Should 
be brought back to life?
This question first arose in me four years ago at a conference, when it became clear to me that educated Protestant intellectuals who take their faith seriously — and who often do outstanding work in their own fields — speak about theological questions less and less often. Do they not feel authorized to speak? Do they lack the language? Or do they simply no longer see a space where it would be worth speaking?
While Protestant churches, which affirm the priesthood of all believers, continue to emphasize lay responsibility in their theological self-understanding, the intelligentsia play an ever smaller role in shaping ecclesial thought. This, too, contributes to the church’s gradual loss of a readiness for dialogue; in its incapacity, it often attempts to redefine itself in the role of a kind of moral constabulary.
Meanwhile, in recent years the debate over the relationship between church and state has flared up again and again. Yet there is an even more fundamental question: how can the church be present in society in such a way that its presence is genuinely relevant, creative, and constructive?
Today, two main tendencies can be observed. On the one hand, many of those who do serious theological work — perhaps because of their temperament, or because of an ecclesial structure in which the relationship between church and theology is marked by hierarchy and subordination — retreat into their own discipline, so that theology often becomes self-referential muttering. On the other hand, having found suitable media platforms, voices have grown louder which, from a one-sided theological perspective, call the church to defend itself. They manifest fear, anxiety, and construct a kind of bunker theology. It seems that, without a social base, moral vigilance can easily turn into a martyr role tinged with self-pity. All of this is not only increasingly weightless and without resonance, but downright suicidal: a church that closes in on itself sooner or later loses its capacity for renewal and eventually becomes captive to its own sectarian logic.
The noted American theologian William Dyrness writes that one of the paradigm-shifting moments of Calvinist liturgy was precisely this: while the drama of the medieval Mass drew attention and emotion inward with centripetal force, Reformation worship generated a centrifugal movement — spinning believers out into the world, so that there they might live out and “perform” their own vocation.
In light of all this, Protestant intellectuals, as throughout history, continue to have an outstanding role in ongoing renewal. By virtue of their vocation, they are the ones who remind us again and again that dichotomous thinking is misleading: we do not conduct dialogue with the world; we live in it.
This is why the legacy of Théma matters to us: it was a place where distinguished Protestant theologians and Protestant intellectuals who loved their church conferred and exchanged ideas. The progressive spirit of Théma’s founding editors and authors was not provocation for its own sake, but an uncompromising love for the church. Their engagement with confrontational topics was guided not by a desire to demolish, but by a sense of responsibility. This is the spirit we are carrying on, as our new editorial team also shows. So let this be an invitation to Protestant intellectuals: to come up with suggestions, to write, and to approach the editorial team boldly with ideas, questions, and generative thoughts.
In the spirit of openness, we consider it important that theology from Hungary should also be read abroad; therefore, we publish every essay in both English and Hungarian, trusting that reflection and shared thinking will soon begin to take place.
Above all, however, théma21.hu does not merely wish to publish texts that are well thought out, relevant, and free from self-serving theologizing. It seeks to build community: one capable of koinonia, and one that — when spun back into the world — is able both to shape and to be shaped.