I just finished reading Stanley Hauerwass engrossing new book, Hannahs Child: A Theologians Memoir, which was recently treated by Peter Steinfels in the magazine. As with most things Hauerwas, I am left feeling both inspired and troubled by his account of what it is to be a theologian today. He presents his life as fundamentally defined by the titular Biblical story of Samuel, whose mother Hannah prayed that if God would grant her a son, she would dedicate him to the Lords service. Hauerwas reports that his own mother prayed this same prayer while trying to conceive him, and as a result, his life has been in many ways defined by the task of trying to live into this narrative of a figure caught in a time of transition. Samuel found himself wrapped up in Israels evolution from a federation of tribes held accountable to the Law by their spiritual elders, as presented in the Book of Judges, into a unified political entity governed by kings. Hauerwas understands his own time of transition as defined by the slow, agonizing decline of a post-Constantinian church trying to move forward into an uncertain future, while mostly remaining paralyzed by the nostalgia for its supposedly once-great cultural and political relevance.Given such a self-understanding of the man and his time, it is not surprising that the Stanley Hauerwas that emerges in the memoir is a character caught in a number of in-betweens: church and world, congregation and university, identity and relevance, modernity and post-modernity, Catholic and protestant, peace-lover and provocateur. In the end, though, I think the Stanley Hauerwas that Hauerwas re-members is primarily a theologians theologian. This is to say, that beyond any natural loyalties, which he admits that he does disdain, Hauerwas is committed to the craft of theology, which he calls word work. Influenced by Wittgenstein and Barth, Hauerwas understands his job as a theologian as helping Christians learn the grammar of faith, so that they might better describe what a reality might look like that is defined by the cross and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Such a description is necessary before we even begin to say anything normative about how we ought to live in this reality. This is perhaps a strange self-understanding for a professional Christian ethicist, but Hauerwas says that ethics is but a name for exposing the practical character of theological speech.Its statements like these that have made his work so hard for some more pragmatically-minded interpreters to take. For example, its difficult to come up with a church position on same-sex marriage, when the resident theological ethicist wants to spend the whole time simply describing marriage itself. But this is what theologians love to do. Its hard to say what it is to live a life defined by the Gospel. What does such a life even look like? For all his distrust of foundational theology, no one seems more concerned about the "quiddity" of Christian life than Stanley Hauerwas. He says several times that the work of theology takes patience, the patience of a bricklayer who slowly learns the tools of the trade and endlessly perfects his craft one brick at a time. This patience is connected to his commitment to pacifism, which is predicated on the eschatological idea that only God has the clarity of mind to be able to act with such definitive and efficient violence. We, on the other hand, must live a life of continual discernment, always ready to rebuild the whole wall if we notice that even one brick is out of place. And theologians love to build, tear down, and rebuild walls.I think Hauerwass identity (if one could call it that) as a theologians theologian is best exemplified by the two poles between which he seems to navigate. On the one hand, he maintains that he is a church theologian. He claims to care more about what the church thinks than what he thinks, and he says, I often learn what I need to say at Yale or Cambridge because I have visited the Church of the Servant King or preached at Nacogdoches. On the other hand, he admits that he is decidedly a man whose institutional identity has been disciplined by the university. He writes enthusiastically of serving on appointment, promotion, and tenure review committees at Duke, confesses his desire for academic respectability, and says, I cannot even imagine what my life might be if I were divorced from the university, and for that I am profoundly grateful. So, which is it?Of course, true to his reputation as a contrarian, it is neither. Yet, as one committed to nonviolent reconciliation, it must be both. That it is neither is clearly displayed in the two most contentious relationships that he describes in the book. The first is with Richard McBrien, whose appointment by Fr. Ted Hesburgh as chair of the Theology Department precipitated Hauerwass departure from Notre Dame. Hauerwas paints a very unflattering picture of McBrien as one interested in Americanizing Rome to further his own program to become the first president of Roman Catholicism in America. Hauerwas also mourns the paradoxical narrowing that came with this program, which involved a kind of re-Romanization of Notre Dame.As a Roman Catholic, however, I think that one could propose a more generous reading of this shift. With regard to the democratization of the church, it seems plausible to think that McBrien, and others, were simply trying to find the kind of theological freedom and creativity that they enjoyed in the university, and that Hauerwas enjoys as both and university professor and a basically free-church protestant, at the ecclesial level. As for the seemingly paradoxical re-Romanization, Hauerwas seems to miss the subtle and perhaps sad political fact that, within the Church, the more creative you are the more orthodox you have to look. In this battle, however, Hauerwas presents himself as championing the purity of the small c catholic church over the democratizing identity politics of the university.The second relationship, in which Hauerwas this time plays the independent university professor against the committed churchman, concerns a young minister who comes to replace the much-beloved pastor at a Methodist church Hauerwas attended. As is the case with most protestant denominations in America (as well as Catholicism), Methodism has been losing numbers, and the young pastor who was assigned to Hauerwass church was charged with the task of trying to grow the parish. She dutifully attended several church marketing seminars and came up with a plan to sell the services that the church had to offer. As Catholics, of course, I think we tend to find such protestant sales techniques a bit unseemly to say the least, if not theologically appalling. Hauerwas was clearly of the latter view, and let the pastor know that not only was she colluding with economic modes of life incompatible with the gospel, but also was a profoundly embarrassing graduate of Duke Divinity School, where Hauerwas teaches. In order not to split the parish, Hauerwas then began attending an Episcopal church more amenable to his theology.Again, I feel a certain empathy with this pastor. I spent four years working with a high school youth group at a UCC church, and I certainly felt frustrated by the shameless way in which I felt we were catering our ministry to the adolescent tastes of our demographic. Yet, I also experienced deep moments of grace in the individual relationships that were formed during the seemingly banal pizza parties and movie nights designed just to get people in the door. I have a lot of respect for protestant pastors who do not have the theological luxury of being supported by the deep institutional pockets of the Catholic Church or the university. Lord knows there are some Catholic priests who could stand having to sing a bit for their supper. As a university theologian, however, Hauerwas is able to side-step a lot of these material pressures along with the question of real ecclesial accountability. In the book he mentions that as a theologian he is not of a free mind, and in a recent interview, he said that he felt accountable to his bishop. Yet, when the interviewer asked if he had ever refrained from publishing anything because of ecclesial prohibition, he admitted that he hadnt.So, Stanley Hauerwas is neither a church theologian nor a university theologian. Yet, he is married to a pastor, has published a book of prayers, and is enthusiastic about participating in the sacraments, while still having maintained close relationships with several university administrators and having sat on the board of Duke University Press. Hauerwas is certainly betwixt and between. He is accountable to many masters, and yet servile to none but One. Hes an anti-individualist whos written a deeply personal memoir. Hes someone whos studied the grammar of faith in order to become faithful. Hes a theologians theologian.