Mission Community Research Articles

Sharing in the Indiscriminate Generosity of God

This article probes three of the findings of the author’s D.Min. project thesis, which explored God’s call of racial justice in a predominantly white, affluent Episcopal parish. The research revealed theological and missional challenges that inhibit the church from joining in God’s mission of justice, namely participants viewing the church as the host of mission, white privilege hindering the practice of listening, and the reluctance of members to articulate the presence and activity of God as it relates to justice. In consideration of these obstacles, this article calls upon the indiscriminate generosity of God for funding the imagination of the missional community for faithful innovation related to racial justice.

Nurturing agency in emerging adults of local churches: a case study from Soshanguve

Emerging adults (age 35 and below) are the majority of the African population. In South Africa, for example, emerging adults make 63.9% of its population. This age group seems to be marginalised in Christian congregations of the township of Soshanguve where this research was conducted. This research is a case study that interviewed 30 de-churched emerging adults from different denominations to make its conclusions. It is stressing how the church could see the emerging adults’ empowerment as its contribution to building an inclusive society. It was found out that many people under the age of 35 years are leaving their local churches because they feel that their voices are undervalued, and they do not have fulfilling roles to play. It was concluded that some de-churched emerging adults are eager to exercise their agency in making their voices heard and playing fulfilling roles in a missional community structure outside their previous congregations. Many others just complained about the marginalisation they experienced in their previous congregations, but they did not exercise their agency to help build a church they would love to be part of. Marginalisation could, therefore, be an opportunity to create an inclusive community. It could also remain an eternal wound for other people who may just be finger-pointing perpetrators of marginalisation without demonstrating a different praxis.Contribution: This is a practical theology article that is strengthened by sources from political sciences and development studies to stress the need for the church to model inter-generational inclusiveness in how it operates.

NASA quesst mission—Community response testing plans

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has made a commitment to deliver data to the International Civil Aviation Organization’s Committee on Aviation Environmental Protection (ICAO CAEP) defining community response to sounds from supersonic aircraft designed such that their sonic boom is replaced with a soft “thump” sound. The dataset will be a correlation of public perceptions of these sounds to the corresponding acoustic levels and will support efforts to develop international standards for permissible noise from supersonic overflight. The NASA Quesst mission is developing the X-59, a unique research aircraft capable of quiet supersonic flight, and will use the aircraft in a series of community overflight tests to measure acoustic levels of its “sonic thump” and related public response. This presentation will provide an overview of the Quesst mission, including X-59 development, acoustic validation, and community testing with a focus on the plans and technical goals for those community response tests. In addition, results of a NASA-sponsored international workshop on strategies and considerations for key aspects of the community test phase of the Quesst mission, including estimating noise exposure levels and conducting surveys to support the dataset development, will be briefed.

An Analysis of the Role of the Missional Church in Community Development

This article reports findings on an analysis of the role of the Missional church in Community development. The study relied on document analysis, with data collected from hard and electronic formats. The following themes were analysed: Missional Church, Missional methods of Effective Presence, Community Development, communities, the Contribution of the missional Church to Community Development and Challenges facing the Missional Church within. The analysis reveals that a missional church is a missional community, in other words, people who are united in living God’s mission in a specific neighbourhood. The study further illustrates that community development is an essential part of God’s mission, whereby the church, notably the missional church promotes active citizenship to enable people to work together to improve human circumstances for the well-being of their communities. In narrating the correlation between the missional church and community development, the study elucidates the principles of community development as a cornerstone to the success of community development. Moreover, the paper argues that better relationships, reconciliation, and solidarity are the value judgments engendered by the involvement of the missional church in community development. The study further illuminates that the involvement of missional churches in community development is not easy as they face challenges like religious pluralization and racial polarisation. Keywords: Missional church, community development, justice, transformation

Reconsidering the place of Christ in Trinitarian mission in the African Divine Church of Kenya

