Friends:

I was happy to attend the Inaugural Lecture of the Rev. Dr. Joyce Mercer at VTS this past Monday. Her title was intriguing--Contentiously Faithful: Practical Theological Reflections on the Tenacity of Belief"

I find such interdisciplinary work fascinating.
She holds that theory and practice are not to be divided.

She focused on practices--and after explaining what she means by practices, she pushed the envelope a bit to see if we could consider 'conflict' or at least some types of conflict in the Christian community to be practices.

She really wants to get at conflict transformation.

One of the strengths of the presentation is that, after reviewing some of the literature, she delves into some social practices to see what they teach us--in this case conflict as it involves adolescent girls, as presented by the media. This adds some 'texture' to the theory.

Much more could be said--but I hope you get a little insight into the presentation.
Dr. Mercer is currently investigating conflict--so this presentation was a beginning and not an end.

Peace,
John