Panel: SCRIPTURE & THEOLOGY 2025: EXPLORING METHODOLOGICAL INTERACTIONS BETWEEN BIBLICAL STUDIES AND SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY



35.11 - REDEMPTION AS TRANSFORMATION - RESOURCE FOR SOCIETAL TRANSFORMATIONS. A DRAMATIC-KAIROLOGICAL OUTLINE

AUTHORS:
Sandler W. (Department for Systematic Theology, University of Innsbruck ~ Innsbruck ~ Austria)
Text:
In the context of Jesus' drama of salvation (R. Schwager) , which, through the resurrection and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, has gained ecclesial and social relevance to the present day, Jesus' proclamation of the kingdom of God opens up approaches to making the ‚great Christian narrative of creation, fall and redemption' a contemporary reality in terms of a theology of events. Small and smallest ‚seed events of salvation' bring the presence of the Kingdom of God to life in an exemplary way and give the people an increased freedom for good in a kairos. This can be used in active faith for sustainable transformation or also be missed. In the wake of a special divine action that can be understood in a non-interventionist way, human beings can make a new beginning in all their fundamental relationships with God, fellow human beings, the world and themselves. Hanna Arendt's concept of natality can be taken up and sharpened in terms of event theology. Where such kairoi are used consistently, they can contribute to sustainable transformations in globally threatening social constellations, for example, via „social tipping points". The kairoi of grace needed for such sustainable innovative political action are, according to Jesus' parables of growth, countless tiny and vulnerable, but at the same time ineradicably powerful seed events, sown over religious and secular, „bad and good" (Matt. 5:45). It is a powerful resource that is underutilized even within the religions. Regarding the demands of sustainable transformation in the face of overwhelming global challenges, a specifically kairological approach emerges here: Instead of desperately trying to move people out of inactivity and thus failing, for example, at the „knowledge-action gap", it is recommended to use unavailable emerging inchoative movements in individual, communal and social life and to work on overcoming widespread „uncultures" (not least in the churches) of their almost reflexive rejection.