The recent interview of Brian McLaren in Sojourners made a slight plea for purple politics — neither red nor blue but purple. I have for a long time talked about how theology in the 80s became Reaganology, and by that I only meant to provoke thought. The 80s saw many evangelicals switch from the Democrats to the Republicans. It can just as easily be argued that theology and politics are inseparable. Are they? And what will that say for those of us who think a Purple Party would have promise?

If purple politics is really a stance of both post-Republican (taking the good, shedding the not so good) and post-Democrat (taking the good, shedding the not so good), then what is Purple Theology?
I suggest the following and welcome your conversation:
1. Purple Theology will transcend the “partisan” nature of current theology, which means it will transcend Evangelical, Fundamentalist, and Liberal — in all their varieties. It will take the good and shed the not so good. It will be at the same time both broad and orthodox.
2. Purple Theology will see itself as a “tuning up” session before the great performance. If the great performance is union with God for Eternity, then theology on earth is a tuning up — never the full, never the complete performance.
3. Purple Theology will root itself in both praxis and doxis, both practice and thinking. It will not limit itself to either, and it will not let one work without the other.
4. Purple Theology will pursue Sophia and not Systematics. (More on this in another post.) Sophia is wisdom, Systematics is an attempt to control the content of the Bible and Theology in an intellectual form that too often gets separated from life itself. Sophia will be the summons of Purple Theology.
5. Purple Theology will frame a “purple-driven life.”
What are some other themes and contours of a Purple Theology? (Just a tad of humor here, but this isn’t meant to be funny.)