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- Herausgeber: IVP Academic
- Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
- Serie: Missiological Engagements
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018
Christianity is not only a global but also an intercultural phenomenon. In this second volume of his three-volume Intercultural Theology, Henning Wrogemann turns to theologies of mission. Mission theologies, he argues, are found in a wide range of implicit as well as explicit forms, from the practice of Christian presence by a Pakistani Christian among a marginalized people to the published deliberations of mission scholars in the West. The task of intercultural theology is to investigate and promote awareness of the variety of culture- and context-specific theologies of mission. From Warneck to Bosch, from Edinburgh to Lausanne to Busan, Wrogemann provides an overview of the theological underpinnings, rationalizations, and visions for mission and its practice. Tracing developments across a range of Christian traditions, movements, themes, and regions of the globe, from Europe and North America to sub-Saharan Africa, Wrogemann presents us with an array of mission theologies across the scope of the modern missionary movement. This rich conspectus is rounded out with the doxological dimension of mission and the varied facets of oikoumenism. Masterful in its scope and detail, this volume will richly inform the study of missiology and global Christianity. And it is essential reading for doing theology in a multicultural key. In a day when the church in the West struggles to understand and appreciate its missionary legacy and calling, Wrogemann's work sparkles with its deeply informed insights and inspiring vision. Missiological Engagements charts interdisciplinary and innovative trajectories in the history, theology, and practice of Christian mission, featuring contributions by leading thinkers from both the Euro-American West and the majority world whose missiological scholarship bridges church, academy, and society.
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INTERCULTURAL THEOLOGY Volume Two
THEOLOGIES OF MISSION
TRANSLATED BYKarl E. Böhmer
For Gerhard Wrogemann (1933–2016)
In loving memory
Contents
Preface to the English Edition (2018)
I am pleased to see the second volume of this trilogy now also being published in English. In my view, the topic of mission is more pressing today than ever before. On the one hand, Christians in various European contexts are evidently extremely uncertain about the task of Christian mission. This uncertainty is widespread, running the gamut from local congregations to church leadership. At the same time, we find extremely vigorous missionary movements all over the globe, yet the challenges they face vary tremendously from one context to the other.
This calls for two things: for reassurance with regard to the task of Christian mission, and for a critical mindset with reference to one’s own missionary activity. The more Christians from one particular continent, agency, or context know about how Christians in other continents, agencies, and contexts live in mission and what they think about mission, the greater the likelihood of making progress in both of these areas. It is therefore necessary today for mission theology not only to meet local needs and sensitivities but also to be well informed from an intercultural and ecumenical perspective and to meet international academic standards.
This book strives to meet the need for expanding the horizon to take into account the many globally diverse contexts and Christian missions. It is intended both to provide a critical overview and to encourage and affirm Christians as they witness to their faith in a pluralistic and globalized world.
Henning WrogemannWuppertal, GermanyEpiphany 2017
Preface to the German Edition (2013)
From the very beginning, the Christian religious configuration has been imbued with a missionary character, since its message is addressed to all people in like measure. This implies a crossing of boundaries and an aspect of transformation that comprise the subject area of the discipline of intercultural theology/mission studies. But how does “mission” take place? What justifies mission, what forms does it take, and what vision determines its structure? A brief study shows that the German media use the term mission in an ambivalent manner. On the one hand, the media report on UN missions as a matter of course, assuming that these are usually humanitarian operations and therefore not only justifiable but—because they address human needs—also desirable, indeed necessary. Conversely, religious missions frequently meet with a certain reticence; people are concerned that these kinds of initiatives actually constitute manipulation and abuse. Understandably, ever since its experiences with the Nazi regime and its elaborate propaganda apparatus, the German public has become particularly sensitized to people claiming universal validity for their beliefs. This sensitivity is a valuable asset because it enables German civil society to detect manipulation attempts, to prohibit them, and in so doing to safeguard particularly the rights and opinions of minorities.
This is the backdrop against which the discipline of intercultural theology/mission studies operates. Its task is to draw attention to the way religious missions are actually configured, to analyze them, and to publicize its findings to members of society, to churches, and, not least, to those active in the field of theological education. The present volume is dedicated to this undertaking. In short, the goal is to show that from a global and intercultural perspective, mission often looks very different and operates under very different claims to validity than is commonly held. From a global perspective, the phenomenon of Christian missions is far more comprehensive and pluriform than people from the usually secularized societies of Western Europe might expect. At the same time, we need to draw attention to the fact that it is not only the Christian religious configuration that purposefully crosses boundaries in seeking to expand. From the beginning, both the Buddhist and Islamic religious configurations have found many ways to cross tribal and cultural boundaries. After a number of encounters between the religions in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, many other religious entities also adopted and adapted the concept and structure of Christian missions. Ever since then, neo-Hinduist missions (such as the Ramakrishna mission), neo-Buddhist configurations (such as Sokka Gakkai), and Islamic revitalization movements (such as Tablighi Jama‘at)—to name just a few—have been actively crossing boundaries. Religious missions are active not only on the local and national level but also as global players.
