Mission Spirituality Research Articles

Spirituality of Communication as Foundation for a Missional Approach to Digital Culture

The article seeks to make the case for a Christian spirituality of communication, one that especially addresses the communicative and interpersonal dynamics in digital culture and strives to elevate these toward a disposition of authentic relationality. From this foundation in a Christian spirituality of communication, the article proposes several key theological characteristics as fundamental for a missional approach to digital culture, including revelation, incarnation, communion, truth in context, and announcing hope. The article concludes by proposing a framework for a lived, missional spirituality expressing each of these in the digital context. Living out of this framework offers digital culture greater potential toward human flourishing as a whole. Keywords: Christian spirituality, digital culture, theology of communication, relationality, mission and evangelization

In search of spirituality for intercultural mission: Hospitality, solidarity and marginality

Today's multicultural situation in many parts of the world requires a new missionary approach and practices. In addition, along with advanced understanding of culture and mission, interculturality is being presented as an alternative to complement the existing cross-cultural mission paradigm. In this intercultural mission paradigm, which emerges in the vision that people with various backgrounds and orientations participate in God's mission together with equal status on the Christian base, mission is not understood as a human strategy, but as a spiritual activity that involves the task of discerning God's initiatory work and of practicing a way of life appropriate for it. This article examines the possibility that the Christian mission as a joint participation in God's mission is practiced interculturally in today's multicultural situation. Focusing on the migration context, this article attempts to define “intercultural mission” within the larger framework of the missio Dei, and presents hospitality, solidarity, and marginality, which has been already recognized as important mission spiritualities in existing studies, as core mission spiritualities for intercultural mission. And, from this, this paper describes intercultural mission as a joint spiritual practice of creating space and building bridges for God's mission.

Sources of Inspiration in Understanding Missionary Spirituality in the Thought of John Paul II

The concept of missionary spirituality falls within the mainstream of Christian spirituality. John Paul II understands it in the personalistic and Christological perspective. According to the Pope’s thought, the missionary spirituality is the fruit of the total submission to the Holy Spirit in the missionary’s aim to become permanently conformed to Christ. This attitude results from a deep union with the Holy Trinity in the experience of the Father through Jesus Christ, in the Holy Spirit. Imitating Christ, the preacher of the Gospel, is essential for an authentic missionary spirituality. Following the ideal of missionary spirituality leads to an authentic inculturation, love of the Church, shapes the proper spirit of prayer and missionary asceticism, dynamises apostolic commitment and lays the foundations for a true dialogue, inseparable from the missionary activity.

Pentecostal movements in Norway

ABSTRACT This article provides a historical analysis of Norwegian Pentecostal and charismatic movements and their distinct character. The paper offers an overview of social, cultural, and theological factors that have influenced its historical development, and explores how key Pentecostal protagonists have responded to this context. The analysis shows how charismatic leaders, like Thomas Ball Barratt, exercise agency, but also how movements depend on systems of institutional practices that transcend the individual. This includes the evangelistic and prophetic practices that are associated with Pentecostalism. Nevertheless, the historical analysis also shows that these need to be balanced over time by doctrinal and pastoral practices, and vice versa. Finally, it is argued that a particular kind of charismatic, entrepreneurial, and missional spirituality has given classic Norwegian Pentecostalism its most distinctive shape.

Beholding

This article addresses missional spirituality, that is what spirituality, individual and corporate, is appropriate and fruitful in churches which seek to participate in the mission of God. The paper engages with neuroscience around how the two hemispheres of the brain, right and left offer two ways of attending to the world and Iain McGilchrist’s assertion in The Master and his Emissary that left brain attention has predominated especially in Modernity. Two Christian responses which utilise these truths about the brain are critically examined, one from an American, broadly Evangelical school of thought and the other from the Anglican Solitary, Maggie Ross. Ross’ recovery of the apophatic stream of Christian spirituality via the right brain of “Deep Mind” is preferred without dismissing other approaches. The “unintended consequences” of seeking silence before God who is, including the gift of “beholding” and how they connect to what is required of missional churches are delineated. Some brief suggestions are made as to might be done to enhance the practice of silence in local churches.

