Christianity Commons^™

When Less Is More: Cultivating A Community In Relationship With God, Lisa Graham Mcminn

Faculty Publications - Department of World Languages, Sociology & Cultural Studies

What does it look like to cultivate a community in right relationship with God? In taking the focus off individual members and placing it on the community itself, we recognize that the whole of a university is greater than the sum of its parts, and that individual parts are repeatedly and continually shaped and defined by the whole. Being in right relationship with God begins with acknowledging our longings to be loved, to be known, and to belong in ways encouraging us to put ourselves intentionally and consistently in God’s gaze of love. Coming before God empty-handed and agenda-less, rather …

Latina/O Conversion And Miracle-Seeking At A Buddhist Temple, Stephen M. Cherry, Kemal Budak, Aida I. Ramos

Faculty Publications - Department of World Languages, Sociology & Cultural Studies

The growing diversification of the US Latino religious’ experiences calls for scholarly attention beyond Protestant or Catholic categories. This study begins to answer this call. Using interview data with 26 Latinos collected over 2 years of observation at the True Lama Meditation Center (TLMC) in Houston, Texas, we describe how Latinos who convert to Buddhism or actively attend the temple while also continuing to attend Christian services (both Catholic and Protestant) see themselves and understand their religious identities and practices. We then explore the reasons for their conversion or changes in religious identities and practices through various theoretical lens. Although …

The Rise Of Latino Protestants, Aida Isela Ramos

Faculty Publications - Department of World Languages, Sociology & Cultural Studies

Excerpt: "During one of my first visits to a church in San Antonio for the Latino Protestant Congregations Project, the pastor invited a church member to speak about his experience in a federal immigration detention center. An elderly gentleman rose from his seat with a Bible tucked under his arm. For the next hour, this man, a Salvadoran undocumented immigrant, told his story."

Latino Protestants And Their Political And Social Engagement (Chapter Six Of Latino Protestants In America: Growing And Diverse), Mark T. Mulder, Aida I. Ramos, Gerardo Marti

Faculty Publications - Department of World Languages, Sociology & Cultural Studies

Excerpt: "On a rainy early spring morning in a modest brick Presbyterian church just outside the Fruitvale neighborhood of Oakland, California, sixtyfour worshippers gather. The entire worship is in Spanish. During the sermon, the pastor makes a passing reference to how few of the attenders now live in Oakland proper, that many have to drive farther than ever for church services. The implicit message: the leadership of the church realizes that gentrification of San Francisco has spilled over the Bay Bridge and now threatens the availability of affordable housing throughout Oakland. In response, the congregation has started programs that offer …

Perceiving The Cultural Sea That Is Our Home - Spiritual Formation And Western 21st Century Culture, Lisa Graham Mcminn

Faculty Publications - Department of World Languages, Sociology & Cultural Studies

Spiritual formation occurs in the routines of daily living. We are formed by choices made at the grocery store, as we reach for our medicine cabinet, as we consider whether to drive ten minutes or walk thirty. Such seemingly insignificant choices reflect assumptions held about who we are, and how we are supposed to live in the world. Spiritual formation, like notions of civic duty, develops from within a cultural context. Cultural environments give us largely unquestioned taken-for- granted assumptions about how the world is and how we should live in it. This essay explores three of the many Western …

The Contexts Of Conversion Among U.S. Latinos, Aida I. Ramos, Robert D. Woodberry, Christopher G. Ellison

Faculty Publications - Department of World Languages, Sociology & Cultural Studies

The growth of Protestantism among U.S. Latinos has been the focus of considerable discussion among researchers. Yet few studies investigate how Latino Protestants and Latino Catholics differ, or which types of Latinos convert from Catholicism to Protestantism. Our study tests various theories about why some Latinos convert including a modified version of the semi-involuntary thesis, the national origin hypothesis, and assimilation theory. We use data from a large national sample of U.S. Latinos and find some support for assimilation theory and less for the semi-involuntary thesis. However, context matters. If we divide Latinos into national origin groups, these groups strongly …

Religious Service Attendance And Volunteering: A Growth Curve Analysis, Young-Il Kim, Sung Joon Jang

Faculty Publications - Department of World Languages, Sociology & Cultural Studies

Despite methodological advances in studying the relationship between religious attendance and volunteering, its dynamic nature still needs to be elucidated. We apply growth curve modeling to examine whether trajectories of religious attendance and volunteering are related to each other over a 15-year period in a nationally representative sample from the Americans’ Changing Lives data (1986-2002). Multivariate results showed that the rates of change in religious attendance and volunteering were positively related, and excluding religious volunteering did not alter the finding. It was also found that the initial level of religious attendance was positively associated with the rate of increase in …

Eating Closer To Home: On Being Neighborly (Chapter Four Of To The Table), Lisa Graham Mcminn

Faculty Publications - Department of World Languages, Sociology & Cultural Studies

Excerpt: "The dandelions awoke on a sunny day near the end of March, following on the heels of a month's worth of rain that fell in three days' time. Bright yellow flowers opened to the sun, welcoming bees and other insects looking for pollen and nectar, and welcoming a giant forager eager for blossoms to make dandelion wine. "Pick me!" they seemed to say. So I did, knowing more would come. Aware of my fellow harvesters, I waited to pick a blossom until a hardworking bee took off for another blossom or for home, hind legs heavily laden with yellow …

Becoming An Old Woman (In The West) (From Dirt And The Good Life), Lisa Graham Mcminn

Faculty Publications - Department of World Languages, Sociology & Cultural Studies

Excerpt: "I turned 53 this summer. To anyone over, say, 63, that will sound young enough. To those younger than about 43, I will seem old-ish, and I'll be so old to those under 20 that the nice ones will treat me with gentle kindness for fear that I might break and the rest will see me as irrelevant and/ or invisible."

