News of the extended network of faculty, alumni, students, visiting researchers, and mission partners is regularly updated, and some of the big ideas or major events in Global Christianity are covered in the CGCM News.
Toleration in Comparative Perspective
The Center for Democracy, Toleration and Religion is pleased to work in conjunction with Reset Dialogues on Civilizations to host the conference“Toleration in Comparative Perspective: Concepts, Practices, Documents” from January 19-23, 2021, over Zoom. The conference gathers scholars to talk about the ways in which religious toleration has been articulated and practiced in places and periods outside of modern “Western” history. Each day will feature a thematic panel — on spaces, philosophy, law, political theory and textual interpretation — that brings together speakers from across fields and disciplines. The conference will begin with a keynote address by Professor Denis Lacorne, of Sciences Po.
Professor Eugenio Menegon will speak about the place of toleration in Chinese society in a paper entitled, ‘The Way Has Not a Constant Name’: State Attitudes to Religious Toleration in Chinese History.
The conference is open to the public, and we encourage anyone who is interested to register through this link.
China-Europe Relations in Late Imperial Times
Dr. Daryl Ireland Featured in Series on Prominent Historians of Christianity in China
Dr. Daryl Ireland, Associate Director of the CGCM, recently was interviewed for a video series entitled "Christianity in China: Recollections on the Field by Prominent Scholars," sponsored by the Whitworth University Library and the China Christianity Studies Group. The series includes talks with other well-known scholars of the field such as Drs. Wu Xiaoxin, Chloë Star, Joseph Tse-hei Lee, Cindy Yik-yi Chu, and several others.
Dr. Eugenio Menegon, Associate Professor of History at BU and a CGCM affiliate, has also been featured in this series. See their videos below!
Christian Hymns in Central Yunnan: Discussion with Film Director Hu Jie
The Chinese University of Hong Kong is hosting a discussion with documentary film maker Hu Jie. This event would be of interest for any person whose work intersects with Christianity among ethnic minority groups in China, anthropological or sociological studies, or documentary film!
'Songs from Maidichong'
1st Prize, Yage Prize (Visual Arts) Winning Works, 2020
1st Prize, The 10th Chinese Documentary Festival, 2017
Zoom play
Dialogue with director Hu Jie
Please click on the link below to enter the venue at 7:30 pm on December 18, 2020 (Beijing time)
https://cuhk.zoom.us/j/
94323550931?pwd= ai9oK0JqR3psUlZ1dVhrQ2V5cUIyQT 09 7:30pm -- 8:50pm, Zoom play
9:00pm -- 10:00pm, Dialogue with director Hu Jie (please use the Zoom Q&A feature to submit your questions)All villagers of Maidichong, the Miao village located in the middle of the mountains in central Yunnan, believe in Christianity. They have kept the faith that came from Europe over a hundred years ago. Singing Christian hymns is a daily routine in the villagers' life. The moving voices seem to come from the sky above. The film tells how the villagers adhere to their beliefs and shows their worries in real life.
Language: Chinese; Subtitles: Chinese and English; Duration: 83 minutes
Hu Jie, born in 1958. Served in the PLA Air Force for 15 years. He started to shoot documentaries in 1995 and independently completed more than 30 documentaries. He focuses on reality, such as "Far Mountain", which records the lives of miners (1995); "Folk Song on the Plain", a story about abducted women (2001), as well documentaries reflecting on history, such as the Great Famine documentary "Spark"(2013), "Looking for Lin Zhao's Soul", "Although I Die", which is about the victims of the Cultural Revolution (2006) or "My Mother Wang Peiying", (2010). Hu Jie is also an excellent painter and is especially good at printmaking.
This documentary can be watched on Youtube: https://youtu.be/
A0umVais55c
《麥地沖的歌聲》2020，首屆杜克雅歌文藝獎視覺藝術組一等獎2017，華語紀錄片節長片組一等獎Zoom 播放与导演胡杰線上聊
請於2020年12月18日晚上7:30（北京時間）點擊如下鏈接進入會場：
https://cuhk.zoom.us/j/94323550931?pwd= ai9oK0JqR3psUlZ1dVhrQ2V5cUIyQT 09
7:30pm -- 8:50pm, Zoom觀片
9:00pm -- 10:00pm, 導演一席談及問答（輸入文字提问） 坐落在雲南省中部群山之中的苗族村寨"麥地沖"，全體村民均信奉基督教。一百年前自歐洲傳來的信仰，保持至今。 唱誦基督教聖歌為村民生活中的日常，動人的歌聲仿佛來自天外。 影片講述村民如何堅守其信仰，並展現了他們現實生活中的憂慮。 影片語言：中文；字幕：中、英文；片長：83分鐘 胡傑，1958年生。曾在解放軍空軍部隊服役15年。1995年 開始拍攝紀錄片，獨立完成紀錄片三十餘部。 其中包括關注現實的紀錄片，如記錄礦工生活的《遠山》，1995 ；被拐賣婦女的故事《平原上的山歌》，2001。 以及反映歷史的紀錄片，代表作為《尋找林昭的靈魂》， 講述文革受害者的《我雖死去》，2006；《我的母親王佩英》， 2010。大饑荒紀錄片《星火》，2013，等等。 胡傑亦是一位出色的畫家，尤擅長版畫。
Alumnus Appointed Executive Coordinator of Africa Inter-Mennonite Mission
Dr. Bruce Yoder ('16) has recently been appointed one of the two Executive Coordinators of Africa Inter-Mennonite Mission (AIMM), alongside John Fumana of the Mennonite Bretheren Church of the Congo. Presently a member of Listowel Mennonite Church in Ontario, Yoder has spent 26 years in mission work in West Africa and Latin America, most recently serving as a missiologist in seminaries in Burkina Faso and Benin. He will begin to take up this new work for AIMM in January 2021.
