MEDFØRER KIRKEVÆKST I SYDNYE TEOLOGISKE PARADIGMER?

Foredrag på kursusdage for præster i Sønderborg Provsti

på Ærø Hotel i Marstal onsdag, den 8. oktober 2014Mogens S. MogensenIntercultural.dk

DISPOSITION1. Kristendommens historiske paradigmer og radikale

oversættelighed

1. Kristendommens demografiske udvikling

2. Kristendommens nye teologiske processer og paradigmer

3. Kristendommens nye ansigter

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1. KRISTENDOMMENS HISTORISKE PARADIGMER OG RADIKALE

OVERSÆTTELIGHED

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KRISTENDOMMENS KULTURLLE ÆRAER• Den jødiske æra• Den hellenistisk-romerske æra• Den barbariske æra• Den vesteuropæiske æra• Den ekspanderende Europas æra• ”Cross-cultural transmission” æra

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1. DEN JØDISKE ÆRA• Kristne i den første generation var alle jøder, trods

indbyrdes forskelle• De første kristne havde ingen opfattelse af, at de havde

”skiftet religion” ved at anerkende Jesus som Messias• Jesus – Messias, Israels frelser• Kristen identitet i den jødiske æra er knyttet til, hvem

personen er eller hvad personen gør

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2. DEN GRÆSK-ROMERSKE ÆRA• Fra Messias til Kristus• Kristus er Herre (kyrios)• Kristendommen gennemtrænger det græsk-romerske tankesystem og

troen på én civilisation, en samfundsmodel, et lovsystem, et idé-univers• Ortodoksi – en kanon af ret tro, udformet i en række udsagn baseret på

logisk argumentation• Kristen identitet i den græsk-romerske ære fokuserer på, hvad den

kristne tror

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3. DEN BARBARISKE ÆRA• Det vestromerske rige erobres af barbarerne (stammefolk), det

østromerske rige erobres af muslimerne• En bybaseret kultur afløses af en bondebaseret kultur –

overtager ideer fra græsk-romersk æra og kombinerede dem med deres oprindelige holdninger

• Universel lov afløses af kollektiv sædvane, der er bindende for alle

• Den kristne folk/landNy hermeneutik: parallel mellem det kristne folk/land og Israel

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4. DEN VESTEUROPÆISKE ÆRA• Videreudvikling af kristendommen i den barbariske æra• Reformationsperioden indebærer reformulering af

kristendommen• Fokus på menneskets møde med Guds ord på

modersmålet• Individet i centrum: den kristne tro som et spørgsmål

om individuel beslutning og individuel tilegnelse

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5. DET EKSPANDERENDE EUROPAS OG DEN KRISTNE RECESSIONS

ÆRE• En videreførelse af vesteuropæisk æra – den kristne civilisations spredning fra vesten til resten (”period of noncontextualization”)og kristen tilbagegang i Vesteuropa

• Kristendommens møde med oplysningstiden: fornuft- adskillelse af religion og fornuft- privatisering af religion- videnskabeliggørelse af teologi

• Kristendommens møde med oplysningstiden: fremskridtstro- tro på kristendommens sejrsgang- og på reformeringen af verden (social retfærdighed osv).

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6. ”CROSS-CULTURAL TRANSMISSION” ÆRA

• Ikke længere nogen ”kristen kultur” eller ”kristen civilisation”, men mange centre for kristendommen

• The process of cross-cultural transmission – kristendommens radikale oversættelighed

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LAMIN SANNEHTwo alternative mission strategies•Mission by diffusion•Mission by translation

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MISSION BY DIFFUSION”The missionary culture [is] the inseparable carrier of the message. … Religion expands from its initial base and is implanted in other societies primarily as a matter of cultural identity”.

”Arabic – a revealed language .. the medium in which the Qur’an … was revealed….The author of the Qur’an who is God thus came to be associated with its speech so that the very sounds of the languate are believed to originate in heaven. … Consequently, Muslims have instituted the sacred Arabic for the canonical devotions … bringing the sacred Arabic to the level of the ordinary believer”

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MISSION BY TRANSLATION”The recipient culture [is] the true and final locus of the proclamation, so that religion arrives without the presumptionof cultural rejection”

”Translatability became the characteristic mode of Christian expansion through history. Christianity has no single revealed language, and historical experience traces this fact to the Pentecost event when the believers testified of God in their native tongues."

