Christian Mission and the Social Sciences

Abstract

Abstract This chapter presents an overview of the debate on the relationship between Christian missions, missiology, and social sciences, understood as terms that express missionary practice, theological reflection, and fields of knowledge that provide analyses of the conditions under which mission takes place and is assessed. It is argued that the link is both socially and conceptually constructed and can thus take many forms. This is done contextually, from a Latin American perspective and prioritizing authors from that context. A central feature of such views is an acute sense of the concrete challenges of poverty, inequality, oppression, and colonial legacies. It is argued that three basic orientations can be discerned: instrumental, dialogic, and activist. They all affirm the importance of the link, but construct it differently. From the idea that mission and the social sciences are fully constituted, separate, or opposing fields, the latter come to be seen as complementary and interconnected.