The task of mission studies, therefore, is to examine missions both within and beyond the Christian religion. It investigates not only the rationalization models of the various role players within their particular religious worldviews but also the way they organize themselves and the methods, goals, and general forms they adopt as they expand. This will provide important insights into the nature of the religious configurations in question, specifically in terms of how they relate to society (the civil society in which they operate), the way they interact with other religions, and also their own intrareligious profile.
The present volume will describe various Christian forms of mission in an exemplary fashion from global, continental, confessional, and contextual perspectives. It will aim to demonstrate that Christian theologies of mission and procedural paradigms for mission efforts are determined not only by the structure of the particular Christian social configuration sponsoring them (i.e., the church structures, network configurations, or social structures of the organizations in question) but also to a significant extent by the particular context in which they come into being or to which they refer. Thus mission may be approached from such aspects as, say, reconciliation, healing, dialogue, or the struggle for justice and liberation. The emphasis on cultural contingency also implies that the concept of a theology of mission must be broadened. As we shall see, theologies of mission find expression in various media, in books and leaflets, say, or in songs and dances, ritual actions and forms of communitization, medicinal and artistic forms of expression, or perhaps in the adoption of ethical and economic procedural paradigms.
In terms of the methodology of religious and cultural studies, part of the task of intercultural theology/mission studies is to promote the awareness that there is a variety of culture- and context-specific theologies of mission, and that there is a need to study them. The question is: Why and to what end do these both implicit and explicit theologies of mission take on particular forms? Since intercultural theology/mission studies pursues mission theology, its methodology is to analyze models of theological rationalization and various visions for mission, and then also how these are put into practice. The aim is to investigate how these relate not only to the New Testament underpinnings of Christian mission but also to alternative paradigms of mission proposed by other Christian actors.
In this way, not only does the discipline show us how religious actors are perceived by both society and civil society, but it also applies the methodology of religious and cultural studies to help describe the phenomenon of mission. In addition, it promotes a better understanding of the missions of the other faiths, and—in view of intercultural ecumenical relationships—it helps us to reserve judgment on the issue of Christian communality in the context of cultural pluriformity. Here the focus is also on processes of Christian self-understanding in the horizon of intercontinental constellations. The importance of how global religious configurations see themselves is demonstrated by instances in which media reports about religious events in one country lead to mass protests and sometimes even to acts of violence in other countries. From this angle, analyses carried out in the area of intercultural theology/mission studies are also politically relevant, at least indirectly.
The present volume is the second in this textbook series on intercultural theology/mission studies. We need to point out now already that this volume will merely allude to some important topics that will be discussed in greater detail in the third volume. Both my own missionary experiences and encounters with people in various countries in Africa and Asia went into the writing of this book. I would like to thank all my conversation partners who provided me with important and helpful advice; I will mention only the following as representative of the many others: Prof. Dr. Han Kook-il (Seoul, South Korea); Prof. Dr. Daniel Jeyaraj (Liverpool, UK); the chairman of the Church of Pentecost, Dr. Opoku Onyinah (Accra, Ghana); Prof. Dr. Scott Moreau (Wheaton, Illinois); Prof. Dr. Kirsteen Kim (Leeds, UK); Prof. Dr. Tharwat Kades (Cairo, Egypt); Prof. Dr. Andreas Heuser (Basel, Switzerland); and Dr. Apeliften Sihombing (Siantar, Indonesia). I would also like to thank my assistants, Alexa Schreitner and Steffen Pogorzelski; my doctoral students Detlef Hiller and Sören Asmus in particular; and finally my coworker and colleague Dr. John Flett.
Henning WrogemannWuppertal, GermanyNovember 2012
1
To Set the Tone
Mission—Surprisingly Different
In the last ten years, general interest in the topic of mission has grown in Germany, both in the media and in academic discussions. Within the broader society, people are asking what the requirements for religious and social missions should be, i.e., what claims to validity they should be permitted to make. It is becoming ever clearer within the field of political studies that even peacekeeping missions carried out with military support need to be assessed according to the legitimacy of their mandate. In religious studies, there are questions about the legitimacy of mission efforts by Christian mainstream denominations in light of an ongoing membership decline, while in social and cultural studies, the global growth of Pentecostal churches is receiving a lot of attention. These different settings show that we need to study missionary efforts very carefully, for missionary work is manifested in very different dimensions. The object of this present volume is to bring this very plurality into view. It will be shown that mission is constantly being experienced and perceived in surprisingly different ways. To set the tone, we will preface the following remarks with an illustrative case study.
Body Language: Just Be There?
We are traveling through the Sindh province of southeastern Pakistan. The road takes us through some flat country with vegetation that is still relatively lush. This will change in a few months as the sun continues to bake the expanse of the Thar Desert. We make a stop in a little village and enter a simple house. Here we meet Asif, a Pakistani Christian who spends most of his time in one of the many local villages that are all inhabited by members of the Khachi Koli caste. We start to talk. Asif tells us that he sees himself as a kind of missionary. When we ask him what exactly the nature of his work is, he answers in a way that sounds flabbergasting to Western ears. The most important thing, he says, is just to live together with the people. Of course he tries to organize help for them, especially in terms of medical care. Even the most basic services are lacking in these areas. He also tries to find help in terms of school teaching. He points out that most of the village residents are Hindus, a population group that receives very little attention in this country. On the contrary—the Khachi Koli experience discrimination.