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STRID OM KRISTENDOMMENS RADIKALE OVERSÆTTELIGHED

• Mission blandt slaver og de tre ”hellige sprog”: Bibel og liturgi kun på hebræisk, græsk og latin

• Reformationen: bibeloversættelse til modersmål

• Mission og kulturimperialisme:kristendom og vestlig civilisation

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2. KRISTENDOMMENS DEMOGRAFISKEUDVIKLING

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,

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EUROPÆISKE OG NORDAMERIKANSKE KRISTNE I PRCENT AF VERDENS KRISTNE

1500: 94 %1792: 87 %1900: 81 %1980: 50 % 2010: 40 %.

K

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K

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KRISTENDOMMENS NUMERISKE TYNGDEPUNKT FORKUBBER SIG

IKKE-DEMOGRAFISKE FAKTORER I FORHOLDET MELLEM DET GLOBALE

SYD OG DET GLOBALE NORD

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MISSION

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The era of Christian Mission, as we have known it, is over! What I mean is mission from ‘West to the Rest’ is a thing of the past. We are living through a new era in missions – everywhere to everywhere. … Korean missionaries are everywhere from Argentina to Zimbabwe; in fact, South Korea alone sends out as many new missionaries each year as all Western nations combined. Chinese missionariesfrom the underground churches are going overseas in large numbers. Indians have one of the largest cross-cultural missionary forces in the world, now increasingly turning abroad. ” (Sam George).

MISSION

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The fastest growing church network in the United States is Hispanic. Some of the largest churches in Europe are led by Africans. A Nigeria-based church has 5000 parishes in 80 countries. … Filipino women have gone to Muslim countries. … The scattered people become conduits through which missionary passion flow into old heartlands of Christianity and they create new frontiers of cross-cultural diffusion of their faith. … One of the remarkable features of scattered people is that they establish worshipping groups in host nations, even in closed countries as well as ‘Christian’ West” (Sam George).

TEOLOGISK FORSKNING OG UDDANNELSE

TEOLOGISKE PUBLIKATIONER OG BIBLIOTEKER

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KIRKERNES ØKONOMI

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5. KRISTENDOMMENS NYE TEOLOGISKE PROCESSER

OG PARADIGMER

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Andrew Walls, ”World Christianity, Theological Education and Scholarship”

(2011)”In the past half-century, the theological map of the world has been transformed … in a foreseeable future two-thirds of the world’s Christian population could belong to the southern and eastern continents. The Christian Church is now multi-centric”

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THE GEOPOLITICAL CONTEXT

• From ”The Great European Migration” (1500 – 1950) to ”The Great Reverse Migration” (1950 – )

• The world is no longer directed by Europeans/Westerners – new powers are rising

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THE GEOPOLITICAL CONTEXT

• The West becomes increasingly multicultural and multireligious

- this alters the whole dynamic of interfaith dialogue and mission

- a huge African and Asian Christian diaspora in the west

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• ”Two processes occurred simultaneously: the largest accesion to the Christian faith [in Africa and Asia]; and the fastes recession from the faith [in Europe]in Christian history.”

• ”Christianity is in process of becoming again what it was in its origins – a non-Western religion.”

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THE RELIGIO-DEMOGRAPHIC CONTEXT

•”It is inevitable that the religio-cultural transformation of th 20th century will place Africans and Asians more and more in positions of leadership in World Christianity”

•”For the sake of the Christian Church worldwide, Africa all Asia and Latin America, home to so many Christians, must pull their true theological weight”

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THE RELIGIO-DEMOGRAPHIC CONTEXT

THE THEOLOGICAL CONTEXT”… the Western theological academy is not yet equipped to give theolgogical leaership to the Church of the 21st century.

