A Rumor of the "Other" (part 2)

Ethnicity often creates an interesting challenge for the church. In this post, I would like to begin to form a basis for understanding the church's role in addressing issues of ethnicity which are prevelant in issues such as immigration,multi ethnicity in the church and other related issues.

One of the greatest challenges for the Christian church in our current context of globalization which is exasperated by large scale immigration and displacement is to explicitly and authentically express a missionary ecclesiology in terms of ethnic heterogeneity.
In recent history, missiology has had an important influence on ecclesiology. In the 1970’s Donald McGavran introduced missiological principles of the homogenous principle which sought to acknowledge the diversity in humanity and when coupled with a capitalized society driven by quantifiable outcomes resulted in the church growth movement (McGavran 1970). The implicit result was that churches were given license to ignore ethnicity other than their own. Churches which were homogenous in socio economic and phenotype descriptions formed ministry to people separated from them by these distinctions to others who were considered to be of homogeneous nature. With church growth at the center of this movement, the focus was on the church building and finding the most effective ways to get the highest number of people into the church building. This perspective of the church has influenced nearly every aspect of current evangelical churches.
Ironically, at the same time that the church growth movement of Donald McGavran who had been a missionary in India, was gaining force, Lesslie Newbigin (who was a contemporary of McGavern as a missionary to India), and later David Bosch began to articulate mission as a way to view ecclesiology in very different terms (Newbigin, 1978 Bosch, 1991). Instead of mission being used in pragmatic ways to attract people who were considered homogeneous into the church, mission became a theological expression to express the nature of God and in turn the true nature of the church. The expression of mission for Newbigin and Bosch was, in essence, opposite of that of McGavern. Instead of mission being a tool to get more people into the church, mission became a descriptive way to understand the nature of the church (Bosch). In primarily the past 10 years, this expression of the missio Dei which Karl Barth had presented through a paper at the 1952 conference of the World Council of Churches was carried forward by David Bosch and Lesslie Newbigin. This understanding has become popularized primarily by the Gospel in Our Culture Network into what is known today as missional theology or missional church.(Guder) Although ecclesiologically very different, the challenge of the missional church is the same as that of the church growth movement. That challenge is to find ways for the homogeneity of the body of Christ which is expressed in Galations 3:28 as well as Acts 2 to include and critically engage the ethnic heterogeneity of a fluid society. Instead of forming techniques as a solution and a way forward, I would like to address the nature of ethnicity within a missional ecclesiology as a systemic way forward.
Carrying the thesis of Lesslie Newbigin forward, Michael Goheen has described a missionary ecclesiology (Goheen). This is an epistemological change in how the church sees itself. Instead of being “a place where”, the church has become “a people who” live into the miseo Dei (Guder 1998). The result is that the church as the body of Christ is defined by its participation in God’s mission to all humanity instead of the terms of defining how to subdivide people or deciding what section of humanity should or should not be the marketing focus.
Lamin Sanneh reflects this same aspect of a missionary ecclesiology as he defines a distinct position for Christianity in the nature that it is meant to be carried from one culture to another. Sanneh defines the difference between what he calls mission by diffusion and mission by translation. Mission by diffusion is related to religion which expands from its initial cultural base and is implanted in other societies primarily as a matter of cultural identity. This would be consistent with the thesis of Edward Said who describes mission as a form of orientalization which is always an outsider to culture. Mission by translation, however, carries with it a deep theological vocation, which arises as an inevitable stage in the process of reception and adaptation. These two ways are not always easy to separate. “Mission by diffusion is unquestionably the stronger strand of Islam, whereas mission as translation is the vintage mark of Christianity” (Sanneh 1990, 29). A central theme for Sanneh is that “mission as translation makes the bold, fundamental assertion that the recipient culture is the authentic destination of God’s salvific promise ...it is the missio Dei that allowed translation to enlarge the boundaries of the proclamation” (1990, 31). Quite contrary to the homogeneous unit principal, the understanding of Sanneh is that Christianity is fundamentally not a faith of location, but rather is by nature a faith that finds its purpose as well as its identity beyond location. The implications of this for the church in a globalized context are enormous. Identity is found in Christ more than any other factor.
An interesting link to this line of thought is found in literature based in themes of community or pilgrimage. Paul D. Hanson’s biblical theology, (Hanson, 2001) describes a common thread in the nature of the people of God as ’community.‘ An interesting concomitant to community found in Hanson’s research is the theme of pilgrimage. Reflective of Paul Hieberts’ centered sets in which we move toward a common center (Hiebert, 1999), Hanson indicates that the person of faith remains a pilgrim in this world who looks yet “to the things that are unseen” (2 Cor. 4:18). And since that pilgrim shares with fellow believers, an important role in God’s plan for the redemption of creation, Paul’s eschatological paradox lies at the heart of his understanding of the community of faith (Hanson 2001, 444). In this sense, Hanson moves away from an individualistic approach to an apostolic calling and is indicating that the church is apostolic in nature, as it is called of God. Another key component of Hanson’s thesis is the forward-looking, eschatological nature of a biblical community that leans forward toward the fullness of the Kingdom of God. The community of faith was thus a pilgrim community. It oriented its life toward God’s future, as the people called to participate in the breaking of a divine order of Shalom (2001, 13). This emphasis on pilgrimage being an essential part of the Christian identity is found throughout Hanson’s research as he states that, “the true community of faith is thus a pilgrim people, seeing its forms and structures as provisional within a world being transformed from brokenness to wholeness” (2001, 493). Denise Buell (Buell,2005) proposes a similar thesis of a distinct identity of Christians which is not location centered when she states that the identity of Christians can be seen as a distinct race or ethnicity which includes or supersedes numerous ethnicities.
A focus on a missionary ecclesiology is reflected in a community which is not defined by bounded sets, concerned with who is “us” and who is “them”, but rather reflective of a pilgrim community which is focused on a common trajectory (centered set) or pilgrimage toward the Kingdom of God. This perspective does not ignore differences of language and ancestry which is self defined by a group, but rather works toward creative ways of reflecting the Kingdom of God so that the focal point is on pilgrimage toward the missio Dei and not on difference or growth as the Raison d'être.
The implications of a church which is concerned with living into the missio Dei instead of marketing has enormous implications beyond the scope of this short paper for the ways that ethnicity, mission and ecclesiology are intertwined. The current context of displacement, migration and globalization, however, necessitate an authentic expression of Christianity which takes seriously the incarnational model of being redemptive and Christian within our global context.
An ecclesiology which flows from an understanding of the missio Dei as the churches nature instead of an ecclesiology which flows from structures of business models or even identity based on nationality will take into account God’s mission to restore the imago Dei which is in all humanity and all cultures or ethnicities.