In response to his appointment, Yoder says, “With over a century of missionary engagement, AIMM’s work has been instrumental in the development of multiple African Mennonite/Anabaptist churches; intercultural relationships between African, North American, and European partners; and transnational Anabaptist networks. Time and again I am amazed and inspired by the vitality and resilience of the African Church and am pleased for the opportunity to engage partners on the continent and around the world to advance their collaborative mission initiatives. I’m humbled and honored to be able to contribute to this tradition of mission engagement in Africa and beyond."
Read the full report from Twila Albrecht, AIMM Search Committee Secretary, here.
Call for Papers: Central and Eastern European Association for Mission Studies
The Central and Eastern European Association for Mission Studies (CEEAMS) is holding their annual meeting on February 23-25, 2021. This year's theme is "Mission Matters: Trends, Challenges, and New Perspectives in Christian Mission in Central and Eastern Europe." To submit a paper proposal, please send an abstract of no more than 300 words to ceeams@ceeams.org by December 15, 2020 with the subject heading: CA2021 / [your name].
Learn more details about the conference at the CEEAMS website.
Call for Abstracts from the US-China Catholic Association
The US-China Catholic Association is currently accepting paper abstracts for its conference on “China, Christianity, and the Dialogue of Civilizations,” to take place August 6-8, 2021 on the campus of Santa Clara University. The theme of this conference is the engagement between Christianity and Chinese civilization. Panels may examine this theme in light of recent challenges, the larger horizon of shared values, and/or pursuit of the common good. Submissions will be accepted on a rolling basis beginning on December 1. Panel topics will include the following:
• The Sino-Vatican Accord in Historical and Comparative Perspective
• Sinicization of Religion: Meaning and Application
• China and Environmental Stewardship: The Contribution of the Churches
• Urbanization and Its Far-Reaching Implications
• The Coronavirus, The Global Community, and the Church
• Sino-Christian Theology: Chinese Intellectuals Engage Christian Tradition
• Chinese Christian Spirituality
• Civic Controversy in Hong Kong and Christian Community
• Young People and Contemporary Society
• Women and Faith Communities in China Today
See the Call for Papers for more information.
2021 Yale-Edinburgh Group Meeting on “Oral, Print, & Digital Cultures”
The Yale-Edinburgh Group will be meeting virtually on June 22-24, 2021. See the announcement below from Drs. Emma Wild-Wood and Alex Chow.
We are delighted to announce the 2021 Yale-Edinburgh Group annual meeting will take place in a virtual environment. The meeting will be held June 22 to June 24, 2021 and will be hosted by the University of Edinburgh.The theme of this year’s conference will be Oral, Print, and Digital Cultures in World Christianity and the History of Mission. You can learn more about the theme at http://divinity-adhoc.library.yale.edu/Yale- Edinburgh/2021theme.htm A call for proposals will go out to the Yale-Edinburgh email list in January 2021. Additional information regarding the conference will also be provided on the Group’s website http://divinity-adhoc.library.yale.edu/Yale- Edinburgh/in the New Year. Proposals submitted last year have not been kept. We ask that new proposals will be submitted once the call is out.We look forward to connecting with you in 2021.Alex Chow and Emma Wild-WoodCo-Directors of Centre for the Study of World Christianity, Edinburgh
Digital Humanities: Mapping Christianity in China
On November 19-21, 2020, the Center for Global Christianity and Mission convened a workshop on “Mapping Christianity in China, 1550-1950.” The Center launched the China Historical Christian Database (CHCD) project in 2018 to map where every Christian church, school, hospital, monastery, orphanage, publishing house, and the like were located in China between 1550 and 1950. The project also seeks to identify who worked inside those buildings, both foreigners and Chinese. The goal is to build a tool that can create spatial maps of when and where Christians were located in China, and a resource that can generate social network maps of Christian actors.
The workshop was designed to mark a milestone in the project. The China Historical Christian Database is exiting its proof-of-concept phase (beta version). Before dramatically upscaling, it was important to get input from various stakeholders. The Boston University Center for the Study of Asia (BUCSA) and the Institute on Culture, Religion and World Affairs (CURA) provided the funds that allowed 266 people from twenty-eight countries to attend the virtual event. Scholars, computer scientists, and archivists worked together to lay out a pathway for the CHCD to become transformative for the study of modern China and modern Chinese Christianity. The sessions were recorded and are available at chcdatabase.com.
New Videos: Political and Popular Theology in Chinese Christian Posters
At the Overseas Ministry Study Center at Princeton Seminary, Dr. Daryl Ireland recently gave two rich visual presentations using Chinese Christian evangelistic posters to uncover the political and popular theology of revivalistic Chinese Protestantism in the mid-20th century. These two presentations are now available at the CGCM's YouTube page. Check them out below!