February 27, 2008

HONG KONG, China/GENEVA – Theological questions evoked by the challenge of religious resurgence in various world contexts were the focus of a recent Lutheran World Federation (LWF) seminar bringing together 22 teaching theologians mainly from Asia.

"What do we believe, teach and practice in the midst of religious resurgence today?" was the title of the 27 January – 2 February LWF Department for Theology and Studies (DTS) seminar held at Lutheran Theological Seminary and the Tao Fung Shan Christian Center in Hong Kong, China. Questions that are not often explored in theological discourse, especially people's daily issues of survival, were a major highlight.

"Globalization evokes questions of identity, especially when we in minority situations ask who we are," remarked Dr Martin Sinaga, who teaches at Jakarta Theological Seminary in Indonesia. Dr Chung Song Mee, dean and church history lecturer at Sabah Theological Seminary in Malaysia, described the charismatic movement impact on churches in Sabah, Malaysia, and how theological education should respond.

In his keynote address, Brazilian Dr Vitor Westhelle, teaching systematic theology at the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago, Illinois, USA, pointed to the growing number of Lutherans in the South, and the challenges they face. Non-traditional neighbors and new emergent pieties "bring to the Lutheran agenda implications for theology and pastoral practice that we are only now starting to realize in its breadth and depth, and redrawing the face of Lutheranism," he said.

Contextualization

The question for Westhelle was whether "the figure of Lutheranism [can] be transfigured, and catalyze new experiences," as the recognized Lutheran doctrines have become too reified, and no longer connected with their contexts. The key, he added, "is a real gift if, and only if, it opens the lock that holds our lives captive."

Rev. Yovan Beno, theology and ethics lecturer at the Mennonite Brethren Centenary Bible College in Shamshabad, India, remarked, "Our theology at times looks like a slogan: it needs to be more relational, dialogical and diaconal." Dr Sarojini Nadar, University of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, reiterated the importance of "critical" contextualization of Christian theology, recognizing that some aspects of indigenous cultures and practices need to be critiqued because of their harmful effects, especially on women.

Lutheran Church of Australia pastor Rev. Basil Schild, working among Aboriginal people cited an Aboriginal pastor in central Australia, "It is so boring here, just waiting for Jesus to come: I want to die because it will be much better then." Schild called for a theology of survival to address such situations.

Discussions focused also on key questions on how material blessings can be understood in ways that are consistent with Lutheran theology; how relationships with those who have died could be understood; how more alive, creative and critical worship could be developed; and how Christian communities deal with religious and political threats to their existence.

Dr Samuael Ngun Ling, Myanmar Institute of Theology in Myanmar (Burma) asserted that daily threat is a reality for Christians there due to a repressive government, and also because being Burmese is equated with being Buddhist. His theological focus on interfaith dialogue in such a context was one of the papers discussed.

Other participants came from Hong Kong, Japan, Madagascar, Malawi, Papua New Guinea, Sweden and Tanzania. DTS director Rev. Dr Karen Bloomquist and Rev. Simone Sinn, theological associate in the department, said the seminar had helped the theologians "move beyond an inculturatio n phase of theological development, toward more inter-cultural critique and transformation of theological understandings."

Some of the presentations and group work from the DTS seminar will be published in the third volume of the LWF Theology in the Life of the Church series. The next global South theological seminar will take place in July 2008 in South Africa.

For more information, contact Rev. Dr Karen Bloomquist at kbl@lutheranworld.org.

Lutheran World Information