Lausanne 2010 Conference

Anticipating the Lausanne 2010 Conference to be held in Cape Town in October there is an excellent site with articles on current issues in mission that I highly recommend: http://conversation.lausanne.org/en

A Rumor of the "Other" (part 1)

by David Wesley

“Race”, when referring to people and ethnicity is normally not used in a positive sense. If you have watched any news in the past couple of months, issues of racial tension fueled by immigration issues, and never ending black/white conflict are as real today as they were 50 years ago. Ethnicity and race is a current and troublesome issue in any part of the globe that you travel. In a sense the problem is like a fire that has started and we have the option of throwing water or gasoline on the fire. The church has done both. I am going to post several posts under the title: “A Rumor of the “other”. I welcome your thoughts.
Polemic and volatile are two words that would describe issues of “race” and ethnicity in 2010. Even after a history of violence, human abuse and destruction, and even after nearly a century of working toward civil rights, social justice, and greater understanding of the nature of the human race, the struggle to live alongside the “other” is a major part of daily news, and the cause of daily mistreatment of human kind as well as large scale, global ethnic killing.
There is perhaps, no greater contribution that the church can make to modern society, but to be a source of healing in this current environment which has a distorted view of the “other”. Too often, however, the church has lost site of the substance of the Gospel as it strives toward structures which are efficient and quantifiable.
The calling to make Christ-like disciples is different from making religious customers of our particular organization or denomination. Large numbers of people coming to know Christ is a great thing, and we are to be about God’s task of redemption. We must, however, remember that the goal is not simply more people for a larger organization. The primary goal is always about making Christ like disciples.
In the past, there were times in which many Christian groups formed strategies in order to grow faster which focused on principles of church growth such as the homogeneous unit principle which built on the fact that a church will grow faster if the people in the congregation are similar in ethnicity or other aspects. The balance in which we work is that our primary identity as Christians is not ethnicity, skin color or political affiliation. Ethnicity as a social construct which if formed from within a group of people instead of by others, on the other hand should not be ignored and we need to celebrate the unique aspects of people groups which serve to give self identity and historical trajectory of culture. These aspects of ethnicity, however, should always be influenced by and subservient to the values of the Kingdom of God which we inherit as a new ethnic identity. “The issue is not how to make the world safe for cultural homogeneity. It is how to balance or rightly order two different identities –our social identity created by our culture, history, and social location and our spiritual identity informed by values of the Kingdom of God.”(Whiteman 2006:60) Too often we are more American, Korean, Kikuyu or Telugu than we are Christian. The challenge in our current global context is to be about forming Christ-like disciples whose ethnic identities is to be followers of Christ which redeems our social ethnicities.
In recent history we have seen what happens when ethnic specific religion degenerates into tribalism and racism as we have seen in the deaths of hundreds of thousands in many places around the globe.
If anything these examples from recent history reminds us that that the great commission is to make disciples, not just converts, and that these disciples must grow deep in understanding Jesus’ mandate to love and forgive our enemies. The disciple in a territorialized world must not only be taught to look upward to Jesus but also outward in love to those around them whom Jesus loves. If any group has a response to the terrorized and war torn sections of our globe, it is the body of Christ as it proclaims the optimistic and radical Gospel of reconciliation and relationship with God and with “others”.
“Tribalism” challenges us to build up holy disciples who know how to break down the barriers, the “dividing walls of hostility” through Christ.
The sent church must be first and foremost engaged in making Christ-like disciples who gather around Christ and not around marketing strategies or ethnicity.
It is to this focus of the church’s response to ethnicity in an environment of racial tension and misunderstanding that I will turn to next.

Saying “Goodbwyes”

by David Wesley

“Why can’t we get all the people together in the world that we really like and then just stay together? I guess that wouldn’t work. Someone would leave. Someone always leaves. Then we would have to say good-bye. I hate good-byes. I know what I need. I need more hellos.” – Charles M. Schulz


For those who are in the NTS initiative called 365m and are preparing to leave the U.S. to Brazil, Croatia and Ireland for a year of internship, language learning, culture learning and many other things, this month is a time of saying “goodbye” to family and friends for a year or two years in some cases. I don’t know about you, but I have had more than my share of saying “goodbye” and I do not particularly like it.

The history of “goodbye,” according to Answers.com (by the way, I’m not at all sure how accurate Answers.com really is, but I’m going to take its word on this one):
No doubt more than one reader has wondered exactly how goodbye is derived from the phrase “God be with you.” To understand this, it is helpful to see earlier forms of the expression, such as God be wy you, god b’w'y, godbwye, god buy’ ye, and good-b’wy. The first word of the expression is now good and not God, for good replaced God by analogy with such expressions as good day, perhaps after people no longer had a clear idea of the original sense of the expression. A letter of 1573 written by Gabriel Harvey contains the first recorded use of goodbye: “To requite your gallonde [gallon] of godbwyes, I regive you a pottle of howdyes,” recalling another contraction that is still used.

As you leave friends and family, I trust that you will trust that God will be with them and will also be with you. The good thing about this process is that for every “Goodbwyes” that you say, you will soon be saying hundreds of “howdyes” in Brazil, Croatia and Ireland.

Lessons Learned

One of the great things about teaching at Nazarene Theological Seminary is that there are often students who have advanced degrees in a variety of areas. There are also students who have amazing life experience, as well as those who have just graduated from university who are progressing in their academic growth by pursuing a graduate degree. In a seminar class of 12-15 students, all of these are often represented.

A few years ago, Nancy and Mark Pitts who both had advanced degrees, and who had successful careers in counseling and education (Mark had been the academic dean at NNU) were part of classes at NTS. They had come to NTS for a semester to “refocus” the tools that they already had toward a cross cultural setting at the Nazarene University in Kenya. The seminar classes with people such as Nancy and Mark in which people brought their expertise to the discussions were amazing to say the least.

In just the past month, Mark has accepted the role of provost at Point Loma Nazarene University in San Diego. The following is an interesting and wise piece that I copied from their blog: http://www.africonnection.org/

SOME THINGS WE LEARNED

In conclusion, some insights and thoughts about our time in Kenya:
• If we had it to do over again, would we make the same decision to spend three years in training and serving, WOULD we do it all again? Our answer is an enthusiastic "yes." It was a real experience with some aggravations and disappointments and challenges in it, of course. Even so, our time at Nazarene Theological and at Africa Nazarene University has been a highlight of our experience-blessed lives.
• We’ve learned that twenty-first century missionary training is very different from training and philosophy of missions a century ago. As a result, it’s useful to us in a variety of situations: listen more than we talk, cultivate partnerships, accept and allow for cultural differences, suspend quick judgment, avoid authoritarian language, accept that understanding comes in several layers over an extended period of time.
• We are encouraged and blessed by the energy and growth of the church in Africa.
• We are constantly amazed at and instructed by the quality and the level of commitment of the denominational leaders in Africa. No one there told us, “Be more like us”, but how do we process the fact that two of the people in this book are training to go back into a creative access area where they may be estranged from their families and their lives will be in jeopardy for sharing the gospel, where one interviewee was part of a house church in which 80% of the members were martyred in 18 months, where several of those we have spoken for these interviews and in other contexts have left jobs or training in engineering, veterinary medicine, or government service to follow the call of the gospel? As we return to the US, what do we do with the example of sacrifice made by some of the people featured in this book?
• Our clear and easy “answers” to some of the challenges in Africa have melted away as we understand better the complexity of the circumstances. We recall the essayist who said, “There is a simple answer to every complex life question, and that simple answer is always wrong.”
• While it’s true that there is poverty and corruption and disease in Africa, it is also true that Africa is making progress in many areas and that the global church needs to see Africa as a real place—not all safaris or all slums, but a place with gleaming shopping centers and well-travelled and well-dressed people and well-educated people as well as those struggling with the well-documented challenges.
• Because we have heard African denominational leaders say such things repeatedly, we believe that Wesleyan-Holiness is a unique and effective resource in addressing some of the key challenges in Africa. The idea of “prevenient grace” is good news to people for whom fatalism about the future is a natural response to great hardship. The idea that Christians are “co-laborers” with Christ is a powerful response to dependency. Our interviewees point to holiness over and over as an antidote to corruption and nominal Christianity if we dedicate ourselves more to imperfectly living it rather than to perfectly defining it.
• For ourselves, we are praising the Lord for the new opportunities he is providing, but admit to being in “listening and abiding” mode for his will beyond new business cards and position description. It’s so easy to see missionaries as the front line in evangelism and the Western world as a de-militarized zone, and yet the newspapers provide painful evidence that darkness is at work in comfortable American neighborhoods as well. In a powerful NPR interview before her death, Mother Teresa pointed to spiritual poverty as a more debilitating condition than economic poverty and encouraged First World people to engage close to home as well as far from it. As we said in our deputation services, we do believe this is part of what the Lord is telling us.
Finally, faithful readers of Africonnection and friends and colleagues and "fellow-travelers" on this journey of faith, we thank you more than we can express for your engagement, for your notes and face to face comments telling us you were reading, and for your kindnesses to us in other ways. The Church of the Nazarene, like all organizations, is changing, but we have benefited from the tradition of strong prayer and emotional support for missionaries. Two suggestions for you to consider: first, please do look for other international missionaries to whom you could extend some of your prayer and emotional support.