For one thing, it is profoundly ingnorant about the Church of the 21st century, and the processes by which it has come into being. It has been largely isolated from those processes by concern with its own traditions.”

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WONSUK MA, ”THEOLOGICAL AND MISSIONAL FORMATION IN THE

CONTEXT OF ’NEW CHRISTIANITY’” (2014)

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”The radical shift in world Christianity … opens up unprecedented possibilities for new theological paradigms and theological processes.”

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”First the top-down theologization willhave to be seriously reviewed. … This ’grassroots theology’ will be borne of the real conrtext of everyday life where constant mission engagement takes place”

THEOLOGIZATION HAS TO BE ’DEMOCRATIZED’

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”Second … theology should draw from lively mission exercises of practitioners, as much as ”specialized theologians” draw from the careful exegesis of the scriptures and the deposit of long historical development of various traditons”

- Problematic categorizatin of proper theology and practical theology. ”This theory-practice divide is a superficial outcome of the modernist Enlightenment thinking”

EXPERIENCE SHOULD BE A CRITICAL BASIS FOR

FORMULATION OF THEOLOGY

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”Third, theologians we will see from the global South will be more ”part-time” theologians, wearin several ministerial hats …This engagement will make their theology lively and relevant enriching theological reflection constantly”.

THEOLOGIANS WILL ALSO BE PRACTITIONERS

”THE PROCESS AND MAIN PLAYERS OF THEOLOGICAL

FORMULATION HAVE TO CHANGE”

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”Even this short list of future theologization presents numerous implications to theological and missional formation. One is the role of the West and the new ”Rest”.

If leadership of gloabl theological process is laid primarily on the leaders of the global South, the role of Western churches with its theological deposit is critical”

4. KRISTENDOMMENS NYE ANSIGTER I SYD OG ØST

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HOLDNING TIL BIBELEN• Bibelen taler til den nye

kristenhed i syd og øst på en mere direkte måde

• Er mere teologisk konservativ i sin tolkning af Bibelen

SAMEKSISTENS MED ANDRE RELIGIONER

• Udvikling af religionsteologi, der understøtter sameksistens og samarbejde

• Pres fra andre religioner i moralske spørgsmål

• Flere og flere kristne lever som minoriteter

• Erfaringer med forfølgelse

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FOKUS PÅ FATTIGDOM”The Southward movement of Christianity implies not just a change in the ethnic composition of the world’s believers, but also a fundamental shift in their social and economic background. The average Christian in the world today is a poor person ... This historic social change cannnot fail to affet attitudes toward the Bible”

Kefa Sempangi, Uganda: ”If the gospel you are preaching does not speak to human needs, it is useless. It cannot compete with the witch doctor and the gods”.

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HOLISME• Er mere holistisk mht. ånd

og materie, religion og politik, mission og udvikling

PENTEKOSTAL OG KARISMATISK KRISTENDOM

• Lægger større vægt på bibelens ord om den åndelige verden: engle, onde ånder mv.

• Fokuserer mere på helbredelser og Guds kraft

• Er mere karismatisk

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TEOLOGI OG TEOLOGIER

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”Of course, Christian doctrine has never been decided by majority vote, and neither has the prevailing interpretation of the Bible. Numbers are not everything, but at the same time, overwhelming numerical majorities surely carry some weight. ….”

TEOLOGI OG TEOLOGIER

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”In such a world, then, surely, Southern traditions of Bible reading must be seen as the Christian norm. We will no longer treat the culture-specific interpretations of North Americans and Europeans as ”theology”- that is, as the real thing – while the rest of the world produces its curious provincial variants of ”African theology”, ”Asian theology”, and so on …”

TEOLOGI OG TEOLOGIER

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”Christian theology eventually reflects the most compelling issues from the front lines of mission, so we can expect that Christian theology will be dominated by these issues rising from the global South”

TAK!

Mogens S. MogensenKonsulentfirmaet Intercultural.dkAdr.: N. J. Holms Park 55, 6070 Christiansfeld

Tlf.: 2617 5712E-mail: mogensen@intercultural.dkWebsite: www.intercultural.dk

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