AUGUST 2005 - ISSUE 5 - ISSN 1448 - 632

GOOD NEWS IN AND FOR OUR WORLD TODAY

CATHOLIC FAITH AND CULTURE IN DIALOGUE IN WESTERN POSTMODERN SOCIETIES

 

PATRICIA J. CROCKETT MGL

 

ABSTRACT

We, as the community of believers in Jesus the Christ are called and invited to be Good News in and for our world today. This is no small task in the light of the increasing complexity of contemporary life. Since Vatican ll the self-understanding and stance of the church in terms of her nature, mission and relationship with the world have undergone a fundamental shift. As the people of God in the world we are coming to a conscious way of being, of life, “cast in dialogue.” It is a dynamic dialogue within the ever-changing milieu of our world situation. This paper explores significant features of the world situation, a new theology of mission and the missionary praxis which accompanies it, and finally a missionary spirituality necessary to sustain and enrich this praxis.

We, as the community of believers in Jesus the Christ are called and invited to be Good News in and for our world today.[1] This is no small task in the light of the increasing complexity of contemporary life. Since Vatican ll the self-understanding and stance of the church in terms of her nature, mission and relationship with the world [2] have undergone a fundamental shift. As the people of God in the world we are coming to a conscious way of being, of life, “cast in dialogue.”[3] The pervasive influence and effectiveness of this approach is evident in current research touching upon the major challenges in mission today: postmodernism, secularization, religious pluralism, inculturation, globalization, multi-culturalism, reconciliation, liberation, and inter-religious dialogue. The “dialogic and diaconal”[4] model opens up new avenues of relationship, and fresh opportunities for both the proclamation and discovery of the person of Jesus and his mission already in our midst. The Spirit of Jesus is abroad and at work as a new wave of evangelization emerges and gathers impetus. This new stance calls forth a re-visioned understanding of what it is to be missionary, and the spirituality and qualities that will sustain and energize us for the task. It significantly influences particular configurations of the elements of mission which find expression in the charisms of the People of God, and their concrete expression of the “how” of evangelization in specific contexts.

The major upheavals of the twentieth century have shifted our world from more stable cultural “holding environments” into the transitional postmodern dynamics of our contemporary situation. The previously achieved balance, integration, and stability have been replaced by what Donald Winnicott terms a “transitional space,” in which all the resilience of cultural values are summoned to a new creativity.[5] This process has precipitated an acceleration of the disengagement of the inter-relationships of cultural and religious institutions already underway. Reading the signs of the times Pope John XXIII called the church into Council, summoning the Spirit’s creativity for a reshaping and reenergizing into the future. No longer adversarial, or in conquest mode, the church embraced a new stance of being in the world. With the change in self-understanding came fresh seminal insight into the nature of the church’s mission. The Theology of Mission that had provided the engine[6], the driving power for the church’s missionary endeavours for four hundred years, began the arduous process of transformation.

 Robert Schreiter has described the developing contemporary approaches through Periods of Certainty, Ferment, Crisis and Rebirth.[7] Following the SEDOS Seminar (1981) “How of Mission,” a dialogical approach to the evangelizing mission of the church[8], while remaining contentious due to the ambiguity of some of its ramifications,[9] can be seen gaining ground as a prime and vital means and stance in missionary dynamics. This is well expressed by William Burroghs in his Concluding Reflections to the discussion of Redemptoris Missio and Dialogue and Proclamation in New Directions in Mission and Evangelization 3:

“ ‘Redemptoris Missio’ and ‘Dialogue and Proclamation’ challenge Christians to enter firstly into dialogue with Jesus and then to embrace the world dialogically as his followers.”[10]

Some clarification of terms is necessary here. Following DP I am using evangelization, evangelizing mission, referring to “the mission of the church in its totality;”[11] and Proclamation as “the clear and unambiguous proclamation,” communication of the Gospel message of salvation,[12] either explicitly or implicitly. Dialogue I am using primarily as an approach, a stance, an ethos or milieu, in which the three understandings of DP[13] will interplay according to the context of mission.