We'd also ask this--there is a new wind blowing that encourages committed Christians to have missionary hearts in more familiar settings. We hear occasionally from some young people or people in transition who say--"I'm wanting to serve God in a deeper way. Is there some work I can do in Africa?" Now the answer to that question is always "yes," but we worry a bit that the reason it's phrased that way is because serving in Africa (or to some extent in China or in India) has been seen as kind of the "gold standard" for service and commitment.

Even some of our African friends, though, are saying to us--why don't your people serve closer to home? And of course Americans DO serve close to home--in all kinds of volunteer or service organizations, paid and upaid but it would be so wonderful if the church could extend its emotional and spiritual support in deeper, richer ways to those "local, tent-maker missionaries" and to see the work THEY do as part of a new "gold standard." Could you look for someone like that and give them the level of support and prayer you have given us? Many of you will say--I'm already doing that, and we thank you for, as usual, being way ahead of us in your insights and faithfulness, but one final thought--any chance the Lord is asking YOU to be that "new era, local, tent-making missionary"?

For ourselves, we believe this new kind of missionary service is what God is calling us to, but we are feeling our way and praying for God's daily guidance and insight. The path is not clear, the job description and parameters of this new chapter are not set. You won't be getting these blog posts anymore (somehow pictures of lions from the San Diego Zoo just don't have the same "zing" as pictures from Maasai Mara!). But we would covet your prayers and we will be praying for you that each of us can have insights about what God is calling us to do in this new era where ALL missionaries hearts are moved, but only SOME missionaries addresses change. Blessings on you, thank you again, and best wishes as you seek the Lord's will for your own area of service.

Yes We Have More Tomatoes

A couple of months ago I posted some comments in a piece entitled “What’s a Tomato?” This really didn't have anything to do with tomatoes, but I began a conversation about the changing nature of mission which has left us in a quandary in which it is hard to even identify missions. I also mentioned the enormous need to focus mission in what many call ‘incarnational mission’. I would like to pick up that conversation and reflect on some of the shifts in how mission is viewed which are at the center of the changes in mission.
An interesting trend in current missions is a movement away from mission as building structures and the organization and a move toward mission as relationship and reconciliation. Coupled with this emphasis of mission as relationship is the enormous amounts of money which are tied to mission as development. These trends as they connect to the growing phenomenon of short-term missions have resulted in a change in which mission is viewed completely different than it was just 15 to 20 years ago.
I see these changes as potentially very positive changes since they are moves away from mechanical approaches to mission and changes which have a greater focus on relationship and on human interaction. A few years ago I stayed at the home of Anthropologist, Paul Hiebert while I was in Chicago for PhD seminars. One evening as we were chatting over bowls of ice cream, Paul said, “the tension in mission is that we thought that structures or organizations are eternal and that people are dispensable, when in reality it is just the opposite.” Hiebert’s words have haunted me ever since. Too many times we sacrifice people in order to advance the organization. In the current (young) generation, however, there is a significant move toward mission as relationship and focused on people. This is a positive change. These changes, however, present their own challenges for God’s mission to not get lost in mission which is anthrocentric so that mission is just something that is beneficial for me as I gain social capital and self fulfillment.
I have attached a short video clip of Dana Robert who teaches at Boston College and was also a keynote speaker at the Edinburgh 2010 Conference. Dr. Robert discusses this shift and the challenge it presents for missions. This is a fascinating area to discuss and I welcome your thoughts.

Assembly Required

Although the instructions say “read all instructions before assembling”, when it comes to purchasing something that needs to be assembled, I am one of those types of people who will dig into trying to assemble, and will read the instructions as I go along instead of reading the complete instructions first. This probably says a lot about the way I learn. Some people prefer to know the theory and basis of something before moving to practical application. I learn better if I can mix hands on experience with theoretical understanding. Many people learn that way, and yet educational systems tend to focus on learning for the “instructions first” type people. For those of us who are educators, there are incredible opportunities due to technology to either bring experiences into the class room or to allow students to be in a context outside of the traditional classroom where technology can allow students to interact with sources which give theoretical or broader understanding of what they are experiencing. At NTS where I teach, we have designed a pilot program which will begin in just a couple of weeks which explores this type of learning by allowing students to be in a global context, but to have connection to interactive learning experiences which integrates practice with theory. I will be posting more about this exciting new initiative over the next few weeks, but for now I have attached the link to an interesting podcast which is an interview with Chris Dede who teaches at Harvard. The focus of this interview is the integration of learning styles with technology. If you have creative ideas for me, I welcome your thoughts.

http://www.educause.edu/blog/jcummings/ChrisDedeonEmergingTechnologie/166539

The Case of Ota Benga

It is hard to imagine that the Bronx Zoo would place a human being on display along with animals, but that is precisely what happened to a man by the name of Ota Benga.
One hundred years ago, on September 8th, 1906, the Bronx Zoo in New York unveiled a new exhibit that would attract thousands of visitors to come and marvel. Inside a cage, in the monkey house, was a man. His name was Ota Benga. He was 22 years old, a member of the Batwa people, pygmies who lived in what was then, the Belgian Congo
Ota Benga first came to the United States in 1904. The St. Louis World's Fair had hired Samuel Phillips Verner, an American explorer and missionary, to bring African pygmies to the exposition.
After the World's Fair, Verner, as promised, took the Africans back to their country. But Ota Benga found that he didn't fit in at "home" anymore — all the members of his particular tribe had been annihilated during his time away — and he asked Verner to take him back to the United States.
That's when Ota Benga ended up at the Bronx Zoo . It's estimated that 40,000 visitors a day came to see him.
At the same time, a group of African-American ministers mounted a vigorous protest.
From an article in The New York Times on Sept. 10, 1906:
"The person responsible for this exhibition degrades himself as much as he does the African," said Rev. Dr. R. MacArthur of Calvary Baptist Church. "It is too bad that there is not some society like the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. We send our missionaries to Africa to Christianize the people, and then we bring one here to brutalize him."
The Bronx Zoo soon ended the exhibit, and the ministers' group moved Ota Benga to the Howard Colored Orphan Asylum in Brooklyn. He stayed there for a short time before being relocated to Lynchburg, Va., where various families housed him and tried to help him live a normal life.
Ota Benga lived in Lynchburg until March 1916, when he borrowed a gun from one of his host families, went to the woods on the edge of the town, and shot himself.
Ota Benga was one of many people who were placed on display during the 1906 fair. Placed on display and treated less than human simply because they were what some would call “they” or “the other”. The same story can be told of African slaves as well as people today who are enslaved. How we perceive and treat “others” has everything to do with our humanity and everything to do with our faith. To un humanize or sub humanize others perhaps says more about “us” than what it says about “them”. We may excuse what happened to Ota Benga as an issue of many years ago, but we still wrestle with the same core issue of how we view others. Others who may be Iranian. Others who may be Muslim. Others who may be homosexual. Others who are Democrat or Republican. Others who are not like me. For those of us who profess Christianity, Ota Benga’s story paints a vivid reminder that understanding and respect must come before disagreement. It also reminds us that who we perceive others perhaps is the greatest identifier of who we are.

