International Review of Mission最新文献

This article aims to propose a “two-way” decolonial reading of the trinitarian approaches within the Latin American liberation theologies: as a critique and as a framework to enhance some of its assumptions. Hence, the article will develop some of the most recognized approaches to this issue within these liberation theologies to identify possible theological and socio-political decolonial rereadings from the particular approach of the trinitarian.

Colonization and Christian mission had a symbiotic relationship. This has raised the question of the relationship between missionaries and colonizers. Most would agree that they influenced each other: colonialism facilitated the growth of Christianity, and missionary work provided fertile ground for colonialism in some parts of Africa. However, it is important to also highlight that some missionary work in Africa was purely for the spread of the gospel and not colonialism. With the partition of Africa after the Berlin Conference of 1884–85, many colonial powers restricted mission work in their colonies to missionaries from their own countries. This resulted in a denominational division and distribution that is still reflected in African churches today. However, in nations that are predominantly Muslim, the mission was not successful by either persuasion or coercion. Although the gospel was brought to Africa by the Europeans and linked to colonialism, it is not European. African Christians do not see the gospel as colonial or needing to be decolonized but are willing to share with others, including their former colonizers.

This article was designed and intended to prompt reflection around the conciliar theme “Mission Reimagined: Transforming Disciples Challenging Empire.” Given the author's own Pentecostal background and substantive recent work on how the earliest messianic disciples lived out their missional vocation in the 1st-century Mediterranean imperial regime of the Pax Romana, this article aims to revisit the apostolic narrative especially as recounted by St Luke in his second volume, the book of Acts, to identify, explore, and reconsider how the first Christians were, effectively, multicultural and transnational communities of the Spirit of Jesus. They navigated their interculturality, transculturality, and cross-culturality not only across ethnic-cultural domains but also across socio-economic and political-economic registers. From this perspective, contemporary global Christian communities that exist across diasporic and migrational zones can draw encouragement from how the first generation of Jesus’ followers two thousand years ago confronted similar challenges. In this way, we can return to the New Testament to retrieve resources old and new for Christian life, spiritual practice, and missional witness in the 21st-century global context.

The affirmation of the co-equality (homoousia) of the first and the second persons of the Trinity at the Council of Nicaea is a major milestone in the history of theology and the church. Established at a time when the Roman empire developed its Christian identity, it has often been assumed that Nicene theology was imperial theology. In this article, the theological surplus of the Nicene position will be examined, investigating its imperial pedigree while also demonstrating the anti-imperial potential and the Nicene Creed's implications for liberative theological thinking then and now.

The Council of Nicaea took place at Constantine's initiative to harmonize religious belief and law into a state-subscribed orthodoxy. From a socio-political viewpoint, the council appeared to use a standardized version of Christianity as an instrument of the empire. The focus in this paper is not on Constantine's initiative or its impact on the non-conforming minorities; rather, it uses this impact as a lens for reviewing an emerging Hindu empire in India. For much of its independent history, India was largely successful in keeping Hindutva's 19th-century undercurrents at bay from polity. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), however, exposed the shallowness of the Indian experiment with secularism. As Hindutva embraces politics, it also exercises social control. In this sense, Hindutva is no different from Christendom, especially when viewed from the perspective of the impact it has on the minorities: a new act on citizenship, dissent-violence, and reconversions. What this shows is that colonial despotism continues even today.

In this paper, we revisit three hallmarks of coloniality of power – control, influence, and access to resources – and their interplay in shaping and framing Anglican witness and presence in the world today. We contend that, although the growth of Anglicanism in the global South, particularly in Africa, represents a notable demographic shift within the Anglican Communion, it does not translate to shifts in control, influence, and access to resources. As a result, colonial legacies of Anglican witness that conferred power to whiteness and maleness and assigned powerlessness and ‘otherness’ to lives and faith experience outside the categories of whiteness and maleness still pervade relationships within the communion. With reference to the “decolonial” encounter of Jesus with the Syrophoenician woman in the gospels (Mark 7:24-30 and Matt. 15:21-28), we reimagine Anglican witness as with-ness. This is a kenotic praxis and a decolonial alternative that would enable theologies of decentralization of power, a polycentric system of control, and an ethic of kenotic accompaniment, acceptance, and inclusion of lives and faith experiences outside the frames of whiteness and maleness in the Anglican Communion.

Please note that this article includes descriptions and examples of racist and derogatory conduct and historical writing. They are included in their original form to provide an accurate portrait of the attitudes of the period this article is examining. Readers are cautioned to take care if this is disturbing for them.

This article explores the commencement of The Salvation Army in Australia and in particular its relationship with the Aboriginal populations it encountered. Utilizing the account of an early encounter, the story of “Black Nobbie Neville,” published in late 1890, this paper examines the attitudes of early Salvationists toward Aboriginal people. The narrative provides a useful tool to contrast and compare with other early Australian Salvation Army writings in considering whether the attitudes, stereotypes, and language used in the account of Nobbie Neville was consistent with a wider mentality of The Salvation Army of the early 20th century. Further, it opens the discussion on whether these views influenced and continue to influence the place of Aboriginal Salvationists in Australia.