However, it is in seeking to answer the question: What is the “mission of the church,” that the fundamental shift in the self-understanding of the church becomes most apparent. The crux of the difference appears to be around the perception of the relationship between the kingdom (reign) of God and the church. In the pre-Vatican II theology of mission the church was equated with the kingdom, and hence mission was very much concerned with bringing people into the church. For practical purposes mission was ecclesiocentric.[14]

Peter Phan, in Proclamation of the Reign of God,[15] explores a kingdom-centered missiology signaled in RM 13. He proposes that the “church has no self-identity except as rooted in and derived from the mission that Jesus received from his Father.”[16] He develops the Pope’s affirmation that “the proclamation and establishment of God’s Kingdom are the purposes of his [Jesus’] mission (RM, 13), and are hence the “starting point and ground of the church’s mission”[17] Bearing witness to the kingdom of God in this approach is seen as the principal goal of the church’s missionary activity.[18]

How is this mission to find concrete expression in terms of re-evangelization, understood here as a new wave of evangelization today? If evangelization is the engagement of the minds and hearts of people with the Good News of the kingdom in every aspect of their lives, it can never be said to be complete. It is a dynamic dialogue within the ever-changing milieu of our world situation.

To read the “signs of the times” (Mt 16:3) today with hope I believe it is necessary to make a conscious choice in our stance, to choose to be co-creators with the Spirit of God in this kairos time of danger and opportunity. Our confidence is in Trinity in whose mission we are engaged and whose “power in us can do much more than we could ever hope or imagine” (Eph 3:20). From this stance it will be possible to become “Christians, people of true dialogue”[19] in the same way that Jesus was “always in dialogue with God”[20] and with those whose lives he engaged (Mk 8:27-30).

Having laid the groundwork for this complex topic it will now be fruitful to examine the following: 

    1. Significant features of the world situation.
    2. A new Theology of Mission and the Missionary Praxis which accompanies it, and
    3. Missionary spirituality.

Significant features of the world situation.

Because of the complexity of our global situation and the accelerated rate of change social awareness is an essential element of a dialogical approach to mission. My focus will be primarily on contemporary western society, picking up something of the impact of salient features such as secularization, globalization, multiculturalism, religious pluralism, and the postmodern challenge. All these elements of life today affect the interplay of the faith and culture dynamic.

Bert Hoedemaker discusses secularization, with its loss of faith, as an “inescapable cultural development that undermines the plausibility of faith itself.”[21] The delicate balance of the relations between religion, rationality and faith have fallen into disarray as our social institutions have not only distanced themselves from religion, but pushed religious institutions and believers to the margins of society.[22] The separation of “public rationality” from “private life worlds” has meant that what we experience as most personal in human life is now vulnerable to impersonal forces of rationality in the political and economic domains.[23] A sense of alienation, powerlessness, and loss of personal value in our society has resulted.

The situation is not all bad however. Hoedemaker suggests that the opportunity for new configurations of religion, rationality and faith resulting from secularization are to be found in the new contexts resulting from the now global tension between life world and rational systems experienced by both individuals and societies.[24] Functional rationality’s negative depersonalizing, dehumanizing and absolutizing elements requires the prophetic challenge of faith and religion. He sees too that rationality provides important parameters to religion’s valid expression.[25] The challenge in developing mission within these dynamics is to become an effective part of the dialogue as the new configurations are honed out in “the battle of intercultural communication.”[26]

The ideals of modernity have been spread abroad by globalization, a confluence of increasingly interconnected global political, economic and social systems harnessing new communications technologies. These electronic communications with rapid information flows have extended the borders both of knowledge and social interaction. This has brought about the collapse of geographical boundaries as cultural identity markers, hence a de-territorialization, with multiple belongings and loyalties becoming the norm. Traditional boundaries have become blurred and porous,[27] are often replaced by those which highlight difference, and hence can serve to intensify rather than minimize conflict.[28]

The boundaries between the global and the local are fraught with tension, on one hand the struggle for political and economic dominance, on the other for identity and cultural survival. Phan reminds us that while the local may be under threat it is far from powerless.[29] At this line of encounter, the glocal space[30], various strategies of resistance, subversion, compromise and appropriation have generated minority discourse of protest of prophetic value.[31] From within such interaction contextual theologies are emerging. This is mission at the margins.