We and They

Primarily during the past 300 years, nations have tried to define race and ethnicity as a way of defining who is "in" and more importantly who is "out". We have used categories of skin color, language, beliefs, and documentation as ways to differentiate between "us" and "them". Anthropologists, lawyers and even clergy from the 17th to the early 20th century went to elaborate measures to define who was "white" so that they could define who was not "white" and thus be excluded from the rights and priveledges that a "white" person had. Sadly to say, this type of definition for categorizing people has been a practice of nations, but in some cases has also been a practice of congregations which are highly concerned about building tight definitions concerning who is "them" and should thus be exluded from "us". I have copied a poem, ironically from Rudyard Kipling entitled "We and They". I welcome your thoughts:

We and They
By Rudyard Kipling
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



Father and Mother, and Me,
Sister and Auntie say
All the people like us are We,
And every one else is They.
And They live over the sea,
While We live over the way,
But-would you believe it? They look upon We
As only a sort of They!

We eat pork and beef
With cow-horn-handled knives.
They who gobble Their rice off a leaf,
Are horrified out of Their lives;
While they who live up a tree,
And feast on grubs and clay,
(Isn't it scandalous?) look upon We
As a simply disgusting They!

We shoot birds with a gun.
They stick lions with spears.
Their full-dress is un.
We dress up to Our ears.
They like Their friends for tea.
We like Our friends to stay;
And, after all that, They look upon We
As an utterly ignorant They!

We eat kitcheny food.
We have doors that latch.
They drink milk or blood,
Under an open thatch.
We have Doctors to fee.
They have Wizards to pay.
And (impudent heathen!) They look upon We
As a quite impossible They!

All good people agree,
And all good people say,
All nice people, like Us, are We
And every one else is They:
But if you cross over the sea,
Instead of over the way,
You may end by (think of it!) looking on We
As only a sort of They!

Brazil

Missionaries are incredible people. I just spent the last two days with Manuel and Lidia Lima who are missionaries from Sao Paulo Brazil who went to Manaus in the Amazon of Brazil to pioneer the work for the Church of the Nazarene about four years ago in an area where thousands of communities are scattered along the enormous Black River. Of the estimated 32,000 communities in that area, only 12,000 have any kind of church. This week, as I was meeting with the Limas to work out details for NTS students to live in Manaus and learn from them, I was impressed at their vision of doing the difficult work of building long term relationships and living into the missio Dei through incarnation mission in a complex and sensitive area.
On Thursday we took an 80 km boat trip up the Black River where we met with some people who live in remote areas who told us stories of God’s grace in their lives. Being directionally challenged, it is a good thing that I was not in charge of directions with all of the tributaries and possibilities of making wrong turns. Fortunately Manuel has a handheld GPS that gave us directions along the Black River through the Amazon.
It is always exciting to hear people tell about “hinge” moments in their life that change them from just existing to really living. On this trip I heard a story like this. I don’t even remember his name, but he was a father in a community along the Black River. Over 50 miles into the Amazon and 50 miles from the nearest hospital or medical care, this father of a young girl in the Amazon told us that a year ago, his daughter was running out of the house with a knife and fell, running the large knife deep into her small frame. In panic he picked up his bleeding daughter, carried her to his canoe and began making his way up the Black River. He said that he knew that it would take hours to make it up the river to Manaus, but he was a father and he had to try. Just three miles up the river, he said that he couldn’t believe his eyes. A large houseboat was there in front of a neighboring community with a group of volunteer doctors that the Church of Nazarene had brought. He pulled his canoe up to the large boat and asked for help. Incredibly, the doctors stopped the bleeding in his daughter and were able to operate and save her life. With great emotion, he told us that this changed his life forever. Just as he finished telling us this story, his daughter came running by on her way to school. The picture above is of this girl with Manuel Lima. This is just a reminder that we all need to enjoy the gift of life and appreciate the relationships that we have with those around us.
During my trip I enjoyed the company of Dr. Steve Hofferbert who, although he lives in Campinas which has had missionary influence for many years, is doing creative pioneer work in education as a part of team for the formation of a new university in Brazil. Steve will be the academic mentor for the NTS students who will be in Brazil for 365m.
This has been a fast and furious week in Brazil. I am excited about the learning experience students will have to learn about culture, language and ministry from some amazing people throughout Brazil.

The missio Dei at the City Dump

I have spent my second day in Rio de Janeiro in the city dump just outside the city observing a truly missional church. Approximately 70% of the congregation in Nilopolis which is in Rio de Janeiro are actively involved in ministry outside of the church. One of those ministries is to a community which has the name Esqueleto, which means skeleton in English. This is an entire community of approximately 40,000 people who live on what they can collect at the city dump. The “homes” that people live in are made from scraps of wood and other things that they have found in the dump. As we made our way through this area which had all of the sites and smells of a city dump with scavenger birds circling overhead, we came to a church building which was constructed with funds from the people of the Nilopolis church. As we went inside, the contrast between the piled garbage around the church and the impeccable cleanliness inside the church was incredible. This building is used for education programs for the children and families around the church as well as church services. The pastor who is from the Nilopolis church is well educated and articulate. I don’t know very many pastors who would strive to pastor a church in a city dump. This is a pastor who is definitely following in the footsteps of Christ. While we are walking around the “community”, an elderly woman who was wearing clothes that appeared to be from her findings pulled the pastor aside. As they were talking, she handed the pastor a handful of Brazilian Reales which were dirty, sweaty and crumpled. The pastor told us that this woman had just sold some trash that she had collected and that this was her offering to the church. The pastor himself was overwhelmed with this offering of about $7, and said that this was an enormous sacrifice for this woman.

There are several areas around Rio de Janeiro where students in 365m will be learning from and serving alongside the people of the Nilopolis church. Esqueleto will, undoubtedly, be one of those that is a life changing experience.

This afternoon, we will travel to Manaus where we will meet with missionaries about learning opportunities for 365m students there.

WHAT IS A TOMATO?