African Divine Church (ADC) is an African Instituted Church affiliated to the Organisation of the African Instituted Churches, which shapes African Instituted Churches’ (AICs’) theology through theological education. ADC has both lived, and sung-narrated theology and it originated from the Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada, hence Pentecostal with experiential undertones. Selected leaders of ADC in Vihiga County contributed to the study. The de-emphasised place of Christ was investigated to establish his place in ADC’s Trinitarian and missional Theology. The study articulated theological principles regarding Trinitarian ecclesiology, to assist the ADC in reworking its Christology. The historical approach of the early church, medieval, reformation, and modern periods regarding the place of Christ as the second person of the Triune God were investigated, to formulate guidelines for a paradigm shift in understanding the place of Christ in Trinitarian ecclesiology and the missional community that ADC may use in reworking its Trinitarian Mission. The study employed a mixed-method that followed three steps, namely interviews, questionnaires and observation. The study population was determined through purposive sampling. A coding method safeguarded the identity and confidentiality of participants. The results were classified as historical, practical and theological. ADC derived its name from John 15:1–17 through meditation, vision and revelation. The colours red, white and green symbolise its mission and growth, while its experiential and charismatic liturgy was derived from 1 Samuel 6:1–4, with evidence of hermeneutical deficiency. Theological findings included the undeveloped relationship between God and ecclesial mission, emphasis on the Holy Spirit, healing, and prophecy with a lessened place of Christ in the Trinitarian mission, as well as the blend of ancestorology with Christology that threatens the hypostatic Christology and Trinitarian economy. The study implied a call for reworking hermeneutics, Trinitarian theology, and reconstructing the relationship between God’s mission and that of the Church and a reworked Christology, distinctive from ancestorology.Contribution: African Divine Church’s narrative theology is exposed especially the Trinitarian mission to a constructive critique and further study. It has advanced mixed-method in progressing narrative inquiry as an alternative methodology.

The college completion agenda: Managing and leading change

AbstractSince the 1947 Truman Commission's recommendation to establish local colleges in communities, the multiple mission community colleges have provided access and affordable education for millions. In the early years of the new millennium, community colleges garnered increased attention as engines of credential completion as the need for a college education came into focus. Broadly known as the completion or the attainment agenda, national efforts driven by philanthropic organizations prompted examination of student progression into and through community colleges. The purpose of this article is to trace the genesis of the completion agenda to the Truman Commission's Higher Education for Democracy report, to describe four community college completion initiatives, to make recommendations for leading internal change, and to provide leaders with a framework for initiating and monitoring change to improve student outcomes through use of the Prosci ADKAR change model and the Aspen Institute's Community College Excellence curriculum.

Believing in the future Missiology’s future prospects

This research attends to David Bosch’s (1995) last publication, Believing in the future: Towards a missiology of Western culture, and uses the work as a guide to formulate prospects for missiology as a theological discipline. Following Bosch, it uses an exploration of current events as a heuristic semiotic to discern the future of the church and to develop prospects for missiology. The ‘post-world’ we currently find ourselves in is described in the following terms: Post-COVID but pre-disaster; a Volatile, Unstable, Complex, and Ambiguous (VUCA) — a Post-stable world; Post-industrial revolutions — the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR); Post-stable climate. This is followed by the construction of missiology’s prospects, missiology for the “new normal”, suggesting several contours that may constitute the future of missiology. These include mission as theology and an expansion of the missio Dei ; The ecclesiological contour; The ecological contour; The 4IR as a new founding narrative; Public theology and faithful presence — the worthy walk of the missional community; Anticipatory leadership; Missional spirituality; and The rediscovery of joy.

Reconciled Community

Abstract Recent experience suggests that there is insufficient reflection on the ‘why’ of mission among missionary pioneers, that is, on the soteriology that underpins missional practices in the West. This article argues, first, that a social view of salvation is the best way to make theological sense of missional community formation (mcf). Second, this implied soteriology is further developed as an integrative lens on various dimensions of salvation in Christianity. Third, it is argued that this relocation of mcf in this social view of salvation offers rich opportunities for witness, and thus a potential remedy against soteriological embarrassment.

Discerning the essence and mission of the church in the midst of COVID-19

This article reflects on how the COVID-19 pandemic gives the church an opportunity to reconsider what the centre of God’s mission is for the congregation. It will engage on the implications of its reflections for public practical theology and congregational development. Spurred by an electronic opinion poll carried out by the author on six focus groups on WhatsApp platforms, averaging 200 participants each, during the lockdown days in Ghana, the question was put, “What one thing do you miss about church during the lock down period?” Majority of respondents mentioned communal fellowship (Konoinia) as the most missed aspect of congregational life. This article reflects on suggestions engendered by this observation and how it helps congregations to discern what makes them relevant to their members. Thus, helping congregations to envision the future, invoke dreams of a new creation where a return to normality will birth a world in which the church would take a new shape, presenting a fresh sense of missional community able to bring God to the people of our day.

Asserting Land, Estranging Kin: On Competing Relations of Dependence in Vanuatu

ABSTRACTThis paper examines how the new material value of land in postcolonial Vanuatu intensifies people's shaping and re‐shaping of claims to autonomy and dependence. Ahamb, like many other villages in Melanesia, originated as a mission community with people moving in from various original homelands. The mix of people from different places facilitated new kinship bonds and senses of community. However, it has also sparked disputes over land rights and leadership, fuelled by the postcolonial government's incentives for converting customary land into registered titles and leases for wealthy investors. The possibility of leasing out land, and preventing others from leasing out land, creates a dynamic where groups increasingly define themselves in terms of landowner clans that exclude outsiders rather than the wider kin networks that include them. Redefinitions of social boundaries generate secondary disputes over dependence and autonomy where care of kin, Christian commitment and future aspirations sometimes prove to be incompatible and in need of negotiation.

