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.
Alum Titus Presler, Principal of Edwardes College in Peshawar, on the shooting of Malala Yousafzai
Alum Titus Pressler (Th.D., 1995), Principal of Edwardes College in Peshawar, Pakistan has two new posts on his blog about the shooting of Malala Yousafzai, the Swat Valley 14 year old who has been campaigning for the rights of girls to an education in defiance of the Taliban's destruction of girls' schools.
SCM-USA to hold Ecojustice Symposium in NYC Nov. 9-10
The following announcement just arrived at CGCM:
The SCM-USA/WSCF-NA Northeast Regional Symposium on the theme of eco-justice local activism will be held on November 9-10, 2012 at St John’s in the Village Episcopal Church and the Center for Spiritual Life of New York University in New York City. This gathering will be an opportunity for students, young adults, senior friends and partners at large living in the Northeast of the USA to come together to discuss one of the key working areas of the Strategic Plan of the WSCF, to reflect theologically on how Christian faith informs social and political engagement on this topic and to engage in strategic thinking on how to support the strengthening of the work of SCM in this geographic area of the USA and nationally. A solidarity delegation from the SCM Canada will attend the conference!
Please, spread the word, attend the conference and support the SCM-USA and the WSCF-NA
Practical Theology/Missiology Lunch Colloquium Announced
Alumni Profile: Dr. Myung Soo Park
Myung Soo Park is a professor of Church History at Seoul Theological University, located in Bucheon, South Korea. He is currently the director of the Institute for the Study of Modern Christianity, a chief editor and publisher of Holiness Church and Theology, and the president of the Korean Church History Society. He received his S.T.M. from School of Theology and Ph.D. from the Department of Religious and Theological Studies at Boston University in 1992.
Both his S.T.M. thesis, “Roots of the Korean Evangelical Holiness Church with special reference to the doctrine of Holiness” and his Ph.D. dissertation “Concepts of Holiness in American Evangelicalism” under the direction of Dr. Dana Robert are considered ground-breaking research, shedding new light on the origins of Korean Evangelical Holiness Church (KEHC), the third largest denomination in Korea. In particular, his research has contributed to shift the historiography of the KEHC from a somewhat nationalistic “Self-born” theory into a “Trans-pacific” theory by relating the origins of the Korean Holiness Churches to the American Wesleyan Holiness movement. In 2007, celebrating its centennial, the KEHC published One Hundred Year History of the Korea Evangelical Holiness Church, Dr. Park played an important role as the editorial supervisor.
His current research interests include the global Holiness movement, global Pentecostalism, and the relationship between Korean society and Christianity. He has written numerous articles and book reviews in Wesleyan Theological Journal, Journal of Pentecostal Studies, and Church History and he is an author of more than thirty books. He was the founding director of the KEHC Historical Research Center, which now has changed its name to the Institute for the Study of Modern Christianity. He also served as the associate editor of the Church history from 2004 to 2009, and was the academic dean of Seoul Theological Seminary from 2005-2010. He is also an ordained pastor of the KEHC.
By Hye Jin Lee
John Berthrong reports on GCTS Christianity in China Conference
John Berthrong and Dana Robert from the CGCM and Dr. Esther Hu from the Department of English recently attended a conference at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary on Christianity in China. John Berthrong chaired a session and shares some observations below.
For the past few years the Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary has hosted a fascinating conference on the state of Christianity in China. This year the focus was on Christianity and Chinese culture. It was a interesting mix of theological, sociological and historical reflections on the past and present state of the Christian churches in China. The papers were informative and genuinely frank about the mix of good and bad that arises in any discussion of Christianity in China.