Pope Francis’ Theology of Mission

AbstractSince his election in 2013, Pope Francis has embarked upon a significant program of teaching, exhortation, and internal church critique aimed at stimulating the missionary reform of the Catholic Church. This article provides an overview of his contributions in this area with attention to his efforts to promote the greater involvement of all the baptized in mission, a deeper spirituality of mission across the church, and renewed practices of proclamation and social outreach. The fundamentally practice‐oriented nature of Francis’ teaching is highlighted and a framework for conceiving the central facets of his mission theology is proposed.

In Search of Transformative Ways of Being in Mission: Introducing the Mission Spirituality Spiral

This article reflects on the interface between missiology (and mission) and spirituality (including spirituality in practice). It explores the relationship between the two disciplines and introduces the mission spirituality spiral, which can be used both as an analytic and as a mobilizing tool. Mission and spirituality are explored at their core. Their cohesiveness and inseparability lead to the notion of mission spirituality, which takes shape in the mission spirituality spiral. The article explains the dimensions of the spiral, which flow one into the other and culminate in the discernment of transformative ways of being in mission.

Az önreflexió megváltozott tartalma online oktatás idején a vallástanárok nézőpontjából

"The Changed Content of Self-Reflection during Online Teaching – The Perspective of Religion Teachers. The spread of the coronavirus pandemic took its toll on all areas of life, and we can safely say that it has fundamentally altered education, too, throughout the globe. Teachers around the world exhibited a wide array of responses to the changed situation, some of them having no real problem with the transition to online teaching, while the majority of them having suffered a considerable loss of faith concerning their effectiveness as teachers when coming up against the changed environment and the new challenges. Most teachers of religion were experiencing a sense of lack due to the enforced suspension of the day-to-day interpersonal relationships, considering that personal encounters have a particular relevance to religion as a subject on account of its pastoral care and spiritual aspects. Teachers did not only have to struggle with the new challenges emerging in their working environment, with problems around ensuring an appropriate technological background, or with the transformation of the existent teaching material for online use, but the adoption of a successful coping in a situation never dealt with before could be affected by certain (psychological) factors running much deeper such as their faith/beliefs, while the reasons for coming to a deadlock can often be traced back to the issues of professional identity, (sense of) mission, or religious spirituality. The present study points out that (self-)reflection increases teachers’ efficiency and productiveness, and it is the author’s belief that conscious reflection can seriously add to teachers’ professional fulfilment during the crisis situation created by the virus, when online teaching methods have to be adopted, since reflection can put intrinsic motivation to work, as a result of which teachers can set a course to their own development. Further, we will present a reflection model that provides a content framework for reflection and wherein there is a possibility for a deeper-level reflection as well, thus going beyond the aspects of environment, behaviour, and views and reaching the levels of professional identity, mission, and religious spirituality. Keywords: online teaching, teacher effectiveness, reflection, onion model "

La beata Paolina Maria Jaricot (1799-1862) ed i cattolici della Moldavia

This Article deals with Pauline-Marie Jaricot. A nineteenth-century French Christian who contributed significantly to the building of the Universal Church through the history of man. She lived her faith in an exemplary manner. It is she who founded the Association “Propagation de la Foi”. The founding of this association marks today 200 years of existence. It was meant to support, both spiritual and financial, the evangelization missions of the Church. Pauline-Marie Jaricot was born in Lyon in 1799, and the years that followed have increased her life of faith through various experiences, both in spirit and missionary zeal. Her efforts for missions were not isolated but increased. Thus, in 1822 the Association “Propagation de la Foi” appears. The actions of this association support a missionary spirituality, material solidarity, and an international network. Among its beneficiaries, throughout history, was the Roman-Catholic Diocese of Iasi. The Catholics of Moldova have started to be supported since the nineteenth century.

Nurturing a missional spirituality

Nurturing a missional spirituality

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.

