In the last two decades, a remarkable and very important effort has been made by the various branches of Orthodox academic theology to popularize the conclusions of scientific research and to approach the various pastoral problems of the Church. It was now time for the difficult and thorny problems of the daily life of believers to begin to be dealt with seriously and responsibly by official Theology as well and not to be abandoned to the good mood and individual discretion of those who only exercise pastoral ministry in the practical field.
Modern Orthodox Theology is called upon to realize its debt and its responsibilities towards the shepherding Church and as a charismatic function itself to contribute decisively to the edification of the faithful and to the general advancement of the Church, so that the true experience of faith becomes a reality even today and the consolidation of an orthodox ethos and orthodox opinion in everyday life.
This is how the sacred writers of the New Testament understood theology in the beginning and the Fathers of the Church later. The apostle Paul spoke of a theology that is recognized only as a charismatic function in the effort of spiritual edification of the faithful and realization of the unity of the Church. The Lord of our faith, indeed, gave the Church apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers, for the training of the saints as a work of ministry, for the building up of the body of Christ, until we all become her
unity of faith and recognition of the son of God, a perfect man, a measure of the age of Christ's crew (Eph. 4,11-13). Then theology will not be an individual or "class" affair, but a living reality of the entire people of God, a "community" and ecclesial function. It will be about the great "mystery of theology", as theological knowledge and learning is called in the patristic tradition.
The era of sterile academicism and encephalism, the era of scholasticism and for Greek Orthodox Theology seems to be in its west. Not even the experts are moved by that theology anymore. The need to join the new spirit and purely research and scientific works, to serve man and his time, is now a clear and glaring reality, for those who have ears to hear and eyes to see. It is the demand of the times that theology and church ministry merge again, as in the past. This spirit for a charismatic liturgical theology was a dominant element in the New Testament Church and the Church Fathers. Faith and history, doctrine and life, cannot be understood separately. The separation of the two carries the risk of heretical deviations.
The need, therefore, for an "Orthodox Theology" also for the issues of marriage has already begun to become a consciousness in the wider area of believers and this is a clear invitation and challenge for our academic theology. [...] (From the preface of the publication)
