My note below on U2 as public theologians was attempting to tie three pieces together in short shrift: their concert personae to public theology to their gargantuan attraction to everyday rock listeners. Now comes the news that U2 set a record for their recent performance at Giants stadium, more than 84,000 people, drawing even better than John Paul II. I can already hear all the cultural and theological critics chanting odes to the low tastes of the masses, who don’t understand U2′s early prophecy, long since abandoned, or who mistake the band for Jesus. But Holy Mother of God,

that is a ton of people. And they’re doing this after more than thirty years of making music.

Tom Beaudoin

Hastings-on-Hudson, New York

Such a combination may induce vertigo, but to be honest I’d like to see a few full songs.

Given their meteorological interests, could they do “I’m Only Happy When it Rains“?

Tom Beaudoin
New York City

During the 1980s in North America there developed a kind of theology called “public theology,” in which public concerns (as in: civil society, often through sociological or political-science type lenses) were made central foci for theological analysis. Sometimes this meant having a social “problem” or “issue” occasion a theological reflection that was to arc back toward deeper reflection or reflective action in public… and sometimes this meant seeing the theological process itself as a public process, in which whatever the terms of the theological argument (God, church, justice), those terms needed to be publicly explainable if not justifiable. There were several rationales for this approach: Christianity is a social phenomenon, its spirit lends it to public interventions, and its claims to truth are in principle public claims in the sense that they involve assertions about phenomena (God, church, justice) that are by definition not private. There was also a third way of defining public theology: that theology which was written for a general educated audience. For myself and many others, publicness in theology was quite strongly and persuasively associated with the work of the Catholic theologian David Tracy (although less so in the third “generally accessible” sense, although Tracy has effectively used the genre of the interview for these purposes, a genre oddly underused in theology as compared with contemporary philosophy).

These ideas about a public theology are still to be found with a certain influence on the contemporary theological scene, especially among those who were trained in the mid-1970s through the early 1990s. The postmodernisms that questioned the privileging of the rational dynamics of theological discourse, and the postcolonialisms that foregrounded the cultural specificity and political history of theological discourse, have hit public theology pretty hard. The term seems much less in use now than it was, say, fifteen years ago. If anything, the new political theologies have arisen to take up the spaces public theologies wanted to occupy.

But just when you wondered if public theology was running out of gas, here’s U2, who have developed perhaps the most influential, long-running, and global public theology — ever. This occurred to me when reading of an upcoming academic conference on U2, and when reading a review of U2′s recent concert at Giants Stadium in New Jersey. The conference, coming up this weekend, is called “U2: The Hype and the Feedback,” and is happening in Durham, North Carolina, at North Carolina Central University. A look through the program reveals an impressive diversity of religious engagements with the band, its music, its fans, its culture. It is impossible to find another rock band whose culture inspires such a panoply of religious interrogation. It is worth appreciating how much theological research rock culture can inspire. (And, if it needs to be said, this research does not only leave itself in the deep but narrow well of fandom, but often rises back up to carry its results into other more mainstream theological conversations.) The review, by Jon Pareles in the New York Times, should give any theologian pause. In just a few hundred words, with no jargon, and with reference to a public event in public terms, Pareles well describes how this concert held together rollicking festivity and spiritual seriousness in a way not only unsurpassed but almost eerily, even liturgically, consistent for this band.

I write this knowing that U2 has become an almost too-convenient reference for those who want to show their worldly spirituality, and that many of the early fans are no longer on board with the new directions, and that some theologians cannot stomach what they learn of the band’s lyrics, politics, or concerts. Still, I find U2′s power as public theologians to be utterly undeniable, and lately sense the real privilege of having been able to have their music as a traveling companion for the last quarter century. Public theology in the academy may be on the wane, but in concert, it is stronger than ever.

Tom Beaudoin

Hastings-on-Hudson, New York