Comparative Methodologies and Theories Commons^™

Thai Contextualized Art, Gregory P. Whitsett, Amy Whitsett

Journal of Adventist Mission Studies

"In the 1980s, a set of four murals depicting four specific and unique Adventist teachings and beliefs was commissioned by Pastor Clifton Maberly who was serving as a missionary in Thailand. His goal was to have these events depicted in a medium familiar to local Thai buddhists so they could wrestle with the new concepts without being distracted by Western art styles. His hope was that if Jesus, Satan and the angels could be depicted using characters similar to those already familiar to the Thai, the viewer would be better able to focus on and understand the truth portrayed in …

Can I Get An “Amen”? Affirming The Contemporary Ghanaian Usage Of Amen, Agana-Nsiire Agana

Journal of Adventist Mission Studies

"Altogether then, the claim that amen as used in the instances we have discussed is inappropriate is found to lack firm biblical or etymological foundation. Neither does the suggestion that if it is a vestige of African worship culture then that provides a reasonable ground for thus condemning it. While it is recognized that amen is often babbled from mental laxity, it is suggested that the problem lies not in amen, as a word, but in the person, as a worshipper. Amen is a rich word, capable of communicating a spectrum of positive human intellectual and emotional responses to worship; …

Bulugo Vine Story: Redemptive Analogy Case Study, John Holbrook

Journal of Adventist Mission Studies

"Shaw indicates that rather than contextualizing the missionary’s perception of Christianity to make it understandable within the local people’s culture, the missionary should facilitate the people themselves discovering God from within their own cultural context ... In my own mission experience, I have found this approach to be valid and preferable, once there are local believers, and as God begins to develop leaders from among them. At times, cultural dynamics or God’s preparation of an unreached people group allow them to discover God without a great deal of intervention on the missionary’s part. However, in the beginning stages, it is …

Sinolization Of Christianity: Increasing Gospel Relevance Or Distorting The Gospel Message?, L. Asher

Journal of Adventist Mission Studies

"This study aims to address the concept of the Sinolization of Christianity in light of cultural studies, biblical principles, and the Great Controversy perspective. It will then set forth some ideas on how it could affect the communication of the gospel in the Chinese context. It will attempt to see if Sinolization makes the gospel more relevant or further distorts the Christian message through the lens of the Chinese culture. The answers to these questions should help Chinese Christians, and especially Adventists, better understand their mission in China."

The Reality And The Apparent: Worldviews And Missiological Strategies, Cristian Dumitrescu, Hatsarmaveth Venkaya

Journal of Adventist Mission Studies

"Worldview is an abstract concept used for identifying a set of assumptions people use to organize their view of reality. Conceptualizing worldview is a challenging task. Nobody has seen a worldview, but everybody has one. A worldview informs a person’s interpretation of reality, their cosmology, and determines their actions and reactions. Charles Kraft (1988) considers worldview as the “center control box” of a person’s life and communal culture. Most assumptions reflect one’s unverified beliefs and answers to fundamental questions, such as who they are and who others are, how people should relate to each other, what causes things to happen, …

Reaching Thai Buddhists And Those With A Background In Thai Buddhist Beliefs, Warren A. Shipton, Jared Wright, Tonya Wright, Nilubon Srisai

Journal of Adventist Mission Studies

"One of the greatest challenges for those working across cultures is to understand the unique features of the host culture and the dominant religious beliefs and practices found in the society represented. If this is to be done acceptably, the written and spoken language must be mastered and personal friendships formed with community members. Much damage has been done by Western missionaries arriving with preconceived ideas on evangelism taken from their home country and with an attitude of being holders of superior knowledge in many areas of thought beyond that held by the host culture. Catholic missionary activity has been …

Contextualization Of An Indian Christian Marriage: A Case Study, Chanchal Gayen

Journal of Adventist Mission Studies

"In this case study the Pheras ceremony was reinterpreted, but many of the cultural elements were retained. Biblical meanings were substituted for the cultural meanings that went against the teachings of Scripture. When doing this type of contextualization it is important to constantly pour Christian meanings into the cultural practice. Good biblical teaching is the antidote to syncretism, a danger that is always present while doing contextualization. The local people appreciated the fact that the wedding ceremony incorporated local cultural elements that were important to them. This approach also communicated the idea that Christianity is not a Western religion, but …

African Christian Leadership: Realities, Opportunities, And Impact, David K. Penno

Journal of Adventist Mission Studies

"African Christian Leadership is a well-organized, well-written report on some very significant research about leaders and the practice of leadership in the African church. The methodology allowed the researcher to hear from a broad spectrum of African Christians. One criticism of the study could be that a sample of church leaders and members in majority Muslim countries of North Africa were not included in the study, but this might be understandable due to the already vast scope of the project. I would recommend this book to anyone who is interested in leadership in the Christian context, and especially as practiced …