Since they are a landless tribe and belong to the Hindu religion, many of the majority Muslim population consider them to be uneducated kuffar (Arabic for “unbelievers”) who can be used as cheap labor but who actually belong to India. For this reason, most members of the Muslim population do their best to avoid contact with these people. “It’s important that I cook for them and invite them over, or conversely, that I let them cook for me, that I enter their homes and eat with them there,” says Asif; “I am seen as someone with a higher status, and simply living together with the people this way makes them ask questions.” Asif has lived in his hut for a long time, he reads the Bible, he prays, but he does not preach on his own initiative. When people ask him for information, he gives it them; otherwise he remains silent. What counts here is his physical presence among the people. In contrast to the Hindu purity laws that define marriage across caste lines and eating together as forms of cultic pollution, Asif demonstrates that these things do not matter to him and his faith. Contrary to the tradition of keeping people of lower caste away from holy scriptures and holy places (temples), Asif lives out his faith among the people, and in this way he illustrates a basic dimension of the Christian faith: that the message of the gospel is intended for all people without distinction and that cultic purity laws no longer apply.
Joining Jesus at the Well: Considering the Scene from a Mission-Theological Perspective
Change of scene. Let us consider a painting by Indian artist Angela Trindade that illustrates a “theology of mission” that Asif also endorses (fig. 1). Angela Trindade was considered a prominent Dalit artist; she died in 1980.1 In the painting she expresses what Jesus means to her and what she sees as the essence of the gospel. There is Jesus—our European eyes can also recognize him as “our” Jesus, but in some aspects, he looks very different. Long hair, beard, and a halo—all of that is very familiar to us. But this Jesus is not wearing Jesus sandals. No, he is barefoot, and his garment is neither white nor gray, but blazing orange. His eyes are not directed to the woman standing in front of him; no, they look half-closed, and he holds his foot at a strange angle—is that a comfortable way to sit? Jesus is being presented here in an Indian way, as an ascetic. He is shown as a person who leads a life of homelessness for the sake of meditative contemplation, a life of peregrination like that of Gautama Buddha; after all, among Buddhists, orange or red is considered to be the color of the monks. The eyes are half-closed like those of someone meditating; Jesus is sitting in what is considered in India to be a meditative pose. Calm, withdrawn. Actually, he looks as if the whole situation does not concern him at all.
Figure 1.Jesus and the Samaritan Woman (1947) by Angela Trindade (1909–1980)
How then, we may ask, can Angela Trindade see him as the Savior, the Christ, the Son of God? Jesus is not “doing” anything! Really? Is he not doing anything? He is. He remains seated and is waiting to be approached, namely by the woman. Jesus is seated next to a well, far outside the village depicted in the background, seated in the shade of a tree, just like the Buddha once was. This is precisely the place where the woman has to go with her water jar—because she is a Dalit woman. That is how Trindade sees it; in this way she is relocating the story from the biblical Samaria to India. The biblical Samaria was also populated with both orthodox believers and people who were despised. The place is key, for Dalits are not permitted to draw water from the village well nearby. No, in many cases Dalit women must travel long distances on foot to draw water. For this reason, the village is depicted at the top right of the painting, off in the distance. The village well is off-limits to the Dalits, because if they were to draw water from it, the others (i.e., those of higher castes) would see it as ritual pollution. And since ritual purity is considered extremely important in the Hindu traditions, it is safeguarded on all fronts: no village water is available to the Dalits, no fellowship is to be had with the Dalits, and there are no rights for the Dalits.
So where can we find the gospel here? It is located in that the Dalit woman approaches Jesus, that he, the Son of the living God, remains seated, and that he talks with her! The Dalit woman in the picture can be recognized by her rather dark skin, although Trindade has defamiliarized the woman for the sake of her dignity; traditionally, Dalit women were forbidden from covering their upper bodies with their garments. Their toplessness made them recognizable as Dalits: yet another form of humiliation. Trindade restores the woman’s dignity, portraying her the way she perhaps appears in the eyes of Jesus. The story of Jesus at the well with this Samaritan woman, this Dalit woman, in whose presence he is, whom he addresses, and—and this is critical—from whom he accepts water, this story is for Dalit women one of the most important stories of the entire New Testament. God became flesh and made his dwelling among us—this assertion2 is especially relevant to those people forbidden from doing this very thing by the precepts of the Hindu traditions, forbidden to enter temples, who may not read any holy scriptures, who have no place. For as Untouchables they are as far removed from the divine as anyone can be. How different, in contrast, is the biblical understanding! Here the eternal God testifies that Jesus Christ came into this world to be close even to the most despised people and to give them new dignity.3
That concludes our image review. What is important is that obviously both Trindade, the Indian, and Asif, the Pakistani, see a fundamental aspect of Christian mission not so much in verbal proclamation as in body language, not so much in being on the move as in sharing life with other people. It is not so much about affirming the content of faith on a rational level as it is about experiencing a physical presence that has a therapeutic effect, that is uplifting, that restores dignity, and that raises questions. In the discourse of mission theology, such kinds of mission initiatives have been labeled as “missionary presence.” This is not about educated missionaries; it is about simple Christians who believe they are called to follow Jesus Christ. This is not about foreign personnel needing to be sent “overseas” but rather about people becoming active in their own countries, crossing ethnic, social, and societal boundaries as they do so, as is the case here in the villages of the Khachi Koli. This is not first and foremost about reading the Bible but about telling biblical stories that are important to the person doing the telling; it is not about a personal encounter between two human beings but rather about being human in communality, for in these contexts, human beings are perceived first and foremost as belonging to people groups. Missionary presence as the body language of faith? This is mission—surprisingly different.