As little as ten years ago, one could say that there is an idea which is accepted as much by intellectuals as well as ordinary people who go about their daily business that everyone knows what mission is. The idea of mission is a self-evident “fact”, requiring no great thought. Today, that is not the case.
There is an interesting new television program called “Food Revolution” which you may have seen. In this series, a chef who is working toward healthy cooking and eating goes into a community which is reported to be the unhealthiest city in the U.S. with the objective to make a real impact. The following clip show how the chef held up various items such as tomatoes and potatoes which students could not identify. He then held up a chicken nugget and a pizza which they identified with loud screams and immediate recognition. http://www.hulu.com/watch/138202/jamie-olivers-food-revolution-test-moment
How is it that children in this community could actually get to the point where they recognize the processed form of chicken nuggets and pizza, but cannot recognize a tomato?
In a similar vein, when I am in churches as a mission speaker, I often teach a combined adult Sunday School class before the service. On many occasions I write the words “missionary, missions, mission and missional” up front and ask them to identify what these words mean. As little as ten years ago, there was a common understanding of what it meant to be a missionary, and what was meant by missions. I have found that in the past three years, however, the word “missions” is understood as anything the church does, in any location and for any reason. A missionary is understood as anyone who is a member of a church. (although I would agree that every member is involved in mission, membership does not make a person a missionary) There is another strand of thought that I often encounter which involves people who view missions in a colonialistic sense of “fixing” people with money and technology.
Although the word “mission” or “missional” are in vogue right now, with conferences using them in their titles and churches including them in their daily language, is it possible, that we are like the children who couldn’t recognize a tomato? Is it possible that we don’t recognize the essential nature of God’s mission in our globalized society?
In the video clip of Oscar Muriu which was my last post, Muriu gives us a framework to understand mission which is harsh to our consumeristic ears, but which is interestingly in harmony with a biblical understanding of mission.
Incarnation is a theological framework in which we realize that the message of the Gospel is housed in the messenger. We don’t give money to have the gospel delivered; neither do we devise programs that tell people about the gospel. In the words of Paul “we have this treasure in jars of clay”. That has enormous implications for those of us who are part of churches that believe more in “come and see” rather than “go and be”. We have come to believe that mission is dependent on money and strategy alone, and we have even come to the point where we even think that it is our money that can “buy the mission of God” by promising that every three dollars donated will result in one soul saved (see http://www.jfhp.org/about/index.cfm).
I am often asked why we send long term missionaries to other countries when the need is so great in the U.S. and when financial resources are limited (the same question could be asked of any country that sends missionaries). Wouldn’t it be more effective to rely on short-term missions or since we live in a “flat world” where technology is readily available, why don’t we just send the Jesus Film or send scripture over the internet instead of sending missionaries? To use Muriu’s words “if I were God”, perhaps I would do it that way. God, however, choose to embody (incarnate) His Mission in fragile clay jars such as us. Mission is not a program or a way to gain clients. Mission is who we are as the body of Christ, or to use the classic observation of Marshall McLuhan: "the medium is the message” and God is the scriptwriter who stamps His image on us so that we may “reflect His Glory”.
I don’t love my neighbor because the bible says so, I love my neighbor because I reflect God’s nature of love which has become part of who I am. In that sense, I can truly love. In the same sense, mission is not something we buy or something we do, mission is who we are as we reflect God’s nature of mission.

Money, Power and Mission

Oscar Muriu is Senior Pastor at the Nairobi Chapel in Nairobi. He was invited to speak at Urbana 09 and used the platform to deliver one of the most intelligent, powerful and moving messages on the subject of Incarnational ministry that you're ever likely to hear. Let's talk about this:

Money and Power: Oscar Muriu from Urbana 09 on Vimeo.

Partnerships

Every year more than 1.6 million people from the U.S. participate in short-term mission trips which normally last from 5-15 days. As growing numbers of people go to minister with Christians in other parts of the world, many are working to make this type of ministry more effective through greater cultural awareness and recognition of the wisdom that can be found in mutually edifying relationships. One of the ways that large churches, inparticular are exploring is that of congregation to field partnerships in which the local church focuses on one particular area of the world over an extended period of time. Instead of a local church sending teams to as many different places as possible, the partnership model sends short-term mission teams to a focused area of the world in order to foster a sustained, collaborative work. The following clip is from a worship service at Bethany, Oklahoma First Church of the Nazarene. This church has made a ten year commitment to work in partnership with Swaziland. This clip is interesting because it demonstrates a partnership in worship and also gives a glipse into some of the partnership initiatives in Swaziland. True partnership in this type of relationship is difficult at best and I am sure that there are many shortcomings in this particular example. It is, however, an interesting move on the part of a local church and the church in Swaziland.

Amazing, horrifying as well as incredible stories keep coming out from Haiti. One particular scene was on CNN which I saw this morning. A group of people, with faces covered in soot and standing in the midst of their crumbled life where singing a song in Creole. I recognized the tune to the hymn:

“Jesus knows all about our struggles, He will guide till the day is done; There's not a friend like the lowly Jesus, No, not one! No, not one!
“There's not an hour that He is not near us, No, not one! no, not one!
No night so dark, but His love can cheer us, No, not one! no, not one!”

Several things come to mind when looking at this. First is that there is a lot that I can learn from amazing people like this who have learned to live by faith in ways that show trust beyond what is seen. I also thought of Dr. Paul Orjala who was a missionary and linguist in Haiti. Paul loved music and a major part of his ministry was teaching Hymns to people. I don’t know if the legacy of missionaries like Paul Orjala was the source of these brave Haitian’s song, but due to the high influence that missionaries had in introducing hymns, there is a good change that the gift of music gave these Haitians reason to hope that Jesus not only knows, but he is with us.

There is no way to make sense of all that is happening in Haiti, but I lift up my brothers and sisters today who are bearing unfathomable pain.

Searching for Authenticity (Conclusion)

So what? After the series of three posts, a natural question surfaces; “so what?” or what are the implications to all of this? I originally wrote this as I was working through some ideas about short-term missions, and so the following are implications for short-term missions.

“If short-term missions are so costly and seem to have very few actual benefits (and may even have adverse results); “why do so many people feel compelled to participate in short-term missions?”
There are a variety of answers that can be given to this question which go beyond short-term mission simply being a new and passing fad of the church, or a simply a well marketed business.

The first indicator is the sociological ambience out of which short-term missions has emerged. Christianity (as well as other faiths) has historically expanded or adapted in movement with historical or sociological shifts. The expansion of Europe which came into being through newly discovered navigation technology, and which resulted in each expanding nation to establish ‘ownership’ of new territories in varied ways (Seed) also was the ambience in which Christianity expanded.

Similar to the Celtic Christians whose pilgrimages focus on a spiritual benefit for themselves, short-term missions is a shift in missions giving and participation. Although the findings of Priest, VerBeek, and others are that the benefits of short-term missions appear to be different than the “urban legends”, and although findings in tourism anthropological studies, such as Hutnyk indicate that the orientalistic perceptions that people carry with them are often a type of consumerism of the poor, there is consistent findings that there is greater benefit for those who participate in going on a short-term mission trip than those who host short-term missions teams. If this assumption is true, then it would appear that much of the motivation for continued short-term missions emerges from self gratification or even the capital which is gained from acts of charity.

Beyond the underlying sociological and even ethnocentric motivations behind short-term missions, I would argue that there is an element in which short-term missions as Christian pilgrimage is not only a natural expression of the missio Dei, but provides a basis for missions that engages the whole church in the whole mission of God. A balanced aspect of the practice of short-term mission is found in Miriam Adeney’s work (2003,2006). Her aspect of the shalom tourist, is an expression of Christian pilgrimage which takes into account the needed respect and care for host locations of short-term missions. A difficult question was raised by Oscar Muriu, pastor of the Calvary Church in Nairobi, Kenya at a conference on short-term missions at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School (July,2009). Muriu asked, “how does short-term missions follow the example of Christ, giving up power?” Continuing, Muriu stated that the problem is that we model mission only on the great commission – the “go and do passage” and don’t take into consideration the Philippians 2 passage which state that Christ went—not because of resources that He had, but because of His humility. Jesus chose to be incarnate into poverty. In Matt. 10, Jesus gave the same call to His disciples. True Christian pilgrimage should be transformational for those who go, but should also reflect that their going is not an expression of their resources, but rather a reflection of their Christianity.