On every continent today life has taken on not only an intercultural dynamic but an inter-multicultural one.[32] Phan’s description of culture in the United States today applies to most societies: “…the present reality…as globalized, conflictual, fragmented, and multiple.”[33] The massive movements of peoples in the twentieth century due to two world wars, increased mobility and globalization, oppressive regimes, ethnic conflict and now terrorism, means that the occurrence of multicultural societies are on the increase. This poses new challenges while bringing an opportunity of richness if the dialogue of life can be opened and sustained. The pain of difference is very real in terms of ethnicity, language, culture and religion.[34] Learning to “love the stranger” is a biblical imperative that takes on new meaning today.  

The combined impact of secularization, globalization and multiculturalism has created apparently open pluralistic societies. A widespread indifferent, relativistic pluralism has however awakened a new urgency within all religions, cultures and denominations to tackle anew the age-old questions: Who are we? Who am I?[35] Walter Kasper suggests that at one pole pluralistic tolerance may absolutise a pluralism of truths, while at the other an antagonistic new confessionalism may develop into a militant fundamentalism.[36] He asserts that “within the mentality of ideological pluralism, religious pluralism is the challenge today for Christianity and for the Church.”[37]

Kasper proposes a dialogic and diaconal relationship with other religions in which Christianity acknowledges and respects their giftedness, prophetically criticizes, and invites to encounter with Jesus Christ.[38] The church is seen to embrace and defend plurality, seeking to be in solidarity with all those who search for truth. In the midst of a fundamental pluralism that is part of the course of history, and not infrequently hostile to Christianity, the present situation provides an opportunity for the church to “radically realize her fundamental nature as a community of believers in a more original, and authentic way –to become a sign for the world.”[39]

Which brings us to the emergence of the postmodern philosophy and stance. Its negative connotations appear to be the challenge to all universal ideological systems believed to be a causative factor in the totalitarian regimes of the 20th century. This is seen as undermining the credibility of universal claims of truth, and human values.[40] Positive aspects of postmodern thinking take on the “one sided rational thinking,”[41] the functional rationalism discussed above, is concerned with the relations between entities, seeing the whole as greater than the sum of the parts and utilizes the symbolic and imaginative in engaging the human person[42]. Its both/and approach has potential for developing new strategies in mission.

A new Theology of Mission and the Missionary Praxis which accompanies it.

In the re-visioning and re-development of the church’s mission since Vatican II a three fold strand of renewal is evident: theology of mission, mission praxis and the missionary spirituality which integrates them.

While there appears to be a certain consensus on the general parameters of a new theology of mission a range of emphases is evident (as would be expected) due to the rich variety of charisms present in the church. The most succinct and concrete summing up of what appears to be a new paradigm is Peter Phan’s Proclamation of the Reign of God. The reconfiguration of the relations between the four basic elements of proclamation, church, mission and the kingdom of God signal the theological shift. The new answers to the five questions: What for, to whom, by whom, with whom and how? point to new directions in praxis.

In the new model the Reign of God takes center stage as it did in Jesus’ own mission. In his person and life Jesus embodied the kingdom. The proclamation of the kingdom (reign) is simultaneously the proclamation of the Christ event. They cannot be separated.[43] In this way the reign of God defines the mission and mission defines the church.[44] Thus the configuration is now: reign of God, mission, proclamation and church. The church is seen as sign, instrument and servant of the reign of God.[45]

Every Christian is by vocation called to mission,[46] to be involved, to usher in God’s kingdom in everyday life. In our time the practical reality is that for the majority of people in the world, the realm of God may be more accessible than the church.[47] Anthony Gittens suggests that it is vital for Christians to actively look for the signs of God’s presence, so that like Jesus we can enable people to recognize “God’s amazing plans and to be amazed by God’s activity” in the people we engage.[48] This evangelizing activity is relational and dialogical. It draws its inspiration and significance from how repeatedly in the gospels we see Jesus opening the conversation with a request or a question (Jn 4:7, Mk 8:23). If we like Jesus in our own way embody the kingdom in life witness, and “seek to bring and find faith, to encounter and be encountered[49]” then the favourable moment will be recognized in which to proclaim Jesus.[50] Or as expressed in Evangelii Nuntiandi our presence, sharing, solidarity, and life witness are the first act of evangelization, the witness that stirs up questions and that opens dialogue.[51]