Developments, Profiles, and Questions: The Layout of the Present Volume
This brings us to the question of how this book approaches the topic of mission theologies of the present. We need to state three delimitations in this regard. First, we must emphasize at the outset that a comprehensive topic such as this one can only be approached by way of example. The informed reader will certainly perceive that in a number of instances, much more could and should have been said. I concede this point unequivocally. My intention was to present as many facets as possible of a topic that is as gripping as it is challenging. Second, I wish to underscore that the material is presented perspectively: even though my many experiences were gained in African and Asian countries, the perspective from which the material is presented is also my own, namely that of a German and of a man. In addition, the first part emphasizes mission-theological conceptions formulated by Germans. I believe this to be a tenable approach as long as the reader remains aware of it. I attempted to avoid the danger posed by an encyclopedic approach: the danger of straying from the central theme. The wealth of material made it imperative to proceed selectively, as demonstrated for instance by the fact that in the section covering the world missionary conferences, only some main points were addressed. That being said, the footnotes provide sufficient material and references in each case to enable the reader to fill in the gaps.
The third delimitation concerns topics covered by the other two volumes of this textbook series. The first volume already addressed both the theme of inculturation and hermeneutical issues. For this reason, the present volume provides a number of cross-references to what was addressed in greater detail in the first volume. Since the third volume will be devoted to the discussion of a theology of religions, and since it will address issues arising from the theme of interreligious relationships and various aspects of dialogue, I have limited myself in the present volume to making just a few remarks on the interplay of mission and dialogue.
The book is divided into four sections. In the first section, we will study the history of the mission-theological developments of the past one hundred years (part one). Here we will need to outline the general politicohistorical climates and the various ways in which the World Council of Churches, the Lausanne Conference, and other international organizations and movements attempted to provide mission-theological answers to issues arising within the respective climates. This will provide us with an indispensable frame of reference into which the subject material of the following sections may be inserted. The second section will deal with the profiles of various Christian actors (part two). It is necessary to use the broad term actorsbecause the respective entities are structured so very differently; the Roman Catholic Church, for instance, is a world church with a rather uniform character in terms of canon law; the various Orthodox churches are constituted in different ways but share certain liturgical and theological traditions; North American Protestant churches again can only be described in broad terms as a group, while they continue to provide the largest contingents of missionary personnel worldwide. When discussing the Anglican Church family, we focus on European contexts even though it would naturally also have been possible to emphasize other aspects. Again, we can discuss the Pentecostal movement in summary fashion only; even so, tremendous caution is needed as we do so, since this movement has become a global phenomenon, with approximately five hundred million adherents today. This section discusses the various general profiles within Christianity as a global religious configuration.
The third section will be devoted to topics of significant interest as far as both the history of mission and the theology of mission are concerned, since they touch on a wide variety of aspects of human coexistence (part three). Here we will discuss continental contexts and their specific characteristics by way of example. This concerns a whole palette of questions and challenges that could easily have included other topics also. Here too my preference is to present material in a descriptive and relevant fashion rather than to attempt an exhaustive treatment, which would be an impossible undertaking, as far as I am concerned. Here I will endeavor to prove the hypothesis that mission can only be spoken of in the plural today. As I do so, I will also attempt to provide comparative perspectives; for instance, when considering the topic of liberation and martyrdom, I will compare Latin American contexts with the Egyptian one; when considering the issue of money/wealth, I will compare West Africa with Sri Lanka; when dealing with the issue of power and healing, I will compare the way the historic mainline churches understand healing with the way the Pentecostal churches do.
The book will conclude with my own approach as far as the theology of mission is concerned (part four). Defining mission as oikoumenical doxology will help us to identify what I believe to be important points that correspond to some important considerations from the domain of global Christianity but that are also especially relevant to European contexts and their specific challenges. The task is to formulate a localized theology of mission that is both compatible with the intercultural milieu and contextually appropriate.
