How Theologians Achieve Greatness

The Woody Allen movie, "Manhattan," includes a scene where two couples are walking and the one played by Michael Murphy and Diane Keaton unveil their Academy of Overrated.  To this body they assign Gustav Mahler, Isak Dinesen, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Lenny Bruce, Norman Mailer, Mozart, , Vincent Van Gogh, and Ingmar Bergman.  The co-hosts on this recording, Korey Maas (Lutheran), Miles Smith (Anglican), and D. G. Hart (Presbyterian), consider their own list of overrated theologians.  The ones discussed are Karl Barth, the recently deceased Juergen Moltmann, and C. S. Lewis.   The reason behind raising the question is not to belittle any of these theologians' achievements but to consider how it is that a theologian -- when there are so many -- emerges as the "go to" authority for ending a doctrinal debate.  It also relates to confessional Protestant theological traditions in which those students training for a specific communion are going to be much more likely to read theologians in the Lutheran, Reformed, or Anglican traditions -- instead of reading broadly in the theologians who transcend specific Protestant communions.  A final thread of conversation was whether the "big names" of Protestant theology can survive in an age of megachurches and church planting networks.   The sponsor this time is Ethan's Donut Factory in downtown Hillsdale, Michigan.