A particular grace of our day is a renewed awareness that mission is integrally Trinitarian, that the reign of God that Jesus proclaimed was a new way of relating to God, the cosmos and others.[52] We as baptized Christians have been taken into the inner life of the Trinity and thus our witness to the reigning of God becomes an invitation to others to explore and come into the Trinitarian love life. Mission is about the Trinity’s presence and action in the world – with no limitation of history or geography.[53] The role of the Holy Spirit in particular[54] as the active, unifying, vital and living presence enables us to see with new eyes and to have the courage to find new ways to witness to the gospel.[55] 

This has been expressed by some as the eschatological principle, the mysterious often hidden or not recognized presence of God at work in the world. Through the proclamation of the reign of God and the Christ event what has been implicit is enabled to become explicit.[56] This approach articulates readily with Richard Cote’s emphasis on a new incarnational theology of mission which he suggests could be of particular value for mission in postmodern societies.[57]

By using marriage as a root metaphor in the gospel-culture encounter he envisages a more integrated theology of incarnation-inculturation.[58] Following the Leonine stance, Cote asserts the continuing reality of the incarnation in which the human is “irrevocably defined by the divine, and the divine is inescapably expressed in the human.”[59] Christ has redeemed culture, that “vital site of identity” for the individual, the community, and the nation, in a “union of gospel and culture that is salvific and transforming.”[60] Re-visioning the faith-culture relationship through the marriage metaphor opens up new pastoral possibilities which include: reciprocity, respect, ongoing process, in-depth and inter-dependent relationship, a holistic approach of acceptance and commitment to an ongoing inclusive autonomy. This shift of focus “redefines the challenge of evangelization in terms of dialogue.”[61] The church too is called to inculturaion, as the gospel is enfleshed within culture as faith within the believing community. It is in this process that the church is enabled to “embody God’s reign more fully.”[62]

Directions for Praxis

“Christians especially are morally implicated in the shaping of the postmodern world.”[63]

Anthony Gittens is not alone in putting this sobering responsibility before us. William Burrows expresses the climate of our present day search for clarity in missionary identity and praxis in the following:

“A great tradition moves ahead by coming to terms with and appropriating the dynamics of its founder, but ultimately it survives and grows only by embracing the risks of being creative in dealing with the future.”[64]

When we look at the enormity of the task we can only thank God for the variety and vitality of the charisms with which the church is gifted. The mission of the church is every Christian’s business in every location. What comes through the literature clearly is that it is particularly to be found in the intricate webs of borders and boundaries, visible and invisible that characterize societies today. Locating and recognizing the new and porous boundaries as key loci for dialogue, encounter, reconciliation, liberation and revelation requires new skills for contemporary missionaries.[65] Multiple border crossings have become the norm as our communication is increasingly inter-multicultural. Social awareness, ongoing study and reflection are essential today in listening with the Spirit to the “signs of the times.”

I would like to pick up two of Richard Cote’s suggestions for mission in postmodern society. There is no doubt that there has been an awakening of the mystic dimension of the human person. There is a deep gnawing hunger in people for personal experience of the Mystery we call God. Cote expands on Karl Rahner’s notion of mission as mystagogy: “Today’s spiritual hunger is of such size and scope, of such manifest density and social relevance that ‘feeding the hungry’ transcends the traditional diaconal function…of distributing food to the hungry.”[66] We have an incredibly rich contemplative tradition that needs to be made easily accessible to people of all traditions. There is something deeper here though than access. Our world needs “the more discerning eyes and more penetrating vision of the mystic,” to “see beyond what meets the eye” to the deeper presence and action of the Spirit.[67] This attentive vision finds concrete expression among the community of believers.

To encourage boundary crossing mission (ad extra) in parishes Cote suggests the creation of more “go structures.” He notes that parishes are often set up as “sacred hospitality centers” with numerous “come structures” which serve mission ad intra. Boundary crossing missionary visitation moving out from the parish center to the marginalized beyond its borders can be encouraged by creating and recognizing outreach ministries. This will require training and funding[68] . Non-traditional ministries in contemporary contexts would include visiting unchurched people, solo parents, the homeless, assisting refugees, ministry to politicians, journalists and media people. Approaches such as these raise the missionary consciousness of faith communities and mobilize their gifts for mission.[69]

In practice much of this has taken shape in the international networks of movement communities such as charismatic Covenant communities. These are an expression of the new charisms with which the Spirit is renewing the vitality of the church in its call to holiness and evangelization.

