Children’s spirituality and theologising with children: the role of ‘context’

ABSTRACT Reflections on ‘child theology’ are often linked to contexts of schools (especially in German literature) or parishes/congregations, where children’s spirituality can be nourished or where they can be supported in their theological thinking. This article will broaden these more ‘traditional’ contexts, and will deal with examples of children’s spirituality and theologizing with children in a context of a hospital or after a migration experience. On the basis of examples of research in various international contexts, especially with children who had to deal with complex personal or political related challenges or even trauma (illness, murder, war, migration, …), a more fundamental question will be asked: what is the role of the context in which children develop their own spirituality and it which others (mostly adults) support them in theologizing? Examples of recent empirical research will be discussed in dialogue with the postcolonial practical theological work of Courtney Goto on the ‘idolisation of context’ (2018). Theological questions will be asked about the relationship between ‘spirituality’ and ‘theologizing’ on the one hand and universal/global/general characteristics or more local, contextual approaches on the other hand.