Christian Versus Heathen Ways Of Praying: A Look From The Age Of Postmodernity, Yuri N. Drumi

Journal of Adventist Mission Studies

"In many respects, postmodernity resembles paganism, but certainly it does not totally overlap with it. People around us are searching, but they do not search for answers and explanations as much as they are searching for people who are living answers. If prayer is a metanarrative, then my life must be a metanarrative too. In this context, I find helpful the analogy drawn by Crossan between Paul’s metaphor of spiritual maturation and that of an individual Christian growing in prayer. Paul says, “When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as …

Cultural Based Discipling According To The Strategies Of Jesus, Jonathan Smith

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

Many newly planted and existing churches in America have difficulty developing a discipleship culture. They focus on weekly worship gatherings and Bible Study classes. Gathering for worship and Bible Study is needed and right, but when this is the only activity, discipleship and a holistic healthy church culture is not occurring. Unfortunately, many churches engage in a consumer-driven culture with people unwilling to be in a sacrificial discipleship process for the Gospel’s sake. Jesus had four primary strategies for developing disciples. They are the gathered strategy, the small group strategy, the mentoring strategy and the sending strategy. Each is part …

Critical Contextualization: Case Studies From Cambodia, Bruce L. Bauer

Journal of Adventist Mission Studies

"Those of us involved in world mission must be at the forefront to encourage local people to develop local expressions of their faith. When I hear people rejoice about the fact that regardless of where they travel in the world the Sabbath school and church service order of worship, the songs sung, and the way of doing church is the same, I do not rejoice, I groan. For that means that the foreign visitor is comfortable, but how about the local people? Are they comfortable with the often foreignness of Adventist worship? We can and must do better to allow …

Natura Sanat: On Ecological Aspects Of Healing Miracles In Kalwaria Pacławska, Poland, Kamila Baraniecka-Olszewska

Journal of Global Catholicism

The subject-matter of my article is a change affecting the discourse on miraculous healings in a Catholic Marian sanctuary – Kalwaria Pacławska – run by Franciscan friars in the South-Eastern Poland and a way in which those changes affect pilgrims’ bodies. In Kalwaria Pacławska there meet, intersect and compete various religious and secular discourses and they all influence emotions and bodily sensations accompanying pilgrimage to this sacred site. One of those discourses has been introduced to Kalwaria just recently. The central element of the sanctuary is the miraculous image of Virgin Mary which is the goal of numerous pilgrimages from …

Authors' Introduction, Kamila Baraniecka-Olszewska, Magdalena Lubanska

Journal of Global Catholicism

No abstract provided.

The Ideologies And Outcomes Of The French And American Revolutions, Donald D. Palmer

Masters Theses

One effective way to compare the fruits of biblical Christianity with modernism is to contrast the ideologies and outcomes of the American and French Revolutions. Pre-revolutionary America was rich with biblical influence. Adherents of both Protestantism and Deism sought a “Christian society,” and while revolutionaries drew from both biblical Reformation and secular Enlightenment thought, much of the latter was biblical thought in secular form. Ministers employed the Bible extensively to support the Revolution. This relative theological consensus encouraged religious practice and a political system that accommodated dispute. Human rights were secure thanks to man’s subordinate position under God. Even after …

A Study On The Revitalization Of Worship By Using Multimedia In Korean Rural Churches With A Particular Attention To Visual Media, In Jun Hwang

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose of this study is to help to bring about the revitalization of worship in rural churches by using visual media. At present, Korean churches, especially rural churches, are facing great challenges due to the aging of the church members, illiteracy rates, a poor educational environment, the lack of incoming young people, pastors’ reluctance to minister in rural areas, troubled rural economy and so on. Nonetheless, churches in rural areas should not be abandoned. In this context, one of the most urgent needs in rural churches is healing and restoration through church worship. At any arduous and difficult time …

Rhetoric, Authority, And Children Of God: Charismatic Authority And Ecstasy In American Religions, Clarissa A. Stephenson

Celebration of Learning

As new religious movements have flooded the social landscape of the United States, they have inspired large counter-movements. These countermovements assumed a category of accepted religions which excluded religious movements that challenged the hegemonic way of life in the U.S. Some of these new religions - deemed "cults" by outsider groups- were seemingly able to exert total control over the actions of their followers, especially in relation to their physical and sexual relationships. Movements like Children of God- the religion to be studied in this paper- place a focus on the physical body as the road to spiritual salvation. The …

Faith, Feminism, And The Other: Rethinking Christian And Muslim Women’S Engagement, Idrisa Pandit

Consensus

No abstract provided.

Putting (Inter)Faith Into Practice: Reflections Of A Jewish Scholar In Residence At A Canadian Lutheran Seminary, Daniel Maoz

Consensus

No abstract provided.