In terms of principles of praxis Peter Phan’s five questions sum it up concisely:[70]  

Boundary crossing mission of any sort takes us beyond our comfort zones, into the unknown and can only be sustained by a deep missionary spirituality.

Missionary Spirituality

The formation of the people of God in their missionary vocation is crucial for the effective development of the mission of the church. Our missionary vocation of bearing witness to and ushering in the reign of God is not a part time job. It encompasses every aspect of the human person’s being with the cosmos, God and others. In our historical context certain characteristics of stance and spirituality are being accepted as necessary foundations for a missionary way of life, for boundary crossers of any kind. My context remains western postmodern societies.

“The universal call to holiness is linked to the universal call to mission. Every member of the faithful is called to holiness and mission.”[73] Pope John Paul II called the church to the deep contemplative stance fundamental to today’s missionaries. He sees this as flowing from being sensitively attuned to the Holy Spirit, from personal transformation in the mystery of Christ, and being marked with love for the church and the world.[74] This is to know personally a life lived within the embrace of the Trinity, and to discover within that embrace the creative and redeeming love which fills the whole universe. The Spirit’s call is out to nurture and develop the homo mysticus within each one of us. The missionary’s anchor needs to be deep within the wellsprings of life in God if we are to be sustained personally, and to become more fruitful for the kingdom.

Those of us who have been called into missionary congregations, priesthood, or public ministry in the church have experienced a painful, humbling and blessed journey since Vatican II. Major visionary and attitudinal shifts have taken place which I believe have enabled us to shed a lot of baggage, cultural and ecclesial, best left behind. A key grace of our time is that we now stand together in vulnerability, listening to the Spirit as we seek to find the way ahead. It is quite possible that Jesus would feel more at home with us!

Anthony Gittens suggests that in being called to mission at the margins we come as ministers, as not very visible, not self important, but very necessary and not with empty hands, to a humble and faithful service in Jesus’ way.[75] The commitment to mission brings us to examine the edges, margins and boundaries with Jesus’ eyes, especially those of “comfort, privilege and security” whose underside is “injustice, exploitation and thriving despair.”[76] This is not easy. The passing across these boundaries involves an experience of death and dying as we move between worlds. This is a new shape of the ascetic thread of missionary life, of the denial of self that it requires.[77] The treasure is within earthen vessels. Wisdom is forged in seeking the new forms of evangelization needed if the poor and marginalized are to come to true human dignity and freedom,[78] a wisdom that “cannot mature without challenge and change, risk and resolve.” It is not given to the fainthearted or overcautious. It is also a wisdom that empowers us to live with paradox, with lack of clarity.[79]

Ambiguity is a hallmark of historical paradigm shifts and there is no doubt that it impinges on vital areas of Christian life and identity today. Cote invites us to view the deep questions, the ambiguity of this transitional time as a summons to faith.[80] He proposes that it is in living the questions, in “wrestling in the darkness of faith and ambiguity” that the Spirit leads us forward in the desert.

“How one ‘befriends’ and ‘lives with’ a deep question, how one learns to ‘carry’ and ‘hold’ it- preciously (as one might when finding a pearl of great value), and tenderly (as one would an infant close to our heart) – is of the essence of a mission spirituality.”[81]

It is only in and through this process that we are empowered to “hear God sing in the night.”[82] Faith, hope and love are activated in trust. This sounds remarkably like the contours of the night of faith working out in a communal setting, and plugs into the Spirit’s summons to the mystic within us. It is a grace of our time.

Our presence in vulnerability with those on both sides of the boundaries invites reciprocity and friendship. A spirituality of presence and dialogue enables a mutual attentiveness and sharing with the other. It is here on the margins that Gittens suggests we come primarily as strangers and are dependent on the generosity of others if we are to be welcomed as guests. [83] We come with a readiness to receive, and a willingness to reciprocate with the gift of Good News we bring. Such a stance empowers the hosts and establishes equality in relationship. From such a stance both may marvel at what God is about in our world and engage together whatever it be that is at issue on the boundary.

