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The question under investigation relates to the agency of the marginalised as a model for taking responsibility for care and progress. This complex phenomenon of existence outside of the centre will be critically evaluated. Two notions of imago Dei—Wentzel's image of God and Kelsey's images of Christ—indicate the debates around the positioning of the marginalised. These debates are becoming an emerging field of interest within the development and diaconia fields of research. A growing interest is in the escalation and unprecedented poverty that some parts of the world are experiencing. The division amongst and between nations is growing rapidly, never seen in modern history. The interest of this contribution lies specifically within the intersections of identity and agency. I seek to explore Christian anthropology within and concerning the rest of God's creation. Questions such as the absolute doctrinal formulation of what it means to be created in the image and likeness of God, how the doctrine relates to contemporary challenges such as the destructiveness of the created order by human beings, the oppressive and exploitative political and economic systems; and the continuation of the doctrine with situations of poverty will be considered. Using a post-colonial approach to Christian anthropology, I will argue that the marginalised as part of the creation of God has the call and gifts to take responsibility, the right and the dignity for care and development. Such an approach redefines marginalisation as a space of liberation. The positioning of the marginalised in relation to the centre and the agency of the poor will be correlated with Radford Ruether's dialectical approach to what it means to be the church. Radford Ruether's approach forms the basis for Dietrich's view of the positioning of the marginalized within the diaconal perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Higher education institutions in South Africa are still dominated by colonial traditions, course content, staff with colonial privileges and attachments, and discriminatory structures and systems. Practical theology and theologians are no exception. This article seeks to investigate the correlations between social just pedagogies and social justice. Social just pedagogies consider the role of the students, lecturers, and non-human phenomena as contributing to epistemology and agency formation. Normative pedagogies remain important criteria for knowledge production and graduate attributes within the South African higher education landscape. Within practical theology, the pedagogies that are used to form students and impart knowledge are still dominated by classical teaching methods that are power-centred and biased towards the privileged. The aim of this article is thus not to replace the normative pedagogies but to challenge the normativity and essentialism that has characterised colonial, race-related, and top-down knowledge production. I will introduce a social just pedagogy of teaching practical theology that critically engages and challenges the privileged normative position of classical practical theology. A social just pedagogy will bring the centre of learning and teaching into the structure of the lecture room, a participatory method of knowledge production, students, and the lecturers. The hierarchical structure of the South African university system will be engaged with as an instrument of traditional classical knowledge production systems. Teaching practical theology through social just pedagogies will also contribute to social justice within democratic South Africa. The question that I will address is how teaching practical theology at higher education institutions can contribute to the agency of social justice in South Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]