I also discovered that language can be very opaque. For instance, now most people who study the church will talk about Protestant churches mostly, about registered, unregistered and urban churches. What will slip by anyone not paying attention is the reference to "urban" churches. It turns out that these are not just major urban versions of the registered and unregistered churches per se. The scene is much more complicated. When my colleagues talk about "urban" churches this is often shorthand for a new phenomena, namely the rise of a new kind of church in China's burgeoning urban landscape. These are churches often founded by and for the rapidly emerging and highly educated urban professionals -- what in North America we would call the highly educated new professional and business class emerging all over urban China. These people do not find a home in the older churches and prefer to found their own. They tend not to register with the state in some cases, but because of their social status, do try to establish good working relationship with the local officials. Because of their urban sophistication, they are again often successful in doing just this. One of the main reasons they form their own churches is that they want the same level of leadership for their churches that they expect in the rest of their lives, and they don't seem to find this in the older churches. If you know anything about Chinese intellectual tradition, you will know immediately how important education is, and if the older registered and unregistered churches cannot provide a highly educated and sophisticated religious leadership, then these new urban churches will do so for themselves.
Of course, the religious scene is so fluid and dynamic in China these days it is almost imperative to check in once a year at this conference to take the temperature and try to fathom the changing dimensions of Christian life in China.
Dana Robert interviewed for Korean film on A.T. Pierson
Four faculty members from the Pierson School of Theology at Pyeongtaek University in Korea brought a film crew to the United States this summer as part of a documentary film project to chronicle the life of Arthur Tappan Pierson (1837-1911), a key figure in the modern missionary movement. His visit to Korea inspired the founding of the school that bears his name. Prof. Dana Robert is Pierson's biographer. Her book, "Occupy Until I Come: A.T. Pierson and the Evangelization of the World" was published in 2003.
Interviewing Prof. Robert were Dr. Yoon Jong Yoo, Dean of Pierson School of Theology, and Associate Professor of Old Testament, Dr. Kwang Hee Lee, Director of the Pierson Memorial Bible Institute, and Associate Professor of Practical Theology, Dr. Dang Youl Cho, Executive Director of the Pierson Memorial Bible Institute, and Assistant Professor of Old Testament and Dr. Won Ryul Ryu, Assistant Professor of Preaching. Here are some photos from the day of the filming.
Short Term Missions
Dr. Olu Q. Menjay explores how people on mission trips can avoid exploiting those to whom they are sent in "On Mission Trips, Remember the Ethic of “Stranger"
Three Dutch Saints
M.L. Daneel, captures his personal recollections of J. H. Bavinck, C. G. Berkower, and Hendrik Kraemer in "Three Dutch Saints."
Daewon Moon Reports on Edinburgh
The 2012 Yale-Edinburgh Group Meeting was held at New College at the
University of Edinburgh on June 28–30, with the theme “Religious
Movements of Renewal, Revival, and Revitalization in the History of
Missions and World Christianity.” Dr. Andrew Walls delivered a keynote
speech about the effects of revival and revitalization in the history
of missionary movements, with extensive examples of “dedicated”
Christians (in contrast to “ordinary” Christians) empowered through
revival and involved in various missions all over the world since the
first century. He noted there is a potential danger in revitalization
because it tends to have a very narrow definition of conversion and
“real” Christians.
Several alumni and current students of BU STH presented papers at the
meeting. Dr. Sung-Deuk Oak (Th.D., ’02, second from left), Associate
Professor of Korean Christianity at UCLA, presented his research on
the Korean Revival and its influence on traditional religions and
colonialism from 1903 to 1935. Jaekeun Lee (STM, ’08, second from
right), Ph.D. candidate at the University of Edinburgh, gave his
presentation on a notable revival meeting in Mokpo in 1906 as a case
study of the influence of the Southern Presbyterian Revivalist
tradition on the Korean Revival. Daewon Moon (right), doctoral student
at BU STH, presented a paper on the contribution of African leaders to
the East African Revival in the 1930s and 40s, and another BU STH
doctoral student, Daryl Island, gave a presentation on John Sung’s
evangelistic bands as a location for a new female identity in
Singapore in the 1930s.
CLADE V Photos and Links!
Here are links to two articles, in Spanish, summarizing the conference followed by three photos:
http://www.protestantedigital.com/ES/Magacin/articulo/4843/Clade-v-teologia-en-el-cono-sur
http://www.protestantedigital.com/ES/Blogs/articulo/3492/Con-sabor-latino-se-inaugura-clade-v-en-costa-rica More