More Than Technique: the Professions as Missional Vocations

Andrew Sloane

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Chapter 11 More Than Technique: the Professions as Missional Vocations

In: Transforming Work

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Andrew Sloane

Andrew Sloane
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Type:: Chapter

Pages:: 220–242

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004696235_015

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Abstract

Older notions of the professions as inherently moral callings to a particular vocation have been under pressure from the critique of professional paternalism and privilege and the conversion of professional practice into consumer commodity. This chapter explores the question of whether it is possible to reclaim the notion of profession as a moral practice and a missional vocation in light of the work of Bosch and others on the mission of the whole people of God. Following a brief discussion of the notion of the ‘professions,’ the chapter seeks to identify and respond to criticisms of that concept, then turns to consider how we ought to think theologically and missiologically about the professions, as well as how professions function as inherently moral enterprises. Using medicine as a test case, the author suggests that fundamental to theological and ethical reflection on the notion of ‘profession’ is a recognition of the power inherent in certain social practices, and the moral call that is entailed in that power. Such views challenge the tendency to treat disciplines such as medicine as primarily exercises in technical competence that are ‘consumed’ by customers. The chapter closes with some reflections on the way these moral enterprises are both sustained by particular forms of (missional) Christian community and function as expressions of them in service of vulnerable people. This provides a missiological re-consideration of the place of professions in light of Bosch’s call for the Church’s mission to include and mobilize the whole people of God.

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Transforming Work

Missiological Perspectives for the Church in the World

Series: Theology and Mission in World Christianity, Volume: 30

E-Book ISBN:: 9789004696235

Publisher:: Brill

Print Publication Date:: 08 May 2024

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- Religious Studies
  - General
- Theology and World Christianity
  - General

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Chapter 11 More Than Technique: the Professions as Missional Vocations

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Transforming Work

Missiological Perspectives for the Church in the World

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