Perhaps, the phrase “short-term missions” is not the best description of this phenomenon. A major problem that has emerged in the recent literature on short-term missions is that people perceive their trip as a short-term participation in mission which begins when they board a plane and ends when they return home. In this sense, mission is strictly defined by location. Perhaps a better aspect of this phenomenon is to find ways to make short-term missions more than just a short project, but rather, a continuous way to live. I would argue that a good descriptor of this which is consistent with a scripture and which is in harmony with much of the Christian tradition is that of pilgrimage which is not defined by crossing salt water or by boarding a plane, but rather pilgrimage in the sense of a centered set in which the focus of the Christian pilgrim is Christ and His mission. Another way to describe this would be to use Lamin Sanneh’s articulation of mission by translation. With this understanding, short-term mission trips become a pilgrimage which begins long before a person boards a plane and continues long after they return home. The activities of those who participate in short-term missions in this light are activities which are incarnation in nature and which partner with a long term perspective of God’s mission.

Whereas the reading for this study focused on describing the context which fosters the phenomenon of short-term mission, further research which focuses on the relationships between pilgrimage and short-term missions connected with research related missionary ecclesiology could give a framework for constructive development of short-term mission practice in the future.

Searching for Authenticity (Part III)

This is the third (and I think the last) part of this three part saga.

Similar to the Celtic peregrini was the early Jesuits of the 15th century. John O’Malley (1993) gives an interesting perspective of how the early Jesuits, primarily between 1540 and 1590 viewed themselves and their purpose which, in many ways is not unlike that of the Celtic Christians. Later Jesuits (after 1590) became intertwined in the political and social power struggles of the Roman Catholic Church. These Jesuits became identified with ministry of “location” such as educational efforts which required them to remain in one place over a long period of time. The Jesuits of the 16th century (1540-1590) however, saw themselves primarily as pilgrims or apostles who like Paul moved from place to place with the urgency to spread the Gospel as they went. In these examples, the Celtic Christians were not unlike much of the contemporary short-term mission movement which does not focus primarily on evangelism, but rather on what earlier Christians would call works of piety.

One clarification, I believe is necessary at this point. Definition of “place” and “journey” are broader than simple locations of a building or a trip. A primary difference between many aspects of historic pilgrimage and pilgrimage as I am describing it is that historically, the primary motivation for pilgrimage was to go to sacred spaces, and it was therefore very focused on “place”. The shift that I am describing and which is articulated by the sources that I am referencing is that pilgrimage has become something other than a focus on “place”, it is a movement toward community (social bonding capital) and a movement toward authentic faith. This type of pilgrimage is often expressed in physical journeys, but the physical journey itself does not make it pilgrimage as I am describing.

Similar aspects of a focus away from location to a focus on journey or pilgrimage are evident in the writings of mission theology which builds on an understanding of the missio Dei as the central identity of Christianity. (Newbigin 1978, Bosch 1991, Guder 1998, Goheen 2000). The focus of these writings is a move away from an ecclesiology of location toward what Michael Goheen calls missionary ecclesiology.
In his book, The Open Secret, Lesslie Newbigin develops a missionary ecclesiology out of a Trinitarian approach to missions. “Newbigin’s approach to the theology of mission underwent a significant change of emphasis in the 1960’s, particularly as a result of the WCC’s New Delhi assembly in 1961.”(Weston 2006, 81) Before this time, Newbigin (as well as most others) saw the Church as the primary ‘agent’ in the work of world mission, or to use Wuthnow and Putnam term, “location”. During the New Delhi assembly, however, he began to understand that a Trinitarian approach which set the work of the trinity instead of the Church as the primary agent of mission as an understanding that would do justice to what the Bible said related to God’s Mission. This development can be seen in The Open Secret in which Newbigin argues that “a Trinitarian approach to mission holds together three facets of the work of God in a dynamic and creative tension: the ‘proclamation’ of the Kingdom (in the authority of the Father), the ‘presence’ of the Kingdom (in and through the Son), and the ‘prevenience’ of the Kingdom (through the ministry of the Spirit who ‘goes before’ the Church in its missionary work)” (Newbigin 1978,72). This core Trinitarian understanding of mission is not particularly new in Newbigin, David Bosch builds on the ecclesiology of Karl Barth in a more explicit way than does Newbigin and comes to many of the same conclusions that mission is not an activity of the church, but rather the very nature of the Triune God reflected in the church (Bosch 1991, 373-380). Church and mission are interdependent elements in Bosch as well as Newbigin. This is clearly seen in the words of David Bosch; “It has become impossible to talk about the church without at the same time talking about mission. One can no longer talk about church and mission, only about the mission of the church…A church without mission or a mission without church are both contradictions.” (1991, 372).

A trinitarian or missional hermeneutic points out that scripture does not particularly give a foundation for developing missions, but that the missio Dei is foundational for understanding all of scripture since mission is God’s nature (Wright 2006). In the New Testament, the Church sends apostles to people of varied ethnic groups. The church, however, did not limit mission to sending missionaries to “the ends of the earth.”As the body of Christ which reflects Gods nature of mission, The Church didn’t just have missionaries; the Church itself was the missionary in Jerusalem, Judea, and Samaria as well as to the ends of the earth. Another way to state this perspective is to say that the church is not just a sending church; rather it is a “sent” church (Guder 1998). The emphasis is not on church as “location”, but rather on church as a people who are reflecting the mission nature of God.

Seminal work which describes this shift in postmodern culture was done by Paul Hiebert (1994) who described epistemological shifts in terms of bounded and centered sets. Heibert describes a bounded set, as a grouping with well defined bounds. A centred set groups things on the basis of how they relate to other things. For the sake of this study, a church that is defined by location could be defined in terms of a bounded set. The primary boundaries would be church membership and focus on identity with the location or structure. The societal as well as theological shift, however, that is defined, not according to identity with location, but rather pilgrimage, could be defined in terms of what Heibert calls a centered set since the church would be defined by its center, the Triune God of Scripture. The trouble with the former, writes Hiebert, is that this may become too exacting and exclusive, while an advantage of the latter is that Jesus Christ becomes the focus of all that the Church is and does.

Interestingly, this theological shift which defines the church in relation to the missio Dei instead of location is parallel with sociological movements in the U.S. which reflect a general movement of society toward meaning or reality that is discovered in pilgrimage or to use Heiberts terms, a centered set. These are also parallels to the phenomenon of short-term missions which is a move away from a professionalization of missions in which mission activity is professionalized through structures and organizations which prepare, send and filter missionaries toward what Ralph Winter has called “re-amateurization of missions” similar to that of the Student Volunteer Movement (1996). Although there are similarities in short-term missions and the Student Volunteer Movement, I would argue that there is more dissimilarity which flows out of the socio ecclesiological context which has fostered short-term missions and which is quite different than the context out of which the Student Volunteer Movement emerged.