On the Theology of Mission: Some Literature References
The present volume is located within the broad discourse of the theology of mission. In what follows we will identify some of the newer mission-theological approaches that have appeared since the 1980s. The Dictionary of Mission, edited by Theo Sundermeier and Karl Müller, is highly commendable.4 For years the standard volume on mission in the English language has been Transforming Mission by South African scholar in mission studies David Bosch.5 An overview of mission is provided in the book Constants in Context by US-American Catholic missiologists Stephan Bevans and Roger Schroeder.6 Another author deserving of mention is Andrew Kirk.7 It will become evident later on that a whole range of other names and approaches from the various mission-theological discourses should be mentioned here by rights in addition to these internationally known names of mission theologians.8 For now, we will need to content ourselves with directing the reader—by way of example—to the work by Korean Pentecostal theologian Julie Ma and her husband, Wonsuk Ma, and to the book by British Reformed missiologist Kirsteen Kim.9 These books present rationales for mission proceeding from the doctrine of the Holy Spirit. In so doing, as we will show, they are following a global trend.
In contrast, Heidelberg scholar in mission and religious studies Theo Sundermeier10 in his discussion of mission emphazises especially the importance of freedom and incorporating it into his concept of a “theology of convivency.” I presented my own mission-theological approach in the book Den Glanz widerspiegeln [lit. “To mirror the Splendor”].11 In the last chapter of this present volume, the basic principles of this approach will be related to the argumentation, approaches, and themes presented in the work as a whole.12 Basically, I argue that although it is indeed possible to attempt—cautiously—to formulate a comprehensive model for a given context, nevertheless, the core aspect of such a theology of mission needs to be its adaptability to other contexts. In short: from the perspective of intercultural theology, the aim is to investigate the contextuality of theologies of mission from around the globe, while from the perspective of the theology of mission the aim is to attempt to formulate a contextual model that incorporates intercultural learning experiences.
Mission from the Perspective of Religious Studies
Before we begin to discuss the core content itself, we need at the very least to touch on an important methodological issue, namely: What is the actual object of theologies of mission? Put differently: In what form are theologies of mission found? I venture to hypothesize that theologies of mission find their expression in a wide range of different media, such as (1) in mission-theological treatises that account for the justification, aim, and methods of missionary activities; and also (2) in unwritten “texts” such as—on the part of Roman Catholics—in the specific spirituality of various religious orders, which is oriented according to the example set by the founder of the order in question. According to Saint Francis of Assisi’s ideal of poverty, for instance, the unwritten theology of mission of the Franciscan orders (both female and male) is the notion of having been sent to the poor, while the example of Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Jesuit order, concentrated the focus of the Jesuit order’s theologies of mission for many centuries on the elites of various nations (but not exclusively so). The Little Sisters of Jesus, on the other hand, founded by Frenchwoman Magdeleine Hutin, emphasize a life of missionary presence.13 Theologies of mission, however, also manifest themselves (3) in forms of action, such as the protest by Latin American grassroots communities whose missionary spirituality of resistance finds expression in songs, poems, and particular types of efforts aimed at creating awareness. But mission-theological subject matter is also present (4) in the social structures and in the standardizations of missionary behavior within various groups; here, this subject matter is “known” intuitively and therefore meets the criterion of enabling the subjects to reflect on their own praxis.
Consequently, the notion that the theology of mission exists only in written form is totally inadequate. Christoph Bochinger and Andreas Feldtkeller are prominent examples of scholars from the field of religious studies who have drawn attention to this issue.14 Accordingly, those pursuing mission studies from both an intercultural and interreligious perspective should expect to encounter other, foreign forms; that is to say that as a process of propagation, mission takes on different forms in various cultural, contextual, and religious configurations, and so it is also understood differently by them. For instance, Bochinger has suggested that those who study mission from the perspective of religious studies should delimit their object of study to the “active and intentional propagation of one’s own religion.” But to which activities does this refer, and what type of intention is meant? Bochinger further qualifies his definition in this regard. He believes that the first requirement for mission is that the subject of mission must have taken a clear decision at the outset to carry out mission. In addition, it is essential that the subject of mission “go abroad” in some sense. Beyond that, it is necessary for the subject to have a “clear and user-friendly definition of the fundamental principles and of the nature” of her own religion.15 In terms of these fundamental principles of one’s own religion, Bochinger goes on to stipulate:
Mission either presupposes or necessarily leads to a corresponding self-clarification. Therefore, the object of a religious studies approach should be to identify evidence of the redefinition of the sociological and theological identity markers of the religion carrying out the mission, either in the form of the demarcation of individual groups and doctrines, or of ecumenical unification movements.16
So far, so good. But what procedure should be followed when the individual actors of a particular Christian religious configuration understand mission purely as the witness of local presence? Does that mean that we should disregard the way these Christians define mission because it does not match up with the artificial definition of some religious studies scholar?17 What about liberation-theological conceptions of mission, which see mission as striving for justice by means of prophetic protest—specifically within the context of a predominantly Christian environment? Proponents of this view define foreignness as manifestations of structural sin: social constellations of power that rationalize injustice and the exploitation, oppression, and exclusion of people. In this view, foreignness is no longer a cultural or geographic term but a sociopolitical-spiritual one.
These few remarks demonstrate that Bochinger’s considerations need to be defined more clearly. We are unable to do so at this point. Meanwhile, what is important is the inference that as a category within the field of religious studies, mission far transcends what most people assume it to be, namely a concerted effort corporately carried out by institutions.
