Training Students to Improvise Responsibly with Biblical Text: a Pragmatist, Spirit-Led Model
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Creative, Critical, and True: Training Students to Improvise Responsibly with Biblical Text: A Pragmatist, Spirit-led Model Author: John Paul Falcone Persistent link: http://hdl.handle.net/2345/bc-ir:104536 This work is posted on eScholarship@BC, Boston College University Libraries. Boston College Electronic Thesis or Dissertation, 2015 Copyright is held by the author. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (http:// creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0). Boston College The Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Department of Religious Education and Pastoral Ministry CREATIVE, CRITICAL, AND TRUE: TRAINING STUDENTS TO IMPROVISE RESPONSIBLY WITH BIBLICAL TEXT: A PRAGMATIST, SPIRIT-LED MODEL A dissertation By JOHN P. FALCONE submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy May, 2015 © copyright by JOHN PAUL FALCONE 2015 ABSTRACT CREATIVE, CRITICAL, AND TRUE: TRAINING STUDENTS TO IMPROVISE RESPONSIBLY WITH BIBLICAL TEXT: A PRAGMATIST, SPIRIT-LED MODEL JOHN P. FALCONE ADVISOR: THERESA O’KEEFE In this dissertation, I argue that Bible education is best understood as training students to improvise responsibly with Scripture. I explore this pedagogical model by reflecting on my experience as a Bible instructor at Cristo Rey New York High School, an inner city Catholic school. The goal of a Cristo Rey education is the integral liberation of students. In the language of liberation theology, to be “integrally liberated” is to survive and to thrive on all levels – material, cultural, psychosocial, and spiritual. Learning to improvise responsibly with Scripture helps students to grow in integral liberation. It helps them develop the capacity to perceive and to act with greater freedom, discernment, and commitment. It helps them to handle and interpret the Bible in ways that are creative, critical, and true. Here being true means more than being factually accurate; it means being true to the text, being true to the needs of one’s interpreting community, and being true to the inner promptings of God’s Holy Spirit. Responsible improvisation connects Biblical interpretation with artistry, with problem-solving, and with the construction of counter-cultural spaces. This dissertation supports a pedagogy for improvising responsibly with Scripture in four different ways: • It uses the theory of Situated Learning to understand teaching as a form of training for practice. • It uses Augusto Boal’s critical pedagogy, known as “Theatre of the Oppressed,” to help teachers imagine what training for responsible improvisation might look like. • It uses the Pragmatist theology of Donald Gelpi, SJ as an overarching philosophical framework which links norms, inquiry, and semiotics with a theory of Spirit-led interpretation. • It outlines and evaluates a teaching unit on the Gospel of Matthew, to construct a warrant for this pedagogical model. I conclude by discussing the implications of this pedagogy for Catholic educational ministry and ministerial training. i TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS .................................................................................................... iv CHAPTER I. IMPROVISING RESPONSIBLY WITH SCRIPTURE: INTEGRAL LIBERATION IN THE INNER CITY CATHOLIC HIGH SCHOOL .................................................................... 1 I. Introduction: A Little Biblical Magic ........................................................................ 1 II. Cristo Rey: A Window into North American High School Education ................... 9 A Sketch of the Cristo Rey Setting .............................................................................. 9 Safety, Culture, and Human Development: Student Needs from an Inner-City Perspective ................................................................................................................ 12 Creating An Alternative Community: An Educational Challenge for Cristo Rey Teachers .................................................................................................................... 18 III. Educating for Integral Liberation ........................................................................ 22 IV. Improvising Responsibly with Scripture .............................................................. 24 V. Method, Disciplines, and Definitions ..................................................................... 31 Creativity and Improvisation (and Interpretation) ...................................................... 33 Critical Thinking and Responsibility.......................................................................... 39 Scripture .................................................................................................................... 41 Truth ......................................................................................................................... 43 CHAPTER II. SITUATING MYSELF AND MY STUDENTS: THE RELIGION CLASSROOM AS A TRAINING GROUND FOR RESPONSIBLE INTERPRETIVE PRACTICE ............................... 49 I. Introduction ............................................................................................................. 49 II. The Theory of Situated Learning........................................................................... 49 Defining Practice, Community, and Culture............................................................... 52 My High School Classroom Community of Practice .................................................. 55 III. Teaching as Training from an SL Perspective ..................................................... 57 Training: Developing Native Capacities .................................................................... 59 Training: Achieving Mastery ..................................................................................... 60 Training: Words in Application ................................................................................. 61 Good Training: “Transparent” Activities ................................................................... 64 Good Training: Negotiating Old and New ................................................................. 66 Good Training: Coping with Changing Norms ........................................................... 68 IV. Conclusion: Rescuing “Training” from Its Cultured Detractors ........................ 72 ii CHAPTER III. HOW TO TRAIN A RESPONSIBLE IMPROVISER: TEACHING AS “JOKERING” ................................................................................................................. 75 I. Introduction ............................................................................................................. 75 II. Teaching, Religion, Art, and Performance ............................................................ 77 III. TO: Roots, Approaches, Techniques .................................................................... 81 Sources and Basic Approaches .................................................................................. 84 Exercises ................................................................................................................... 86 Games ....................................................................................................................... 88 Performances ............................................................................................................. 90 IV. TO and Training for Responsible Improvisation................................................. 93 (1) Making Material Available................................................................................... 95 (2) Honing Perception ............................................................................................... 97 (3) Generating Options ............................................................................................ 100 (4) Remaining True to One’s “Points of Departure” ................................................. 101 (5) Occupying Space ............................................................................................... 105 (6) Reflecting in Action ........................................................................................... 106 V. The Role of the Teacher as Joker ......................................................................... 108 VI. Conclusion ........................................................................................................... 110 CHAPTER IV. CHRISTIAN SEMIOTIC REALISM: A PRAGMATISTIC THEOLOGICAL FRAMEWORK .............................................................................................................. 115 I. Introduction ........................................................................................................... 115 Donald Gelpi and His Theological Project ............................................................... 116 II. Four Key Elements of Gelpi’s Christian Semiotic Approach ............................. 119 The Holism of Experience ....................................................................................... 120 The Process of Interpretation ................................................................................... 124 Norms, Conversion, and Truth ................................................................................. 130 A Triadic Metaphysic .............................................................................................. 135 III. Gelpi’s Trinitarian Model..................................................................................