I have a friend who loves definitions. For him nothing is well-written or well-said that does not explicitly, completely and in the most certain terms explain everything it is trying to say.

As he sees it, before we can understand anything we need to break it apart into many parts, like mathematics. He defines theology as a "science," and would probably be very pleased if we looked at the origins of the word "catholic."

Our present word comes from the Middle English catholik, which meant "universally accepted." This word in turn comes from Old French catholique, which itself comes from the Latin catholicus, which means "universal." But even before then it was a word in Greek, katholikos, which derived from a combination of words which can be loosely translated as "according to a whole." I suppose we could even say that the word "fragmented" is an antonym of catholic.

This reveals a problem. No matter how far back in history we go or how precisely we try to define it, no part of the above definition conveys what Catholic means. It fragments it into a bunch of little concepts which are not held together. Quick, if I ask you what Catholic means, what comes to your mind's eye? Just close your eyes and evoke "Catholic" for a moment.

Notice three things here: First, it is your imagination that just formed a picture as an answer; second, the picture is likely of something you deeply love (I, for instance, think of the tingling that ran all through me as I sat in a pew full of other small children waiting to walk up to receive my First Communion); third, your answer will not be a fragmented set of definitions, it will be "according to a whole" --- you will define Catholic by how you have lived it. It is pretty amazing, but our entire sense of being alive is "catholic."

So, with much love and respect for my friend, I beg to differ; I don't think theology is a science at all. The oldest definition we have of theology, which is "faith seeking understanding," sounds to me much more like a relationship of love. Faith is that something we have felt in our deepest being, the outpouring of love when we receive the Eucharist, and then it is our heart seeking; and we only seek that which we love.

In theologizing we seek for a way to tell others about that moment -- with the words, songs, pictures -- which will let us share what we know in faith with a community. And we search for the deeper meanings which our Scriptures, and Tradition can illuminate. Definitions will never be enough.

In his book "A Wounded Innocence: Sketches for a Theology of Art" (Liturgical Press, 2003) Alejandro Garcia-Rivera recounts the moment when the Episcopal Commission for the History of the Church in Latin America realized that the theology of the Americas was not in a set of definitions in books someplace, it was everywhere, all around --- as you might say --- right under our noses! The beliefs and history of Catholicism in the Americas was in the symbols, like our Lady of Guadalupe; in the art, like the intricately drawn Salvadoran crosses; in the rituals, like the Posadas; and in our houses of worship, like Mission churches which unite both austere crypts and also exuberant gardens. Our Catholicity is "according to a whole," the whole of how we live our faith-filled life.

Garcia-Rivera uses a very helpful example. "Textbook" theology is similar to that thing many of us had to reluctantly do in high school --- dissect a frog. "Living" theology however, is the joy of seeing (and sometimes playing with) a living little frog. If we had never seen a frog alive, no matter how hard we studied the dissected one, we could never grasp what a frog was all about. The sheer joy of jumping, croaking and swimming would all be lost to us.

I would like to add here a third moment between the living frog and the dead and dissected one, and that is a beautiful painting of a frog, or a great story of a frog, or a play about frogs, a frog game or song. Even if none of us were present during the time of the early church --- the wholeness, the wonderful truth of a living church comes through to us in all of the creative ways in which we have told, represented, drawn, sang and finally loved what it means to be church for two millennia.

The walls of our California missions tell about that living church; so does the St. Joseph's table at our parish, the candles burning at the foot Our Lady of Guadalupe, the fragile vestments and altar cloths of days long gone, the children's choir slightly off key but joyful. These are all living theology. They help us to understand the faith we profess, not as a set of definitions -- which are only parts --- but in experiencing the healing balm of wholeness. In the wholeness of a community of faith, as Catholics and "according to a whole," we are united globally (horizontally) with our sisters and brothers. Every time we all say or sing the "Our Father," we know ourselves Family.

And what is disclosed by the living faith that surrounds is that we are also united vertically, between heaven and earth. The old Mission chapels make us aware that those who went before us also believed, lived for, and left a witness for us of a "más allá." This is customarily translated as a "beyond," but it is much richer --- it really means "something more, just over there." This simple phrase discloses the amazing gift of continuity because "just over there" is related to in actual living closeness to "just over here," and because the "more" is a promise, that what we just taste now we shall be filled with then.

According to a whole, catholic means there is a whole within which everything that is…lives, and that whole we know, in love, to be our God.

Cecilia González-Andrieu is a Presidential Scholar at the Graduate Theological Union, in Berkeley.