Liberating The Imago Dei: An Examination Of Jewish And Christian Feminist Biblical Anthropology, Carissa S. Wyant

Doctor of Philosophy Theses

This study provides a comparative analysis of the work of Roman Catholic feminist theologian Elizabeth Johnson and that of Jewish feminist theologian Judith Plaskow, who have both sought to reconstruct the Imago Dei (“image of God”) within their respective traditions. By way of this analysis, it makes a methodological and a substantive contribution. Methodologically, it expands on Elizabeth Schüssler-Fiorenza’s feminist critical approach to reading Scripture by relating it to Francis Clooney’s comparative theological approach to reading texts in religious traditions other than one’s own. Although there have been attempts at comparisons of various religious traditions from a feminist perspective, this …

Radical Social Ecology As Deep Pragmatism: A Call To The Abolition Of Systemic Dissonance And The Minimization Of Entropic Chaos, Arielle Brender

Student Theses 2015-Present

This paper aims to shed light on the dissonance caused by the superimposition of Dominant Human Systems on Natural Systems. I highlight the synthetic nature of Dominant Human Systems as egoic and linguistic phenomenon manufactured by a mere portion of the human population, which renders them inherently oppressive unto peoples and landscapes whose wisdom were barred from the design process. In pursuing a radical pragmatic approach to mending the simultaneous oppression and destruction of the human being and the earth, I highlight the necessity of minimizing entropic chaos caused by excess energy expenditure, an essential feature of systems that aim …

Falling Far From The Tree? God's Rejection Of Cain Outside The Garden Of Eden (Genesis 4:1-16), Mark Remington Squire

Master of Sacred Theology Thesis

Squire, Mark R. “Falling Far from the Tree?: God’s Rejection of Cain Outside the Garden of Eden.” S.T.M. Thesis, Concordia Seminary, 2018. 105 pp.

This thesis offers a review of the history of interpretation of the account of Gen 4:1–16. Specifically, the focus of this thesis regards the question of why God favored Abel and his sacrifice and not Cain and his sacrifice. The paper provides an original translation of Gen 4:1–16, as well as translation notes. The historical interpretations of the answer to the question of why God favored Abel over Cain are grouped into three broad categories: Cain’s …

Wrap-Up Report, Wonsuk Ma

Empowered21 Global Network of Spirit-Empowered Scholars

No abstract provided.

Karl Marx And Liberation Theology: Dialectical Materialism And Christian Spirituality In, Against, And Beyond Contemporary Capitalism, Peter Mclaren, Petar Jandrić

Education Faculty Articles and Research

This paper explores convergences and discrepancies between liberation theology and the works of Karl Marx through the dialogue between one of the key contemporary proponents of liberation theology, Peter McLaren, and the agnostic scholar in critical pedagogy, Petar Jandrić. The paper briefly outlines liberation theology and its main convergences with the works of Karl Marx. Exposing striking similarities between the two traditions in denouncing the false God of money, it explores differences in their views towards individualism and collectivism. It rejects shallow rhetorical homologies between Marx and the Bible often found in liberation theology, and suggests a change of focus …

Bremmer's "Maidens, Magic And Martyrs In Early Christianity" (Book Review), Cynthia Hammell

The Christian Librarian

No abstract provided.

Mattes's "Martin Luther’S Theology Of Beauty: A Reappraisal" (Book Review), Craig Rosenbeck

The Christian Librarian

No abstract provided.

Arcari's " Beyond Conflicts: Cultural And Religious Cohabitations In Alexandria And Egypt Between The 1st And The 6th Century Ce" (Book Review), Grace Andrews

The Christian Librarian

No abstract provided.

Speelman's "Melanchthon And Calvin On Confession And Communion: Early Modern Protestant Penitential And Eucharistic Piety" (Book Review), Robert Lancaster

The Christian Librarian

No abstract provided.

The Art Of Dying As The Art Of Living: Exploring Buddhist Death Meditation As A Path To Human Flourishing, Kayla Stock

Obsculta

Can spiritual practices that inform our ideas about death alleviate fear of death? Can they lead to human flourishing? To explore these questions, I will examine the Buddhist practice of death meditation, assessing the practice both theologically and scientifically, then discussing the merits of this practice toward the purposes of human flourishing. I will end with an exploration of the potential ministerial applications of Buddhist death meditation.

One From The Beginning: A Proposed Apologetic For The Growth Of The Church From Ad 30-250, Douglas Taylor

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

“The oftener we are mown down by you, the more in number we grow; the blood of Christians is seed.” Why Christianity from its inception grew in numbers has remained a relatively stable and uncontested topic. Moreover, recent history has seen a move by some scholars to claim not one but multiple Christianities existed in the first three centuries. No study, however, has approached the growth of Christianity as being a result of positive apologetics and then defended that there was but one Christianity from the beginning through the use of Root Cause Analysis. After proposing an early fixed understanding …

Agang's "No More Cheeks To Turn?" (Book Review), David H. Michaels

The Christian Librarian

No abstract provided.