The integrating power of a spirituality attentive to the Spirit’s stirring will seek to pick up the postmodern sensitivity and yearning for wholeness.[84] It is the whole person at the margin that is of concern. From within the increasing fragmentation of our societies people are crying out for integration and stability. Our lived experience of finding our home and roots within the Trinitarian life, as deepest center, unifying power and sustenance for the journey is a tangible witness to the reign of God present as our deepest security. This will find expression in relationship with self, with others, with the cosmos, and will facilitate the gradual transformation of margins into frontiers of life.

It is our great comfort that the Word made flesh, Jesus the Christ has gone ahead of us to show us the way. A “border-crosser at the very roots of his being” in the incarnation, in his ministry, his death, resurrection, ascension and sending of the Spirit, Jesus announced and effected the kingdom of God by inviting all boundary dwellers into his Father’s mercy, love and forgiveness.[85] We find ourselves identifying with Jesus as he repeatedly passed back and forwards across borders “be they geographical, racial, sexual, social, economic, political, cultural, and religious.”[86] In his company we hope to grow into the freedom and love with which he made the crossing. 

To be Good News in and for the world today is to recognize and affirm that the kingdom of God has already in some measure taken root and begun to flourish in our own hearts and lives. We have been captured in love by the person of Jesus, and with trust in God and attentive to the Spirit have “launched out into the deep.” The magnitude, darkness and currents of the deep may make navigation hazardous, and the journey is definitely not for the fainthearted. There is a certain sense of having lost our moorings and that our navigational aids need an upgrade! Nonetheless it is in such times of uncertainty that history shows us that the Spirit of God moves in new ways, unfettered by our previous securities. It seems to me that our stance as the church in the world, as “yeast in the dough” will be vital to the outcome of this season of the reign of God, if in the simple and the ordinary we are able to hear the invitation to listen attentively and with reciprocity to one another in the Spirit. Then it will be possible to live life within the embrace of the Trinity, with the mystic’s insight and the prophet’s courage, to be enabled to read the signs of the times and engage the spiritual thirst of the people in dialogue with the gospel of life.

Bibliography

“Australian likes and dislikes” in The Sydney Morning Herald, availablefrom: http://www.convictcreations.com/culture/aussieviews.htm 

Bosch, David,  Transforming Mission: Paradigm Shifts in Theology of Mission. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1991

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Cote, Richard G.     Re-Visioning Mission: The Catholic Church and Culture in Postmodern America. New York: Paulist, 1996

Dialogue and Proclamation: Reflections and Orientations on Interreligious Dialogue and the Proclamation of Jesus Christ. Statement of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples and the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue. 1991.  par 82, 89. available from: http://www.vat…/rc_pc_interelg_doc_19051991_dialogue-and-proclamatio_en.htm

Gittens, Anthony J. Gifts and Strangers: Meeting the Challenge of Inculturation. New York: Paulist Press.1989

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John Paul II, Ecclesia in Oceania. Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation. Strathfield: St. Pauls, 2001.

Hall, Gerard.   Robert Schreiter, “Contemporary approaches to Mission” in Lecture Notes: Theology of Mission.

Hall, Gerard. Jacques Dupuis' Christian Theology of Religious Pluralism. Available from: http://dlibrary.acu.edu.au/research/theology/ejournal/Issue 2/Gerard_Hall.htm

Hoedemaker, L.A.   Secularization and Mission: A Theological Essay. Harrisburg, PA: Trinity Press International, 1998.

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Kelly, Anthony.   Lecture Notes. Theology of Mission. Also, A New Imagining. Melbourne: Collins Dove. 1990

Netland, Harold A.  Encountering Religious Pluralism: The Challenge to Christian Faith and Mission. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2001.

Paul VI,  Evangelii Nuntiandi. Apostolic Exhortation on Evangelization in the Modern World. Homebush: St. Pauls, 1989.

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Schreiter, Robert.   “Inculturation of Faith or Identification with Culture” in Scherer, James & Bevans, Stephen,   eds. New Directions in Mission and Evangelization 3: Faith and Culture. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis. 1999, pp68-75.

Schreiter, Robert, The Ministry of Reconciliation: Spirituality and Strategies. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1998.

Schreiter, Robert, The New Catholicity: Theology between the Global and the Local. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1999.

Shorter, Aylward.   “Inculturation: Win or Lose the Future” in Scherer, James & Bevans, Stephen,   eds. New Directions in Mission and Evangelization 3: Faith and Culture. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis. 1999, pp 54-67.