The topic of mission is far more complex. Accordingly, operative definitions of the theology of mission need to be formulated accordingly. For instance, Pentecostal conceptions of spiritual warfare are predicated on a particular “theology of mission,” not as a “theory,” but in terms of everyday practice. However, this practice is based on certain presuppositions that can be condensed and coherently formulated as spiritual precepts. Here we find a point where the theology of mission converges with empirical mission studies and religious studies research; not only that, but it also converges with conversion research in particular.
As stated above, in the present volume we are able to discuss many of these aspects by way of example only. At the same time, the stated objective of this volume is to present the whole spectrum of the different theologies of mission and missionary modi operandi, to portray the complexity of contextual referential connections, and thus to question not only common presuppositions about what “mission” allegedly is, but also the presuppositions behind what “conversion,” “dialogue,” “power,” or “pluralism” are thought to be. If mission may be generally characterized as a transformative event, then the term is an open one in the sense that transformative events repeatedly transcend themselves. We will endeavor to show that the term and the phenomenon of mission do not become amorphous as a result, and also that it is necessary to carefully engage in an intercultural and interreligious discourse about the contours of contextual manifestations of mission, their justification, and their limits. The following deliberations will be carried out in commitment to this objective.
2
Developments to Date
An Introductory Overview
The topic of Christian mission continues to be relevant. In the face of declining church membership in Europe, the call for the church to become missional is becoming ever louder. At the same time, the burning question continues to be just what this mission consists of. Is it true that Christianity has become an old, has-been religion, as many headlines in the media would have it? A very different picture emerges when we look at global Christianity today.
On the Relevance of the Topic of a Theology of Mission
To begin with, we may note that in the course of the twentieth century, the propagation of Christian churches and congregations in some parts of the world happened with astonishing rapidity. These areas include the sub-Saharan part of the African continent. While in 1900 Christians accounted for less than 10 percent of the total population, by 2000, that proportion had increased in most countries in this region to between 50 percent and 70 percent, and in some countries to as much as 95 percent (Rwanda and Burundi). While in Asia the numerical growth appears to have been smaller, with the Christian share having increased from 2.3 percent of the population in 1900 to 8.3 percent in 2000, in terms of absolute numbers this represents an increase from around twenty-two million people at the time to around three hundred million people today, with enormous growth having taken place especially in South Korea, China, and Indonesia. It follows that Christianity is by no means a dying religion; on the contrary, in many parts of the world it continues to be an exceptionally vibrant one.1
However, these figures allow no room for missionary triumphalism, since during the same time frame the Christian share of the total West European population fell from about 98 percent in 1900 to approximately 75 percent on average in 2000. In many societies, an even more drastic decline took place, such as in the Netherlands, where fewer than 50 percent of the people still belong to one of the Christian churches today. In addition, one other observation is extremely relevant concerning the subject of mission: in the twentieth century, the world’s large religious configurations came to be global players—even more so than before. This trend continues unabated in the twenty-first century. In the case of Christianity, since the 1970s at the very latest, the main area of expansion clearly shifted from the northern hemisphere to the southern, with the result that Christians in Europe and North America can no longer regard themselves to be the authoritative Christian societies. Challenges in the area of ecumenism and the theology of mission are evident when considering the tremendous variety of contexts in which Christians live worldwide. Ecumenical dialogues are held to discuss such issues as what is it exactly that unites the dialogue partners and how is it possible for them to serve and witness together. But it is also essential to engage in mission-theological reflection in order to address the question of mission within the context of Germany today, so as not to sidestep such issues as fraternal cooperation and responsibility toward Christians worldwide, and in order to deal with the differences in character between Christians not only around the world but increasingly also in immigrant communities in our own backyard.
Despite the challenges and despite these developments, the term mission continues to be a contentious one in many quarters, at least in Western Europe. This is, however, often based on a very narrow definition that sees mission as nothing more than a short-term, verbal attempt to persuade others. It will need to be shown that a wide variety of theologies of mission are in effect around the world; it will also need to be shown how the most diverse actors understand and practice the giving of Christian witness in a wide range of holistic and contextual ways. As we do so, we will concentrate on a number of issues of interest, such as the relationship between missionary witness and interreligious dialogue, how to respect other cultures, the impact converts from among these cultures will have on the Christian faith, and, conversely, how the Christian faith will transform their cultures. Other important questions concern the relationship between mission and social service, the significance of mission partnership and cooperation between “old” and “young” forms of Christianity, or the influence of one’s definition of, say, development, justice, reconciliation, plural democracy, ecology, education, or gender issues on one’s definition of mission. But before we proceed to address these issues, we need to consider at least briefly the epochs that preceded the Christian mission history of the twentieth century and to see which forms of propagation we can distinguish (even if we do so in very broad terms only), so that current discussions may be located within the wider framework of the global history of Christianity.
