Celebrating the life of Practical Theology pioneer Allen Joe Moore (Sept. 7, 1927-Sept. 18, 2016)
On October 4, 2016 many gathered at Marsh Chapel at Boston University School of Theology to celebrate the life and memory of Dr. Allen Joe Moore (BUSTH ’63). Allen was a pioneer in the field of practical theology, publishing prolifically and mentoring generations of students on the relationship between practical theology and religious education; Christianity and culture; family life and sexuality; and liberation approaches to education. Allen’s book Religious Education as Social Transformation was a seminal text within the field, dedicated “to call the church back to faithfulness in engaging justice issues in society and to the work of education in this engagement.” His work demonstrates how “cultural, religious, and educational categories not only help clarify social issues,” but also “how educators facilitate the construction of meaning and alternative, faithful ways of living in individuals and communities of faith.” Allen was also a leader in professional guilds. He co-founded the Association of Seminary Professors in the Practical Fields (forerunner of Association of Practical Theology) and the predecessor body to the Association of Professors and Researchers in Religious Education, which he served as first President.
We celebrate Allen Moore’s memory and legacy with an excerpt from the Mediation offered by Rev. Dr. Robert Allan Hill, Dean of Marsh Chapel, at the October 4th service:
“Upon the readings we might meditate a moment. We are glad to affirm the goodness in creation, with the writer of Genesis, that book of multiple beginnings, even as we long for and lean toward not only the care of creation but also the glory of the new creation, ‘joy of heaven to earth come down’. We are heartened by the familiar phrases of the Shepherd psalm, sung into the teeth of the shadow of death. Our gospel, light and salt, the announcement and challenge to shine and shimmer, to become who we are and are meant to be, encourages us, again, this afternoon.
We could pause a moment further to meditate on 1 John. How apt a choice for today! Today we remember a practical theologian. And 1 John, we might reflect, is something of a practical theological response to a Christologically theological gospel. 1 John is written to fix John. John’s soaring spirited freedom, spirited truth, spirited height, spirited incarnation, spirited love, spirited Spirit, left out some important things, the church found later. One generation usually puts back what another forgot. 1 John recalls the centrality of fellowship, the mutuality of love, personal ethics, social ethics, church life and leadership, and even the primitive old apocalyptic hope—all of which John left behind, yet all of which are crucial. In a word, John recalls kindness, disciplined kindness. Beloved let us love one another… 1 John, is a practical theological emendation of a Christologically theological Gospel. Good. See what love God has given us! And let us practice the Presence of such love.
We do so, even in the shadow of death. Death makes us mortal. Facing death makes us human. Death is natural, facing death faithful. There are many ways of keeping faith. Of course we have our own natural anxiety in the face of our fragility, soon to ‘shuffle off this mortal coil en route to that undiscovered country from whose bourn no traveler returns’. Still, it is often two other forms of death that most challenge us: the death of voice and the death of dreams. To face death is to face the loss of our loved ones’ voices and the prospect of the incompletion of our most cherished dreams. We can be frank with one another here. We are able to honest: we still walk by faith not by sight, still see in a mirror dimly, still hope for what do not see, still have the treasure in earthen vessels.”
Allen’s full obituary is available here. The livestream of the October 4th service at Marsh Chapel is available here.