Practical Theology Unit

The 2026 AAR Annual Meeting Call for Presentations for the Practical Theology Unit sessions are the three below:

1 Artificial Intelligence and Digital Worlds: Reimagining the Future of Practical Theology and Ecclesial Practice

The Practical Theology Unit (PTU) invites proposals for innovative papers, experimental sessions, and multimodal contributions for the AAR 2026 Annual Meeting on the topic: Artificial Intelligence and Digital Worlds: Reimagining the Future of Practical Theology and Ecclesial Practice. In alignment with the 2026 AAR presidential theme “Future/s”, we seek work that goes beyond analysis of the present moment to imagine, critique, and perform futures where artificial intelligence and digital worlds reshape how religion is lived and studied.

AI and digital infrastructures increasingly inform how humans think, create, relate, and hope. They challenge established assumptions about community, authority, embodiment, and meaning-making—core concerns of practical theology and ecclesial studies. Simultaneously, they generate new possibilities for connection, accessibility, pastoral imagination, and global collaboration. These shifting conditions call practical theology not only to respond but to envision what might emerge, what might transform, and what must be resisted.

Reimagining Future/s: A Practical Theological Task

Practical theology has always occupied the threshold between the real and the possible. Its task is not only to study lived religion and theology, but also to help shape the world in which we practice our faith. We recognize that digital technologies are not neutral tools but active forces in shaping the lived experience of faith. Practical theology must therefore critically and boldly engage with the plurality of future trajectories of practical theology and ecclesial practice in an increasingly digital world. This requires: 

• Critical discernment of ethical, social, and power-laden dynamics embedded in digital systems
• Theological imagination that reconsiders the imago Dei in the context of human-machine collaboration
• Empirical engagement with digitally mediated religious identities and communities
• Praxis-oriented innovation in ministry, pastoral care, and education
• Justice-centered awareness of digital inequities and potential techno-colonialisms.

The aim of this session is to create a space to reimagine the future/s of practical theology and religious practice in a digital world. We therefore welcome proposals that explore the future/s of practical theology and ecclesial life shaped by technological transformation and especially invite proposals that:

• Critically examine how digitality is reshaping traditional practices of worship, formation, pastoral care, and mission
• Explore theological frameworks for understanding digital embodiment, presence, and community
• Investigate the ethical dimensions of emerging technologies including artificial intelligence, virtual reality, and social media platforms
• Consider questions of access, equity, and digital divides within global ecclesial contexts
• Envision faithful and creative responses to digitality that serve human flourishing and ecclesial vitality
• Probe new methods for researching digital religion and praxis

We encourage proposals that:

• critically engage and expand scholarly formats by incorporating digital or multimodal methods
• demonstrate meaningful interdisciplinary collaboration
• integrate embodied or practice-based theological inquiry 

Session Format

Session will be designed to allow for interaction and shared reflection. We welcome formats that are not purely linear presentations — for example, short inputs combined with discussion, practice-based elements, or small experimental components. At the same time, proposals should be grounded in solid scholarly work.

2 Preaching Futures: Homiletics, Ecology, and the Climate Crisis

For next year’s AAR theme Futures, we invite contributions that explore how preaching is shaped by ecological change, climate crisis, and the search for responsible and hopeful ways of speaking in uncertain times. The session aims to bring homiletics and ecological questions into a constructive conversation: practical, reflective, and attentive to lived experience.

We are interested in proposals that look at (among other topics):

· how climate anxiety, grief, or resilience appear in preaching

· ecological or creation-centered theologies and their homiletic implications

· preaching as a practice shaped by place, embodiment, and the more-than-human world

· climate justice and its pastoral, liturgical, and communicative dimensions

· Indigenous, postcolonial, and decolonial insights for ecological preaching

· emerging homiletic forms in ecological contexts (e.g. outdoor liturgies, walking practices, shared or dialogical preaching)

· intergenerational perspectives and youth-driven ecological concerns

Submissions from a range of practical-theological, ecological, and interdisciplinary contexts are encouraged.

Session Format

Session will be designed to allow for interaction and shared reflection. We welcome formats that are not purely linear presentations — for example, short inputs combined with discussion, practice-based elements, or small experimental components. At the same time, proposals should be grounded in solid scholarly work.

3 “Do we have a theological future?” Lessons to be learnt from Children & Adolescents (co-sponsored session with Childhood Studies and Religion)

The 2026 Presidential theme; “Future/s,” reminds us of Nelson Mandela’s often quoted remark, “The future belongs to our youth.” Children and youth ministry have been largely positioned within the discipline of practical theology internationally and in many local contexts of theological education. Ironically, there is still much theological reflection required through the lived realities and experiences of these children and young people. Perhaps the call for more interdisciplinary engagement among and with practical theologians is overdue? The 2026 Presidential theme calls for a re-visioning and imagining the future of practical theologies that take the place and voice of children and young people seriously.

Are we able to critically assess and help build futures for which we hope? What do these futures look like when we prophetically listen to children and young people? How are children and young people themselves envisioning their futures; might they be asking simply, “Do we have a future?” How do practical theologians and practitioners envision and live into the futures that they might imagine for younger generations, including childhood, (as active participants or protagonists of the present moment)?  How are sub-disciplines of practical theology (religious education, spirituality, pastoral care/ministry, homiletics, empirical theology, congregational studies, et al.) and faith practices engaging these questions? What do we know about children and young people and their beliefs in the future? This has numerous implications for theology, political engagement, mental health, activism, and more. We invite proposals from both scholars and practitioners.

The Practical Theology Unit regards practical theology – a discipline committed to bridging theological reflection and lived reality – uniquely positioned to offer critical insights and transformative practices to these important questions, and the Childhood Studies & Religion Unit aims to investigate the complex and multifaceted relation between religion and childhood functions as a forum for focused interdisciplinary and interreligious dialogue about the diverse relations of children and religion As a co-sponsored session, we invite proposals for brief presentations that integrate these  topics.

Session Format

The session will be designed to allow for interaction and shared reflection. We welcome formats that are not purely linear presentations — for example, short inputs combined with discussion, practice-based elements, or small experimental components. We will consider empirical work with and among children and young people. We also invite research that engages positive frameworks of children and young people and not merely deficit approaches to these. Submissions from a range of practical-theological and interdisciplinary contexts are encouraged.