International Bulletin of Mission Research

Despite the popularity of religion in African settings such as Ghana, reports of moral decline abound. This article reviews traditional, mission, and Christian theological perspectives of morality in Ghana. Using interviews, surveys, and content analysis of vehicle slogans, it examines what Ghanaians today consider to be values in terms of virtues and vices. It explores implications for Christian mission involvement in shaping morality in education and the public sphere.

This article explores the multiple and complex Christian-cultural dynamics of reconciliation advanced by Christian and cultural leaders. Based on field research conducted in northern Uganda, largely among the Acholi people, the study draws attention to different levels of convergence and divergence, harmony and tensions between and among Christian and cultural approaches to reconciliation, and the subsequent social capital generated from both of these approaches. The research demonstrates that Christian leaders drew attention to the biblical resources of forgiveness and reconciliation, whereas cultural rituals of reconciliation involved full acknowledgment of the wrong, healing, reparations, and compensations.

Ethiopian Qene (traditional and living oral poetry) intertwines biblical interpretation with the observation of nature and critique of current events. It is always delivered as improvisation. It is performed in traditional schools, as well as at liturgical and social events. It contains metaphors, rhymes, and rhythm. It includes important values and is useful for theological studies and biblical hermeneutics.

This article explores the dynamics that inform the structure of the Catholic’s Church Amani Mashinani model for conflict resolution. We explore the adaptation of the model in the processes of dialogue, forgiveness, reconciliation, retribution, and healing. Using two conflict situations, we illustrate the applicability of the model by church leadership and the community in resolving conflicts. The model borrows from Paul Lederach’s proposal of peacebuilding from below. From the findings, we conclude that the Amani Mashinani model can be adapted to resolve conflicts in diverse contexts. It has great potential for engaging those who take part in it.

Despite the demise of apartheid, economic inequality remains racially skewed in South Africa. For young people born either shortly before or after 1994, the official demise of apartheid—termed “born frees”—we must ask whether they are indeed “free” of the social and economic constraints of the past. How does ongoing inequality color notions of reconciliation and restitution twenty-five years later? This article focuses on the context of Christian young adults living in Stellenbosch, one of the most unequal towns in South Africa. We explore their lived experiences and theologizing on these issues arising from empirical research in Stellenbosch.

Africa’s staggering rate of urbanization and the silence of religion or theology in response form the backdrop of this article. Africa’s urban futures, up through 2050, are considered through the lenses of fifteen African cities and theological institutions in these cities. I employ a set of research questions, seeking to contribute theologically to a body of knowledge known as African urbanism. The article imagines theological education/formation in response to Africa’s urban explosion through exploring flourishing cities as an organizing imaginary, but also through outlining concrete embodiments and prospects for reimagining theological education/formation in African cities.

In religious Africa, theological education and ministerial formation are strategically important, as leadership development impacts church practice and supports community well-being and development. In a time of profound fragmentation, the great aspiration of “integration” is seen as a solution to connect and transform ministry training, with little consensus, however, about what the term means. Since African theological education needs to respond to training in innovative ways, this article reports on an African study on integrative theological education. It reveals the institutional and contextual challenges that impinge on educational practice and underlines integration as a key approach to professional education.

Located on the disputed border with China, Arunachal Pradesh is the most remote of India’s northeastern states. Christianity is growing there—from 1 percent in 1971 to 30 percent in 2011—but that number may have reached a plateau. Arunachal Pradesh is undergoing rapid sociocultural change. While Hinduism is not well-established in the region, there is tremendous interest in a relatively new religion called Donyi-Polo. Some Hindus argue Donyi-Polo is actually a branch of Hinduism, and they are having some success in making this claim. This article explores the changing religious, political, and cultural dynamics of Arunachal Pradesh.

This book documents how Christian migrants from the origins of Christianity until 1500 helped establish Christianity as a world religion. Its sociohistorical methodology identifies and celebrates the contributions of ordinary Christian migrants in cross-cultural and transnational contexts. It argues that Christian missionary engagements are often incorrectly associated with empire and institutional authorities; in reality, however, most of the cross-cultural missionary work was done by ordinary Christian women and men who migrated for various purposes. This book thus embodies a new historiography based on migration, providing ample evidence of the reality, complexity, and relevance of migration for World Christianity.

This review essay addresses the major themes of Ghanaian theologian Kwame Bediako’s thought, as presented in Tim Hartman, Kwame Bediako: African Theology for a World Christianity. Bediako advocated examining the traditional spirituality of African peoples, studying the Bible in vernacular languages, and asking how the person and work of Jesus Christ engage local cultures. He insisted that Western theology was not central and normative to the Christian faith, and that African theology provided a better model for the development of contextual theologies worldwide.

A review essay of John G. Flett and Henning Wrogemann, Questions of Context: Reading a Century of German Mission Theology. This work is a carefully selected and edited collection of German mission writing of roughly the past century. The texts selected address mission contextualization, that is, ecumenical interactions among different sectors of World Christianities as they pertain to mission. Together the readings, along with the editors’/authors’ commentary, show the history and content of German missiological approach(es) to contextualized mission. As such, it is a textbook appropriate for courses in the theology of mission, religious pluralism, intercultural theology, and World Christianity.

The Global Flourishing Study (GFS) will involve data collection for some 240,000 participants, from twenty-two geographically and culturally diverse countries, with annual data collection on the same individuals for five years. The survey includes questions on well-being, along with demographic, social, economic, political, religious, personality, childhood, community, health, and character-based questions. The GFS will expand knowledge on the extent to which many of the world’s largest nations are or are not flourishing. The study has the capacity to advance our understanding of the societal determinants of human flourishing and to enrich our knowledge concerning how they vary by cultural context.