Although it is evident that the phenomenon of short-term missions has occurred within the atmosphere of social change, it is debatable if this shift away from a focus on location to a focus on pilgrimage is a shift that is contrary to the essence of the Christian Church. Perhaps it could more safely be argued that it is unnatural for the church to focus primarily on location and consider mission as something that is above and beyond the normality of the church.
If it is within the nature of God and in turn, within the nature of the church to be translated from one context to another, this would indicate obstacles as the Gospel is carried from societies which are perceived as societies of power. Some have stated that it is inevitable that movement from cultures which have been “colonializers” to other parts of the world is by nature oppressive and racist (Said 1978). In this understanding, Christianity would by nature be bound to location or would inevitably be colonialistic as they carry the gospel from one location to another.

Similar to the thesis of Edward Said is the work of anthropologist, John Hutnyk (1996). In his book, The rumour of Calcutta: Tourism, charity and the poverty of representations, instead of exploring the people of Calcutta as a normal approach for anthropologists, his study is focused on those who visit Calcutta. There is a wealth of parallel theory and implications to short-term missions since Hutnyk focuses on people who travel to Calcutta on a budget, mostly from North America, Europe and Australia. Like short-term mission travelers, budget travelers (or backpack travelers) come not to bask in the glory of the Raj, but to explore the underbelly of Asia and to do some volunteer work in order to alleviate their guilt. Hutnyk explains that although these travelers (like short-term mission travelers) have the best of motives, like short-term mission travelers, they do not question the way they frame their exposure to Calcutta. They frame or represent what they see, based on what Hutnyk calls “the rumours of Calcutta”. He states, “they have heard the ‘rumour of Calcutta, the imagery by which the city is known. For them the city is already enframed” (Hutnyk 1996, 163). This framing is similar to Edward Said’s argument that the colonializers often ‘orientalize’ the other based on ‘the rumour’. In a similar vein is Robert Priest’s article, Missionary Positions: Christian, Modernist, Postmodernist (Priest, 2001) which questions the ‘rumour’ related to the origins of term ‘missionary position’ as a means of orientalism or a way of enframing a ‘rumoured’ perception of missionaries. In the case of Calcutta, Hutnyk points out that budget travelers, have a perception before they arrive (the rumour) which provides the framework by which they will experience the city. Similar to John Urry’s (2002) perception of the ‘tourist gaze’, Hutnyk says that this ‘enframing’ leads to a problematic aspect in which Third World tourism participates in a voyeuristic consumption of poverty (1996,11). This consumption by what Hutnyk calls budget travelers of backpack travelers, which are parallel to short-term mission travelers includes photographs and souvenirs, but also entails ‘good works’ experiences and cultural capital. The ties between Hutnyk’s work and short-term missions are unmistakable and disturbing. The interesting connection related to this study is that this class of tourist which Hutnyk describes are people who are critical of what he calls “modern lodge” tourists who are explicitly seeking their own comfort and a sense of similarity to their home. He also points out that these backpacking travelers are also in search for ‘authentic experiences’ (1996,9), and a ‘once in a lifetime experience’, which, is often warped by ‘enframing’, but which is similar to Wuthnow’s and Putnam’s theory of a search for authenticity.

Contrary to the theories of Said and Hutnyk, Lamin Sanneh (Sanneh), defines a distinct position for Christianity as the gospel is carried from one culture to another. Sanneh defines the difference between what he calls mission by diffusion and mission by translation. Mission by diffusion is related to religion which expands from its initial cultural base and is implanted in other societies primarily as a matter of cultural identity. This would be consistent with the observations of Said and Hutnyk. Mission by translation, however, carries with it a deep theological vocation, which arises as an inevitable stage in the process of reception and adaptation. These two ways are not always easy to separate. “Mission by diffusion (, however,) is unquestionably the stronger strand of Islam, whereas mission as translation is the vintage mark of Christianity”(Sanneh 1990,29). A central theme for Sanneh is that “mission as translation makes the bold, fundamental assertion that the recipient culture is the authentic destination of God’s salvific promise ...it is the missio Dei that allowed translation to enlarge the boundaries of the proclamation”(1990,31). The understanding of Sanneh is that Christianity is fundamentally not a faith of location, but rather is by nature, a faith that finds its purpose as well as its identity as it moves beyond location.
In Paul D. Hanson’s biblical theology (Hanson), a common thread of the nature of the people of God is “community”. An interesting concomitant to community found in Hanson’s research is the theme of pilgrimage. Reflective of Paul Hieberts centered sets in which we move toward a center, Hanson indicates that the person of faith remains a pilgrim in this world, who looks yet “to the things that are unseen” (2 Cor. 4:18). And since that pilgrim shares with fellow believers an important role in God’s plan for the redemption of creation, Paul’s eschatological paradox lies at the heart of his understanding of the community of faith (Hanson 2001,444). In this sense, Hanson moves away from an individualistic approach to apostolic calling and is indicating that the church is apostolic in nature, as it is called of God. Another key component of Hanson’s thesis is the forward-looking, eschatological nature of biblical community which leans forward toward the fullness of the Kingdom of God. The community of faith was thus a pilgrim community. It oriented its life toward God’s future, as the people called to participate in the in breaking of a divine order of shalom (2001, 13). This emphasis on pilgrimage being an essential part of the Christian identity is found throughout Hanson’s research as he states that “the true community of faith is thus a pilgrim people, seeing its forms and structures as provisional within a world being transformed from brokenness to wholeness” (2001,493).

Searching for Authenticity (Part II)

To those who are reading along in this series of articles, this is the second post. This post fundamentally asks where or how we search for authenticity. It includes some elements which you may not agree with or which you would like to dialog further about. I invite your observations.

In literature related to spirituality, this duality of dwelling and seeking can be seen as a phenomenon that goes beyond contemporary social trends. Philip Sheldrake describes this duality between the spirituality in place and spirituality that is found in journey (1996) as he describes the early Celtic traditions before 700 which describe primarily a faith of transition between the fixed stable life and the more unstable life-styles of what he calls the holy wanderers. Perhaps the recent social shifts described by Putnam and Wuthnow help to explain the present fascination with Celtic Christianity. Sheldrake points out that many of the current perceptions of Celtic Christianity are not all together accurate. The “myth”, however, that has developed about Celtic Christianity resonates deeply with societal shifts away from a spirituality of place to a spirituality of journey. Celtic Christianity seems to embrace a more contextual, grounded, varied yet uncomplicated, messy, even chaotic faith and spirituality than the conventional, institutional forms (Sheldrake 1996, 3). According to Sheldrake, The importance of pilgrimage and journey in the Celtic tradition, balanced with a strong sense of place, are sentiments that are very much in tune with the experience and temper of our own age (1996, 3) and are perhaps a clue to the connection in short-term missions to expressions of “finding reality” when people travel for short-term missions. A physical journey that acts out an inner journey, therefore, may be understood as one factor that differentiates this type of travel from many forms of modern tourism outside of what has been called niche tourism.