Looking Back: Mission History in Time-Lapse Mode
Since its very beginnings, Christianity has been a missionary religion. The New Testament describes how people who encountered the risen Christ received a call from him, and that these encounters not only helped the disciples to understand the meaning of the death of Jesus Christ but also provided them with a new direction: they were to tell the good news of the crucified and risen one, proclaiming it to all people.2 In this way, a group of frightened and distraught people was transformed into a community of witnesses who founded communities within a short period of time in many different places throughout what was then the Roman Empire. We may roughly characterize the early mission history as follows: In the first three centuries, the Christian faith was not propagated by means of planned mission. There was no such thing at the time. Rather, mission was carried out by individual witnesses of the faith, by both men and women, frequently by traders, soldiers, and long-distance travelers who spread the faith throughout various cities of the Roman Empire. Mission took place through the impact of Christian house churches, of congregations that attracted people by their hospitality,3 Christian life witness, and ethical sincerity.4 We should expressly note that women played a particular role in the propagation process during this phase of the history of Christianity.5
We may date the second epoch schematically to the period from AD 500 to 1000. During this period, Christianity expanded first to central and western Europe, and then to eastern and northern Europe.6 By this time, it had already gained a foothold in North Africa. Another important development was the Nestorian missions along the silk route into China; one could also mention various Christian kingdoms such as Aksum or Armenia. Notable turning points in the history of religion were marked by the various waves of Muslim conquest that ran their course by around AD 750. This development hampered the missionary impact of Christianity in North Africa and in the areas stretching into Persia.
Meanwhile, the East Syrian church continued to expand along the silk route for centuries. The East Syrian church was independent both in terms of its doctrine and its organization. Wolfgang Hage comments:
[The] “East Syrian,” “Nestorian” (officially: “Apostolic”) “Church of the East” had served in the Empire of the Persian Great Kings from time immemorial as the counterpart to Mediterranean Christianity with its state church character and with its mission which was always influenced by the interests of politics and state; and it continued to serve this function in the empire of the Caliphs and [then also in that of the] Mongolian Ilkhans. This church was always subject to the authority of non-Christian rulers, and so it experienced neither a “Constantinian shift,” nor the consequences of one—those consequences which are so helpful in terms of increasing the power of the church. Even so, the East Syrian church’s efforts to expand the Christian faith into distant countries were so successful that within the medieval framework of global Christianity, it stands apart as the “mission church.”7
We can do no more than to merely mention these developments, but they suffice to show that the history of Christian propagation could also have proceeded very differently. But let us return to the Western church, which succeeded in expanding into the northern and eastern regions of Europe. It was particularly the monastic orders that now crossed borders in the service of mission, and they did so within the context of cultural inequality. It was especially the large landed monasteries that played a deciding role in the Christianization, education, and economic development of many parts of Europe. In the process—consciously or unconsciously—mission came to be relegated more and more to these religious orders.8
Around 1200, mendicant orders arose that began to care for needy people in the then-flourishing cities of Europe. In this regard, it is especially the Franciscan and Dominican orders that deserve mention. They also sent delegations to the courts of distant rulers, such as to the courts of Muslim potentates. After America was discovered (1492), these mendicant orders (especially the Franciscans, Dominicans, and Augustinians), along with the Jesuit order, which was founded in the sixteenth century, came to serve as the most important missionary actors worldwide: in Latin America,9 North America, Asia, and some African coastal regions. From the sixteenth to the eighteenth centuries, mission in the sense of crossing boundaries fell almost exclusively to the Catholic orders,10 that is, predominantly to male members of these religious orders, whereas the Protestant churches that came into being in the sixteenth century hardly carried out mission at all during this same time frame. Catholic missions fell directly within the church’s purview. The church had to give its approval to the missions and retained control of them by means of an institution it established to this effect in Rome, namely the propaganda fidei, the congregation for the propagation of the Christian faith, headquartered within the curia in Rome. As a result, mission enterprises came to be founded in the following way: first, the religious orders submitted an application for them; second, the church and the Catholic kings gave their approval to them; and then, third, the members of the orders carried them out. The missions remained subject, fourth, to the control of the church (and crown) for their entire duration.
It was only in the nineteenth century that the Protestant churches came to the fore as significant missionary players in their own right. There were, in essence, three reasons for this: First, until the end of the Thirty Years’ War (1618–1648), the Protestant powers were battling for their very existence, at least in the area of France and the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation, leaving no energy to spare for boundary-crossing mission. Second, the large Protestant territories in central Europe had almost no access to the open sea; it was first the Catholic powers of Spain and Portugal, and then France and England in particular, that controlled the oceans, which remained the status quo for quite some time. Third, in many areas, the territorial rulers who wielded authority over the church within their borders had little interest in making Christians aware of their worldwide responsibility. They were concerned instead with promoting the local church in confessionally homogeneous territories according to the cuius regio, eius religio principle: “Whose realm, his religion.” The subjects were to have the same faith as the rulers governing them. The respective churches believed themselves to be responsible only for their specific realm and not for the global Christian mission. However, the eighteenth century ushered in an appreciable change in this regard. The Great Awakenings, i.e., revival movements among Protestants in North America and in England, promoted a missionary consciousness that also spread to continental Europe. The expansion of the European powers did the rest. In this way the nineteenth century would come to be known as “the great century” of mission (Kenneth Latourette).
