Welcome to Theological Studies
Founded and sponsored by the Society of Jesus, Theological Studies is a Catholic scholarly journal that serves the Church and its mission by promoting a deeper understanding of the Christian faith through the publication of research in the theological disciplines and through reviews of noteworthy books. The journal has been in continuous publication since 1940.
About This Website
In keeping with the Society of Jesus’s commitments to serve the global Church, the journal is pleased to provide this site as a resource for scholars who do not have ready access to our journal. It contains articles and book reviews from 1940 up to the last five years, which can be accessed here free of charge. Articles or reviews published in the last five years are available by subscription, or a per article charge, at SAGE Journals. Article submissions by authors must be made via SAGE, where you will also find the latest formatting and style guides. For your convenience, they are also available on this website.
In the Current Issue
From the Editor’s Desk
Occasionally, I’ll find #PopeFrancis trending on “X” (formerly Twitter). On one such occasion, the cause of the media spike was Francis’s statement that “those who work systematically and with every means possible to repel migrants” are guilty of “grave sin.”1 To no one’s surprise, given our current political climate, the statement generated angry soundbite commentary. One tweet claimed that other countries had “emptied their jails and mental institutions and sent them on the way to [American flag emoji].” “Illegal immigrants,” complained another user, “did not knock on the door[;] they broke the window and snuck through the backdoor.” Two weeks later, another migrant story spewed out of the ugly underbelly of social media: Haitian immigrants, it was claimed, were eating cats, dogs, and geese in Ohio.
Ecclesiology via Ethnography: Studying the Church through a Discernment of Concrete Ecclesial Life
Pope Francis’s 2023 motu proprio, entitled Ad Theologiam Promovendam (“To Promote Theology”), calls for theology to be rethought methodologically and epistemologically in light of existential wounds. In response, I argue that the developing field of ethnographic ecclesiology presents one important theological method for studying the synodal church in a more synodal manner. By reorienting the ethnographic habits of participation, reflexivity, and listening to the synodal vision of communal discernment, the theologian is better able to perceive the trinitarian imprint that shapes the witness and discipleship of distinct ecclesial contexts that constitute the global church in via.