Exploring Local Church Praxis of Public Theology

Abstract The Baptist Union of Victoria (BUV) encourages local churches to give priority to contributing to the well-being of their local neighbourhoods through community engagement and advocacy. This commitment to holistic mission and local community development is an integral part of the public theology of local churches, given Elaine Graham’s argument that ‘practical care and service constitutes the essential praxis of public theology’. But to what extent does the reality of BUV local church mission match this rhetoric? The 2016 National Church Life Survey (NCLS) helps identify what community service BUV churches and their members are involved in. This article discusses the statistical state-wide responses of Victorian Baptists from NCLS 2016, together with interview responses from church leaders. It explores aspects of community development most valued by attenders, where church members are volunteering, and how and where churches are providing social services, prophetic advocacy and environmental care. This denominational case study illustrates that churches offering social services and fostering advocacy and creation care are functioning as the local praxis of public theology.

Pentecost and the World: Roland Allen, the Spirit, and Remodeling Twenty-First-Century Mission

A century after his major publications, Roland Allen continues to attract attention within the mission community. He has much to say to contemporary perceptions that new models in mission are urgently required. Allen is less concerned with methods than with the spiritual impulse for mission and the biblical principles by which it is lived. The missionary Spirit of Christ is at the heart of all mission, and the Pauline principles that Allen advances derive from our response to that Spirit. Following Allen, this article challenges a number of accepted contemporary practices in mission, asking “Is Christ here being revealed?”

사도바울의 선교사상에 나타난 삼위일체 하나님과 선교적 공동체 연구

사도바울의 선교사상에 나타난 삼위일체 하나님과 선교적 공동체 연구

Bridges to Health: U.S. Daughters of Charity, Seton Institute, and Funding Primary Health Care Activities in Latin America, 1985–2010

Daughters of Charity in California founded the Seton Institute for International Development in 1985 to support the efforts of Catholic sisters striving to improve the health of those struggling in poverty in Latin America. The institute offered training, disaster relief, medical equipment, and grants for capacity-building projects. Positioned as a fundraising and grant distributing entity, Seton Institute solicited funds from government sources, corporate sponsors, and individual donors. Leaders sought to balance their need for funds with the commitments of their charism. As the expectations and priorities of U.S. government-funded programs and Latin American sisters did not always align, Seton Institute chose to put the desires of Catholic sisters first and shifted efforts towards private aid. These Daughters of Charity prioritized building transnational relationships that reinforced their community's mission to serve those in poverty rather than accept funds from any available resource.

The role of university Knowledge Transfer Offices: Not just commercialize research outputs!

While there is a prevailing rich body of studies on the role of university knowledge transfer office (KTO) in the commercialization process as part of the Third Mission, research on its role in community engagement activities is relatively neglected, even as funding agencies and policy makers conceive these as instrumental to sustaining social and economic development. This article focuses on the role of university KTO in supporting, facilitating or undertaking Third Mission community engagement activities. Drawing on data from the annual Higher Education Business and Community Interaction survey for the years 2007–2012, this paper empirically explores the relationship between a range of Third Mission activities by university KTO and performance of three key business-community services – provision of consultancy, provision of continuous professional development courses (CPD), and leasing of facilities and equipment (FE). It emerges that the routines of developing strategic plan and creating spin-off are positively associated with all types of community knowledge transfer (CKT) activities. Further, the routines of establishing partnerships with local and regional bodies, and licensing are positively related to CPD and FE, respectively. The article is concluded with implications for theory, practice, policy, and suggestions for future research.

Leadership development for missions in poor urban communities

Leadership development is an ongoing need in Africa. Good leadership is key to the building of any society. This article is written from the perspective of someone who lives in an African community of poverty. As he or she observes the many problems the African continent faces, he or she wonders about the role of the church to participate in seeking solutions to these problems. The article stresses that effective leadership development should equip people to be participants of the flourishing of their communities. It discusses the theological and missiological foundations of leadership as avenues to align leadership formation with the improvement of the quality of life of Africans living in communities of poverty. The researcher belongs to a missional community which focuses on discipling local residents, with the hope of nurturing agency from inside out. He uses the autoethnographic methodology to describe this case study of his missional community efforts.

