One netperson wrote:

I’m surprised that you think that it is possible to distinguish between popular belief and theological reflection! We dress the “popular belief” bit up with a lovely euphemism like an “indigenous expression of the Christian faith”.

To which another responded:

Yes, I think it is possible to make a distinction between the two. In fact, I agree with the Catholic theologian, David Tracy, when he says that there are three ‘moments’ in the expression of faith. The first is the foundational faith-narrative of the church, which includes much of the bible, the liturgy, and the informal faith-conversation of Christian people. ‘Theology’ then comes along as a second movement, a critical moment in the conversation which is also a critique of the conversation. The impulse for such a critique is, of course, made possible only because the foundational narrative encourages such critique in its prophetic and analytical modes. And the critical moment is fed back into the continuity of the conversation. A third moment is what I am doing now: reflecting critically on the conversation itself, and on how it happens. This ‘meta-critique,’ as Tracy calls it, is of course made possible only because a tendency in this direction is always already present (‘indigenous,’ we might say) within the faith conversation as a whole.

So then, there is a critical discontinuity within the faith-conversation which is predicated upon its continuity as a conversation.