participation in its worship. Theological dramatic theory shows us how the Trinity acts out a grand narrative in creation, redemption and glorification, and invites us to participate in the Story being performed. This same narrative can be present in worship and can invite our immediate participation. But this cannot happen if either God or the congregation is relegated to the role of mere audience. However, when the Story is told and performed in worship and when the worshipping community is able to participate alongside the Trinity in the Theo-drama of worship, then worship takes on the ability to form that community missionally. Worship is a habit repeated week after week; therefore, its power to transform a community into a missonal congregation is immense.

The paper investigated religious and social transformations within a specific religious tradition in South Africa. After clarifying the charged concept of �transformation�, the authors showed that transformation is about more than changed systems and structures, for, on a deeper level, it is also about the change in relationships and attitudes between the different cultural groups in South Africa. The argument was supported by making use of data from the SA reconciliation barometer 2010 and the 2009 Transformation audit. In the next part of the paper, the authors took a closer look at the Dutch Reformed Church (DRC) as a case in point. The basic question they asked was how do these social transformations affect the religious transformations within the DRC and vice versa? By making use of Mary Douglas�s concept of �the enclave� it was proposed that a new enclave developed in the DRC after 1994, the characteristics of which were investigated in the remainder of the paper.

Social capital can be defined in various ways. In most of these definitions at least three dimensions can be distinguished. First there is �bonding� (the horizontal relationships between people operating within different social networks and with specific norms and values). The second dimension is �bridging� (bonds that transcend differences in religion, ethnicity, culture and socio-economic status). This dimension prevents horizontal ties from becoming the basis for narrow and even sectarian interests. Normally, a third dimension called �linking� also forms part of social capital, and ideological aspects come into focus here. This dimension includes aspects such as justice, political power and the equitable distribution of income and property. When leadership in Acts is analysed through the lenses of these multi-focal spectacles, interesting perspectives are discovered that can enrich theories on leadership. These discoveries can also open up new perspectives on aspects of being a missional church in our South African context from within the context of Acts.