In the introduction of Tourism: Between Place and Performance, Coleman and Crang (2004) describe a form of moving away from location and toward discovery. Their focus is somewhat distinct from that of Wuthnow and Putnam as they describe various modes of tourism. One particular mode that they describe draws from George Ritzer’s foundational “McDonaldization Theory” (2008). This particular mode of tourism, according to Coleman and Crang is about expanding the space of home rather than visiting the other (2008, 2). In this sense, they are moving toward a type of location, but in reality they may just be taking their own location on a trip. Reflective of many short-term missions trips, this form of tourism is associated with the McDonaldization of travel in which tourists seek out tourist space such as a McDonalds where they will find familiar surroundings and predictable food, those who bring food from home along with them, or those who chose to stay in tourists hotels which reflect surroundings reflective of their home surroundings. This form of tourism, according to Coleman and Crang insulates tourists rather than allowing them to experience the culture of the location as they seek more of the same. A twist to this search for sameness is the search for an experience of others which is staged or which is in some way reflective of similarity. Goffman’s theory of front and back regions (Hughes-Freeland 1998) describe how the front or that which is experienced by the tourist is the staged show, while the back regions contain the authentic experience. MacCannell (1976) argues that as people seek the authentic, the back stage is put on show and in the process, authenticity is lost or threatened. An example of this in short-term missions are missionaries who receive requests from short-term mission teams who want to come and be a part of a Jesus Film showing or they want to come and ‘do evangelism’. Because these were people who donate money and want to see where there donations were going, missionaries scurry to get a group of people from a local church who will set up the film in a park so that the visitors can experience an ‘authentic’ experience. In this sense, the back stage had been moved to the front stage.

A second mode of tourism described by Coleman and Crang which has linkage to short-term missions and which is contrasted with those who seek more of the same, is what they describe in terms of ‘romantic’ (as opposed to ‘mass which is used to describe those who seek sameness). This mode of tourism includes those who seek for places which carry symbolic capital and which are measured by the adventure, difficulty, cost, or exotic nature of the trip. Coleman and Crang point out that since this type of tourism is always just beyond the reach of tourists, it is driven by type of loss of authentic place (2004, 4). This understanding of a search for location can be found in tourism literature from the mid to early 1970’s. Dean MacCannell (1976) is cited by Coleman and Craig as he noted tourism as an existential quest for ‘authentic’ experiences.

Brent Plate (2009) describes contemporary pilgrimages (which could be classified as niche tourism) to places such as the Trinity Atomic Test Site in New Mexico, the gravesite of Elvis Presley, and ground zero in New York as places that people visit because a kind of sacred power has been invested in the particular place. Plate argues that although some would call this just “tourism” instead of “real pilgrimages”, that there are many similarities in the two and that there is very little if any real distinction. According to Plate, both are born from a desire to travel, to head into an unknown, foreign place where one might experience new sights and sounds and tastes and smells, and ultimately to be corporeally inspired by some transcendent locale. There is something about the quest itself, whether for noble, pious, pure, impure, or just plain curious reasons, that make the journey potentially transformative…pilgrimage is tightly bound to our sense of identity, and sometimes the best way to find ourselves is to get lost. (Plate 2009, 263)
The lines between tourism and pilgrimage therefore are not as clearly delineated as would appear since contemporary tourism has aspects of pilgrimage. The distinction between pilgrimage and missions also present a challenge when considering short-term missions.

In the case of Celtic pilgrimage or other Christian pilgrimage, some would debate whether one would call this missions and whether the participants would be considered missionaries since the primary focus was spiritual or ascetical (Sheldrade 1996, 67). Another way to state this is that the primary objective of pilgrimage is normally the person who is on the spiritual journey, as opposed to the focus of missions which is normally on the host location and the salvation of others. Sheldrake (1996,67) points out that some have described the Celtic Church as a mission church rather than a missionary one. The primary reason for this is the fact that the wondering ascetics did little explicit conversion work, but rather found ways to work out their own salvation as they journeyed.

Searching for Authenticity (Part I)

This posting is the first of three to four posts that I will make related to some concepts that I am working with related to some social and theological shifts that are happening in western society. I would welcome any input or further thoughts that you may have.

Although the popularity of short-term missions from the U.S. has come into focus in primarily the past ten to fifteen years, the social and global shifts which foster an environment conducive to such a pervasive phenomenon have been in formation for much longer. Robert Wuthnow gives a sociological interpretation out of extensive research related to spiritual journeys and spiritual practices in his book After Heaven: Spirituality in America since the 1950s. (1998). Wuthnow’s finding is that since the 1950s, Americans have shifted in their expression of spirituality from a focus on dwelling to a focus on seeking. According to Wuthnow, in the past, people primarily identified their faith by membership in a church that had a specific location. Because of social economic shifts, however, this general perception has changed somewhat. An example of this shift is that people produce less durable goods, and to a larger degree they produce a network of communication or serve as brokers of goods or information. This shift from a focus on dwelling to a focus on seeking can also be seen in how people perceive institutions. The older pattern, according to Wuthnow (8) was tightly bounded and hierarchical. Institutions were literally the building blocks of society. The newer pattern, however, emphasizes looser connections, diversity, and negotiation; practical activity takes precedence over organizational positions. Sociologist Robert Putnam makes a similar observation in his seminal book Bowling Alone (2000). Putnam describes the social shift in the United States away from membership in social organizations and away from what he describes as physical capital.

This shift has produced confusion in measuring progress of success of institutions such as a local church. There have been several notable studies conducted which wrestle with the complexity of measuring church vitality in the U.S. and how that is measured. Many of the popular studies have focused primarily on measuring Spiritual vitality in relation to church attendance. A prominent example of this is the Barna Group. Although Barna recognizes that measuring church vitality is changing, they primarily use measures of location (to use Wuthnow’s term). The following is an example from an article of the Barna Group:

With Americans pursuing a growing number of "church" options, some of the traditional measures of church health are being redefined. According to a new study released by The Barna Group, which has been studying church participation patterns since 1984, popular measures such as the percentage of people who are "unchurched" - based on attendance at a conventional church service - are out of date. Various new forms of faith community and experience, such as house churches, marketplace ministries and cyberchurches, must be figured into the mix - and make calculating the percentage of Americans who can be counted as "unchurched" more complicated. The fact that millions of people are now involved in multiple faith communities - for instance, attending a conventional church one week, a house church the next, and interacting with an online faith community in-between - has rendered the standard measures of "churched" and "unchurched" much less precise.

Although this article recognizes the same phenomenon of people moving away from spiritual identity based on location, studies like these which measure the decline in church membership and a lack of consistent attendance to events in the church building conclude that spirituality is declining in the United States. Putnam, however, indicates that the younger generation is not less engaged than their predecessors, but engaged in new ways (2000,26). Similar to the proposal of Wuthnow, Putnam acknowledges the move away from dwelling or physical capital and toward seeking or social capital. A similar argument is made by Wuthnow in his more recent book, Boundless Faith (2009) in which he disputes arguments of Jenkins (2007) and other common assumptions which assert Christianity is flourishing in many parts of the world beyond the United States, and therefore, Christian churches in the U.S. are drawing inward, and are withdrawing involvement from global activity. Wuthnow also disputes the assumption that local churches in the United States focus inwardly with little or no interest in their communities or the global context. Wuthnow’s primary thesis in Boundless Faith is concomitant with the thesis of Putnam that instead of a move away from spirituality, there is a younger generation that is seeking new and different ways to express their faith. This new and different expression flows directly from the theories of spirituality moving from identification with location to an expression of seeking which can be seen in the phenomenon of short-term missions as well as increase in niche tourism which focuses on a type of spiritual pilgrimage.

The Changing Face of Mission

I am currently working on developing a few interviews with key people who work in missions related to the changes that are occuring in missions due to changed financial realities as well as changing shifts in the perspectives of the current generation of youth. I hope to be posting these on this blog in a few weeks. My personal perspective is that although demoninational organizations are having to readjust how they approach the financing of missions, there is a very large interest in missions on the part of youth and college students. The interesting dynamic is that the current generation seems to have a passion for people and for living as a Christian witness to parts of society previously marginalized by many Christians. The following clip is an interesting overview of Urbana 2009 which is currently underway that reflects this shift.