“This Greater Issue of Light against Darkness”: Sereno Edwards Bishop, Missionary Religion, and the Hawaiian Islands, 1827–1909

The history of nineteenth‐century missions provide a fruitful field to explore the development of religious thought and practice in a secular setting. This article shows how the religious views of the clergyman and educator Sereno Edwards Bishop, born in Hawai‘i of American missionary parents, were shaped by his childhood among the mission community in Hawai‘i and by his American college education. These instilled in him a liberal approach to theology that was informed by a spiritually alert sense of Hawaiian geography and environment. Contrary to the notion that he cast his faith aside in addressing matters of wider social and political importance, Bishop emerges as someone who thought critically about mid‐nineteenth‐century Protestant Christianity, grounding his perspective on politics, society, and natural history in Hawai‘i according to his religious principles. Given Bishop’s specific intellectual and cultural heritage, it is difficult to subsume his perspective within broader narratives of American expansion; rather, both Pacific and mainland American elements shaped the thought of such mission‐descended figures.

Detection of Mycobacterium lepromatosis in patients with leprosy in India.

IntroductionThe most commonly noted reactions in leprosy patients are type 1 reactions and erythema nodosum leprosum, with some rare phenomenon of host response known as Lucio phenomenon or leprosy of Lucio and Latapi which is caused by Mycobacterium lepromatosis. So far, no case of M. lepromatosis has been reported from India.Materials and methodsThe main objective of this study was to detect any positive cases of M. lepromatosis in India with such a complication. We screened slit skin smear/biopsy samples from lepromatous leprosy (LL) patients reporting to The Leprosy Mission Community Hospitals across the country. Eighty-eight slit skin smears were collected from leprosy patients in 70% ethanol. DNA was extracted from all these samples. Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) was done for 2 genes; one set was for 16S rRNA and the other set was for coproporphyrinogen III oxidase (hemN) gene. Then, sequencing was done for all positive amplicons. Homology of the sequences was analyzed using the Basic Local Alignment Search Tool at the National Center of Biotechnology Information database.ResultsAmong 88 isolates, we found 4 positive cases for M. lepromatosis. All 4 were LL cases with a bacteriological index ranging from 2+ to 4+. On the basis of the National Center of Biotechnology Information Basic Local Alignment Search Tool analysis, the sequenced amplicons of both genes matched with the M. lepromatosis 16S rRNA and phosphofructokinase genes but not with hemN gene of lepromatosis. This is the first report for the presence of M. lepromatosis in LL cases from India.ConclusionThis new species M. lepromatosis exists beyond Mexico, Singapore and it is the cause of DLL in India also. It may cause dual infections along with M. leprae in endemic areas like India.

Born from below: Urban regeneration through incarnational theological formation in Guatemala City and beyond

This article sets out to describe the development of and engagement with a global training collaborative around the formation of urban ministry leadership committed to the act of loving cities and working for peace. The collaborative is an initiative of Street Psalms called the Urban Training Collaborative and each urban training hub has agreed to be shaped and formed by an Incarnational Training Framework (ITF). The ITF was constructed over a 20-year period in the midst of a global missional community made up of leaders from cities all over the world. The ITF is infused by an incarnational theology as interpreted from below and focused on the message, method and manner as exemplified in the life and mission of Jesus Christ such that messengers are free of fear and unleashed to love their cities and seek their peace. The Incarnation of Jesus Christ animates faith-based engagement around the complex issues of poverty, injustice, social inequity and violence, and shifts paradigms from scarcity to abundance, theory to practice and rivalry to peacemaking. To shed light on the practical outworking of an incarnational theology from below, we will critically reflect on Guatemala City as a case study to illustrate how the formation of a city-wide missional community was developed through engagement around the aforementioned ITF which led to the corresponding paradigm shifts and then subsequently seeding a global training collaborative

Generation to Generation: Inter-Generationality and Spiritual Formation in Christian Community

The witness of the Scriptures and of virtually every human culture suggests that one of the most pivotal and thus crucial dimensions of human formation, and thus spiritual formation, is the intergenerational dynamic: older men with younger men; older women passing on the faith to younger women. One generation encouraging, blessing and transmitting wisdom to the next generation. And yet, it is often observed that this is a missing dimension of congregational life–that congregations are increasing stratified along generational lines. Thus this essay will make the case that the church is a liturgical, catechetical and missional community and that faith formation, in Christian community, will happen through the interplay of the generations in worship, teaching/learning and service. And that therefore congregations would be wise to be more attentive to how they foster intergenerational connections, rather than inadvertently or intentionally create generational divides in the church. Also, it is important to stress that a critical part of congregational life is that of equipping older men and women to be a means of grace to their younger counterparts. The essay will draw on the Biblical references to intergenerational formation, the insights of contemporary social-psychology and the observations of the author regarding contemporary congregational life.