Starbucks-Colored Glasses (From Just Moms: Conveying Justice In An Unjust World), Lisa Graham Mcminn

Faculty Publications - Department of World Languages, Sociology & Cultural Studies

Excerpt: "Sarah, my middle school daughter, finished her hot chocolate as I licked the last bit of foam from my mocha. We returned the white mugs to the counter and started our walk home. Glen Ellyn, the suburb next door, sits less than a mile from our house in Wheaton and is one of the wealthiest suburbs of Chicago.

In 1996, it also held the nearest Starbucks.

Wheaton ranks high on the affluent scale, too, and Mark and I found raising our daughters in Chicago's wealthy western suburbs a challenge. Our neighborhood, like most others, displayed well-landscaped front yards conspicuously …

Farming Practices (Chapter Two Of Walking Gently On The Earth), Lisa Graham Mcminn

Faculty Publications - Department of World Languages, Sociology & Cultural Studies

Excerpt: "My mother and her siblings grew up raising sugar beets . in Fort Morgan, Colorado- on one of the six million family farms that provided food for the rest of the nation. Grandma sold eggs from their chickens and cream from the dairy cow to buy fabric to make school dresses for Mom and her sisters. Grandma also tended the large vegetable garden that fed her family along with the chickens and cows they raised."

Crafting Community (Chapter Eight Of The Contented Soul: The Art Of Savoring Life), Lisa Graham Mcminn

Faculty Publications - Department of World Languages, Sociology & Cultural Studies

Excerpt: "Norm Ewert and Sharon Coolidge live simply in an affluent suburb. They are Wheaton College professors committed to caring for the poor around the world. Before she and Norm married, Sharon had purchased a small home a couple blocks from campus. After they married, they expanded and remodeled the 1850s home, using recycled materials (leaded windows from a school, French doors from a church, a carved staircase salvaged from a house fire) and adding a reservoir to capture and reuse rainwater, a solarium with well-placed windows for passive heat, and thick walls for insulation. As Mennonites they live simply …

Sexual Identity Concerns For Christian Young Adults: Practical Considerations For Being A Supportive Presence And Compassionate Companion, Lisa Graham Mcminn

Faculty Publications - Department of World Languages, Sociology & Cultural Studies

Most sexual identity development models disregard the importance of valuative frameworks and faith for young adults with same sex attraction. This article is a theoretical and pastoral attempt to outline practical considerations for Christian professors, staff, and laity who seek a new role, that of compassionate companion, or a supportive presence for Christian young adults with same sex attraction. Observations and recommendations are based on 11 years of teaching and mentoring college students, sexual identity development research, and a theological concept of our human will-to-relate.

Y2k, The Apocalypse, And Evangelical Christianity: The Role Of Eschatological Belief In Church Responses, Lisa Graham Mcminn

Faculty Publications - Department of World Languages, Sociology & Cultural Studies

Apocalyptic beliefs in Christianity have endured for two thousand years and on occasion have motivated and justified radical and even revolutionary collective action (Boyer 1992). Why apocalyptic visions are part of some Christians' belief system is grounded in their beliefs about the end times, or eschatologies, that shape church cultures and subsequent behaviors. This paper considers cultural aspects of collective action, applying the concept of frames that give events meaning and inspire and legitimize collective behavior to Christian church responses to Y2K as a recent example of an anticipated apocalyptic event. Five interpretive frames linking eschatological ideation with specific collective …

Mental Health Needs And Resources In Christian Communities Of South Korea, Lisa Graham Mcminn

Faculty Publications - Department of World Languages, Sociology & Cultural Studies

In an effort to understand the mental health needs and resources of Korean Christians, we collected quantitative and qualitative data through surveys and interviews with Korean pastors and Christian educators. Several mental health concerns were identified: the high level of daily stress faced by many Koreans, marriage and family concerns, conflicts between Korean culture and the teachings of the church, and a tendency to keep emotional discomfort suppressed. Mental health resources include deep spiritual commitment to a life of prayer, high levels of commitment to family and community, cultural values of persistence and patience, and reliance on Christian communities for …

Masculinity And Femininity: Origins And Implications (Chapter Two Of Growing Strong Daughters), Lisa Graham Mcminn

Faculty Publications - Department of World Languages, Sociology & Cultural Studies

Excerpt: "God could have made one sex, but he chose to create two distinct image-bearing creatures. Articulating conclusions about how women and men bear God's image differently is difficult, perhaps because we believe we must first figure out which differences to attribute to environment and which are knitted into our beings at conception."