Who Is Hiding in the Shadows: The Outlines of Dark Ecclesiology

Abstract

The article describes dark ecclesiology, a new theological theory of the church. According to the author, it represents a strategy of emancipation of the ecclesiastical thought and practice from clericocentrism. For centuries, ecclesiology focused on describing hierarchical structures that shaped normativity within the church. Everything strange and abnormal remained in the shadows. “Invisible" groups (women; queer people; unbaptized; human embryos; animals and other non-human living beings) fall into the shadow area and are excluded by the clerical authorities from the scope of ecclesiology. Dark ecclesiology allows for a fresh look at the church. As a theological research method, it reconsiders the church's composition, structure, and boundaries; it provides an opportunity to speak about earlier excluded church actors and things, avoiding their forced normalization within the framework of mainstream ecclesiological theories. The critical potential of dark ecclesiology makes it possible to reveal the contingency of church norms and the arbitrariness of the exclusion from the church of those who consider themselves to be church members. Shadow actors are described through theological infra-language, which is a way of correlating different perspectives and narratives in one space through which they express their belonging to the church. Dark eccle-siology refers to a flat ontology that asserts the ontological equality of all actors, including God. Methodologically, it uses the ideas of object-oriented philosophers (T. Morton, G. Harman, and others) and B.