The recognition of Christianity as a global religion has shifted ecumenical projects from denominations to cultures and heightened the need for a strategy to engage religious pluralism (The Oxford Handbook of Mission Studies, 2022, p. 3-4). The influence of modern science on Christian mission expanded the related disciplines to include “theology, practice, history, cultural studies, religious studies, and social studies (OHMS, 2022, p. 4). 

I’m intrigued by the notion that a secular context provides the church an opportunity for “mutual exorcism” – to “purify each other from the dehumanizing forces each can harbor” (OHMS, 2022, p. 7,10). I understand this to refer to the possibility for secularist and Christian worldviews to challenge each other in ways which can be fruitful for their adherents and the general society. I imagine the Christian helping the secularist to temper the stridency of his or her optimism regarding collective human capacity to organize society towards justice and happiness. On the other hand, I can see the secularist showing the Christian the inconsistency of their desire to wield political power to effect the vision of Jesus. 

The effects of money and power dynamics on the modern missionary movement (OHMS, 2022, p. 8) have been evident during my missionary career. I have spent about 20 of the past 30 years in missions overseas as an American, mostly in the Global South but more recently in Southern Europe. In every context where I have served I have witnessed disfunction in missions strategies related to money and power dynamics. One common denominator I have witnessed personally and researched is the positive effects of emancipation of leadership and financial sustainability. At the same time, so many Global South missionaries follow the example of their Western mentors and end up seeking financial support from the U.S., Europe, and Anglo Commonwealth countries with strong missionary legacies. 

I find comparative theology to be a promising approach for missionaries like myself, where people of other faiths are seen as partners rather than object of mission (OHMS, 2022, p. 11). Vinoth Ramachandra states that we close ourselves off from conversion to the religious other as well as to a conversion to a deeper understanding of our own religion (FULLER studio, 2024). Ramachandra (2024) advocates for Christians not say “Come to us for we have the truth, but come with us He has the truth”. 

I believe it is urgent that the church promote the agency of those who are often “marginalized from missional centers of power, such as women, non-Western Christians, and minorities” (OHMS, 2022, p. 12). However, when I hear descriptions of Majority World Christianity where “lay people are the primary agents of mission” (OHMS, 2022, p. 13), my experience in the Global South makes me wonder why I usually witnessed the opposite. I refer to Brazil where I served as a church planter for 16 years, a context where the attraction model was predominant and ministry centered on professional pastors. 

The emergence of missiology as a scientific approach to cross-cultural evangelism helps me understand how social science methods came to be employed in the field (OHMS, 2022, p. 8). As theology and biblical studies came to be scientific disciplines engaged by scholars in universities, the same approach was applied to the missions (OHMS, 2022, p. 19). The Anglo-American Protestant world has been influenced by the Germanic ideal of missionary science since the early 20th century (OHMS, 2022, 21). And in the German-speaking world, the focus on local appropriation of the message rather than its delivery has been felt wherever I have served. The intercultural theology moniker helps me understand how in my lifetime many seminaries changed their course description from “missions” to “intercultural studies”. I have no criticism of this, in fact I feel that as a missionary I have benefited from it in contexts moire antagonistic to evangelism. But it is helpful to know the Liberal Protestant German context from which it emerges. 

The scientific approach to mission coming out of Germany let to a theological shift versus Anglo-American pragmatism (OHMS, 2022, p.?). As a result, apparently, missiology was short-lived in the Anglo-American academy but lived on till present in Germany and Scandinavia (OHMS, 2022, p. 26-7). In the U.S., only the private Christian universities maintained missiological research chairs, which were short-lived in mainstream secular colleges (OHMS, 2022, p. 27). All this is potentially encouraging to me as someone seeking to teach in European seminaries and develop missiological research programs. 

On the other hand, as someone engaged in missions in Europe, the most strong source of missiological research I encounter (perhaps as an English-speaker) is the Center for the Study of World Christianity in Edinburgh (OHMS, 2022, p. 29). The CSWC has excellent resources online that I consult regularly. As someone living in majority-Catholic Portugal, I am encouraged to know of the convergence of Protestant and Catholic missioligists (OHMS, 2022, p. 31). Two years ago I helped organize a theological symposium at the Universidade Lusofona in Lisbon and I am hopeful that areas of missiological study may promote ecumenical partnership. 

Lastly, the news that missiology has become “a corporate narrative exercise, in which Christians hear, exchange, and ponder the life stories of those who have sought to live the communal life of the gospel, and to witness to its truths in a multiplicity of contexts” (OHMS, 2022, p. 33), is encouraging. As someone coming from a highly energized missions agency like YWAM, a “less pragmatic, more theologically reflective, and more interdisciplinary and culturally divers” approach sounds wonderful (The Oxford Handbook of Mission Studies, 2022, p. 33).  

References

FULLER studio (Director). (2024, April 29). Deconstructing Evangelism Through the Lens of Global Christianity. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nWnIjON8sWELinks to an external site.

Kim, K., Jørgensen, K., & Climenhaga, A. F. (Eds.). (2022). The Oxford handbook of mission studies. (Upper Level BV2090 .O94 2022; First edition.). Oxford University Press; Biola Library Catalog. https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&AuthType=sso&db=cat09700a&AN=blc.oai.edge.biola.folio.ebsco.com.fs00001149.2ad0546b.f552.5b2c.aa65.cf3897a492f1&site=eds-live&scope=site&custid=s6133893Links to an external site.