The Franciscan Vow of Poverty as an Ancient and Modern Resource for Innovative Missional Practice

This paper explores the experience of those choosing to live a monastic lifestyle and analyses these experiences as potential missional practice in our time. Questionnaires, surveys, and interviews were used to correlate the language, symbols, understanding, and experience of participants. Using the data in an imaginative way, I offer a conversation between: a pilgrim interested in monastic practices, Clare as a facilitator, and composite characters that were created using the research data. These characters’ conversations share and critique the lived experience of the research participants. This imaginative conversation also creatively provides a literature review. Drawing on ideas from fantasy fiction, the analysis and results of the research are explored in a fantasy world called “Freedom.” The research demonstrates the cyclical process of contemplative action. Innovative missional practice (by individuals and the Church as a whole) becomes an ethos by which to live. Defining missional spirituality in this manner deepens the Church’s understanding of “mission” in our time.

페체르스크 라브라 수도원의 선교적 영성 연구

Missional spirituality refers to spirituality that follows the missional life of Jesus Christ, and handles evangelical missional work. Missional spirituality is spirituality of seeking, a practice of neighboring love, and a spirituality of a missional alternative community. The monks of the Ukrainian Kiev Pechersk Labra monastery spent more than half of their lives in the underground caves. The monks walked the path of spiritual training in the cave, came out with the power of the Holy Spirit, passed the gospel to the group who came and fixed the disease. Those who accepted the gospel in the PLM were scattered throughout Ukraine and Russia and missioned; the PLM contains the characteristics of missional spirituality. This feature shows the problems and answers of Korean churches that are struggling with dualistic and hierarchical problems by concentrating their efforts on attracting them due to the influence of the Western Church Christendom.

Middle Knowledge: Human Freedom in Divine Sovereignty

In the last two or three decades, we have witnessed a renewed interest in spirituality in Christian academic circles. More recently, we have also seen a growing number of publi­cations on the mission and missional church—both on popular and academic levels. While one can easily find many quality works on Christian spirituality and some decent books on mission/missional church, one would only find a few works that combine both themes in a single volume. In this work, Charles Fen­sham, professor of theology at Knox College, Toronto, attempts to do just that—as one may discern from the book’s subtitle: A Missional Spirituality. As such, this book ad­dress­es those who have interest in spirituality and/or in mission but particularly to those who would like to see how biblical missional impetus shapes a particular understanding of Christian spirituality.

Missional metanoia: Missional spirituality in holistic theological education

Theological education is in crisis having lost an important dimension with its main focus on quality academics often abstracted from real life. This study aimed to propose that the formation of spirituality is fundamental to theological education and that theological education should be a holistic formation. The setting of this study is re-imaging theological education in the Dutch Reformed Church (DRC), a denomination in the process of missional transformation, but it is also applicable to theological education in general. This study focused on the relation between theology and spirituality, the significance of missional spirituality in theological education and a probable model for the formation of a missional spirituality. The study found that theology and spirituality are interdependent, and theological education should thus focus on all the different areas of learning and formation, that is, minimum knowledge base, pass-on-able habits and skills, and attitudes and beliefs. Theological education should ultimately cultivate a missional spirituality, forming missional leaders for the church. Leaders who are equipped are able to equip others for God’s mission. Theological education is not about obtaining a degree but in essence a process of formation and transformation. Wright asks: if the gospel is not transforming you, will it transform anything else? Transformation to be able to transform – a missional metanoia.Contribution: This study provides a probable model for holistic theological education and the formation of a missional spirituality.