The Great Century of Mission: The Nineteenth Century
The nineteenth century is the century of the Industrial Revolution, the century of scientific discoveries and rapid economic development, and the era of the increasing technological superiority of European nations over other regions of the globe. Admittedly, these developments had already begun earlier, but in the nineteenth century they gained momentum and achieved a broad impact, in the course of which the scientific, technological, economic, and military superiority of Europe was established. As a result, European nations attempted (with ever-greater intensity from the middle of the nineteenth century onward) to take possession of colonial territories in order to represent their own economic interests in other regions of the globe as well. The first eighty years of the nineteenth century were an era of increasing colonialism. From 1883/1884 onward, the colonial movement was intensified and radicalized during the so-called imperialism phase: its climax took place at the so-called Berlin Conference or Congo Conference, during which the territories of Africa were divided on the drawing board among the colonial powers, especially among England, France, Germany, and Belgium.11 What followed was the systematic conquest and occupation of the corresponding territories. Whereas for some time already, Christian missions had been working in many areas of Africa with the consent and sometimes even the support of local tribal rulers, the occupation efforts of the colonial powers now placed the missions squarely within the newly established sovereign territory of these same colonial powers, and the missions had no choice but to submit to the political decisions they made—for better or for worse. The spectrum of relationships between missions and colonial administrations ranged widely; some missions insisted on putting a wrench in the works of the colonial governments, others criticized the phenomena of colonialization to a greater or lesser degree, while others again actively supported and endorsed colonial interests.
But what gave rise to the mission movement that initiated the abovementioned missions? In the nineteenth century, a new type of Christian mission agency came into being: the so-called mission societies that were founded within the sphere of Protestantism. What was new about these societies was that they were not founded by those in mainstream of the churches, i.e., as a result of the intentional planning of the respective church bodies. Instead, they tended to develop on the fringes of churches, because those who initiated them were usually revived laypeople who founded benefit societies on their own initiative to promote Christian mission. Substantial revival movements in North America and England had prodded the consciences of many Christians to be mindful of the call to bring the gospel to all people, and these revival movements soon also spread to the European continent. The First Great Awakening took place in North America between 1726 and 1760, beginning in Dutch Reformed congregations. It was spearheaded by Calvinist Jonathan Edwards (1703–1758). There were three factors that contributed to it: first, a high esteem for Holy Scripture; second, a high esteem for the personal experience of faith; and third, as a consequence of the first two, a strong missionary desire for others to undergo a conversion experience as well. The immediate result was the implementation of local mission among Native Americans and settlers, an initiative known as the North American home missions.
Another missionary impulse—and this was a second source of the missionary movement—was constituted by Methodism, founded by brothers John Wesley (1703–1791) and Charles Wesley (1707–1788). The Wesley brothers served as missionaries in North America in 1735. After their return to England, both brothers were active as itinerant preachers. Their preaching was characterized by an emphasis on, first, spiritual rebirth, and second, a methodical pursuit of Christian ethics and the Christian way of life in general (hence the name Methodists). This led to a missionary consciousness that focused both on improving social conditions (the negative aspects of the Industrial Revolution, mass poverty, etc.) and on the personal conversion of the individual. This double focus still characterizes Methodism today.
The third source of the missionary movement in the nineteenth century was the so-called Second Great Awakening of 1787–1825. In North America and in England, it ultimately gave rise to developments that were felt as far as continental Europe. Many mission societies were founded as a result. The Baptist Missionary Society, founded in 1792 as a result of the work of famous missionary William Carey (1761–1824), served as the prototype for these new mission societies.12 Some of their characteristics were as follows: (1) Founded by laypeople, these societies (2) had a broad basis of support, i.e., many people who financed them; (3) they selected their own goals for their missionary work, i.e., they were not initiated by any churches, and (4) they deployed both lay missionaries and—very soon—highly trained missionaries as well, both ordained and lay. A whole range of additional mission societies were then founded at the beginning of the nineteenth century according to the model of the Baptist Missionary Society. William Carey is also significant as far as the theology of mission is concerned.13 After a conversion experience in 1779, Carey joined the Baptist church. In 1792 he authored the treatise An Enquiry into the Obligation of Christians to Use Means for the Conversion of the Heathens. In this publication he refuted an extreme Calvinist belief related to the concept of predestination, namely that mission is unnecessary since God will eventually bring about the conversion of the heathen anyway, i.e., without help from anybody. Carey countered this by emphasizing the Great Commission of Matthew 28 as his core justification for mission. For him, mission was not something relegated to the few, to certain particularly enlightened or gifted Christians; Carey viewed mission as the duty of every single Christian, both male and female. The impact of the book and of Carey’s sermons led the Baptists to found the Baptist Missionary Society (BMS) at their annual general meeting in 1792. In that same year, Carey left for Bengal as the first missionary of this society, where he arrived in 1793, learned Hindi, and later translated the Bible into Hindi and other Indian languages with the help of additional coworkers. In 1800 he established the Indian city Serampore as the center of this mission together with Joshua Marshman (1768–1837) and William Ward (1764–1823), fellow BMS missionaries who had followed him to India.