선교적 영성(Missional Spirituality)에 대한 소고: 대안 공동체로서, 일상에서, 하나님의 선교에 참여하는 영성

기독교 영성은 삼위일체 하나님과의 관계에서 일어나는 것으로 인간 의 영적인 부분만이 아니라 전존재에 해당한다. 그러므로 기독교 영성은 크리스텐덤의 이분법적인 세계관에서처럼, 오직 교회 안이나 수도원 안에 서만 습득할 수 있는 것이 아니다. 현대인의 일상은 하나님과의 관계를 돈 독히 하고 그것을 구현할 수 있는 영성의 현장(context)이다. 아울러서 기 독교 영성은 예수 그리스도의 공생애에서 볼 수 있듯이, 공동체 안에서 이 루어진다. 선교적 영성은 하나님의 선교(missio Dei)에 근거를 두는 영성이다. 그 러므로 선교적 영성은 교회나 수도원 안에서 혹은 선교현장에서 사역하는 선교사나 목회자들만의 영성이 아니고, 장소가 어느 곳이든지 상관없이 일 상에서 부름 받고 보냄 받은 모든 기독교인에게 필요한 영성이다. 마지막 으로 선교적 영성은 개인적인 경건생활의 차원을 넘어서, 기독교 공동체가 이 땅에서 하나님의 선교에 참여하는 대안 공동체로서의 역할을 감당케 하는 영성이다.

To the Nations for the Earth: A Missional Spirituality

In the last two or three decades, we have witnessed a renewed interest in spirituality in Christian academic circles. More recently, we have also seen a growing number of publi­cations on the mission and missional church—both on popular and academic levels. While one can easily find many quality works on Christian spirituality and some decent books on mission/missional church, one would only find a few works that combine both themes in a single volume. In this work, Charles Fen­sham, professor of theology at Knox College, Toronto, attempts to do just that—as one may discern from the book’s subtitle: A Missional Spirituality. As such, this book ad­dress­es those who have interest in spirituality and/or in mission but particularly to those who would like to see how biblical missional impetus shapes a particular understanding of Christian spirituality.

Scottish Fulfilment Theory and Friendship: Lived Religion at Edinburgh 1910

Employing the perspective of ‘lived religion’, this article examines how Scottish missionary practices influenced the 1910 Edinburgh World Missionary Conference. Scottish intellectual and worship traditions intersected with commitment to cross-cultural relationships in the missional practices of J. N. Farquhar, Nicol Macnicol, and Annie Small. The juxtaposition of ‘fulfilment theory’ and ‘friendship’ reflected missionary openness to personal engagement with Indian religious and cultural traditions. Instead of being merely an intellectual preparation for ‘comparative religion’, Scottish fulfilment theory signalled an embodied missionary spirituality that emerged as implicit criticism of colonial hierarchies in India.

Missional spirituality at home: Families and the life of the kingdom

Missiological texts typically focus on the church or individuals as the agents of mission (within the missio Dei) and it is rare to find any reference to families or the home. Such an omission, however, overlooks the extent to which families can witness to the transforming grace of God in the midst of the world. In this article, I explore the importance of families for mission, and argue that the New Testament shows that the family is subordinated to the church but also transformed by the kingdom. In the light of the New Testament witness, I explore three scriptural themes of a family spirituality for mission; holiness, hospitality, and service. Given the significance of life within the home, the disciplines of missiology and Christian spirituality need to engage more deeply with the family as a context for Christian formation and outreach.

Missio Dei Is Missio Trinitas: Sharing the Whole Life of God, Father, Son and Spirit

Abstract Missio Dei (“the mission of God”), and grounding the mission of the church in the character of God as a missionary God, is one of the most important theological (re-)discoveries of the twentieth-century. The concept is limited, however, if focused on one aspect of God as sending God, model of incarnational mission or empowerment for mission. This article argues that missio Dei is missio Trinitas (“the mission of the Trinity”). It explores the richness of missio Dei from an explicitly trinitarian perspective and its implications for local congregations, in conversation with missional church writers. The article argues that missio Trinitas places primary responsibility for mission with a Trinitarian God, invites the church to join God in the dance of (co-)mission, moves mission beyond church programs to a spirituality of mission, turns church attention to a whole gospel for the whole world, and calls all Christians into mission as communities rather than individuals. Ensuring a Trinitarian understanding of God and mission helps the church to remember the importance of divine agency, spirituality of mission, holistic mission and the mission of the whole people of God.