Tracey, David.         Extract from: Re-enchantment – The New Australian Spirituality. OC Books' 36th Email Newsletter.

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 Footnotes

1. Vatican ll Council, Ad Gentes (hereafter AG), Decree on the Church’s Missionary Activity, in Vatican Council ll: The Conciliar Documents, ed. A. Flannery (Collegeville: The Liturgical Press, 1975) 2.

2. Vatican ll Council, Gaudium et spes, (hereafter GS), Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, in Vatican Council ll: The Conciliar Documents, ed. A. Flannery (Collegeville: The Liturgical Press, 1975).

3. Vatican ll Council, Ad Gentes (hereafter AG), Decree on the Church’s Missionary Activity, in Vatican Council ll: The Conciliar Documents, ed. A. Flannery (Collegeville: The Liturgical Press, 1975) 2.

4. Vatican ll Council, Gaudium et spes, (hereafter GS), Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, in Vatican Council ll: The Conciliar Documents, ed. A. Flannery (Collegeville: The Liturgical Press, 1975).

5. Anthony J. Gittens, Reading the Clouds: Mission Spirituality for New Times, (Sydney: St. Paul’s. 1999). p.42

6. Cardinal Walter Kasper, The Future of Christianity: A Meditation on the Church and Contemporary Pluralism in the Post Modern Era. Available from: www.maristmelb.org.au  p. 19

7. Donald Winnicott, quoted in Richard G Cote, Re-visioning Mission: The Catholic Church and Culture in Postmodern America, (New York: Paulist Press, 1996) p. 133.

8. Peter Phan, Proclamation of the Reign of God as the Mission of the Church: What for, To Whom, By Whom, With Whom and How? Par`8, Available from: http://dlibrary.acu.edu.au/research/theology/ejournal/Issue2/issue2.htm 

9. Robert Schreiter, “Contemporary Approaches to Mission” in New Directions in Mission and Evangelization 2, eds. J Scherer & S. Bevans (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1994).

10. Dialogue and Proclamation: Reflections and Orientations on Interreligious Dialogue and the Proclamation of Jesus Christ. Statement of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples and the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue. (1991) par 82, 89. available from: http://www.vat…/rc_pc_interelg_doc_19051991_dialogue-and-proclamatio_en.htm

11. Ibid. 4 (c)

12. William R. Burrows, “Concluding Reflections” in Redemption and Dialogue: Reading ‘Redemptoris Missio’ and ‘Dialogue and Proclamation.’ (New York: Orbis, 1993) p. 243.

13. DP 8

14. Ibid. quoting Evangeli Nuntiandi Apostolic Exhortation of Paul VI. (1975) 22

15. Ibid. 9. Firstly in terms of reciprocal human communication, undertaken secondly with an attitude of respect and friendship, and thirdly in Interreligious dialogue seeking mutual understanding and enrichment.

16. Phan, Proclamation, par 8.

17. Ibid.

18. Ibid. 18

19. John Paul II, Apostolic Exhortation Ecclesia in Asia

20. Phan, Proclamation, par 23.

21. Gittens, Clouds, p 27

22. Ibid. p 28.

23. Bert Hoedemaker, Seculariszation and Mission: A Theological Essay. (Harrisburg Pennsylvania: Trinity Press International, 1998) p 2

24. Ibid. 1

25. Ibid. 5

26. Ibid. 53

27. Ibid. 61

28. Ibid. 53

29. Peter Phan, Christianity with an Asian Face: Asian American Theology in the Making. (Maryknoll, New York: Orbis) 2003, p 14, 235.

30. Robert J. Schreiter, The New Catholicity: Theology between the Global and the Local. (Maryknoll, New York: Orbis) 1999, p26

31. Phan, Christianity, p 14

32. Schreiter, New Catholicity, p 12

33. Phan, Christianity, p 14

34. Ibid.  p 10

35. Ibid. p 237

36. Phan, Christianity, p 240

37. Kaspar, The Future, 12

38. Ibid. 12

39. Ibid. 13

40. Ibid. 19

41. Ibid. 22-23

42. Ibid. 8, 9

43. Ibid. 9

44. Richard G. Cote, Re-Visioning Mission: The Catholic Church and Culture in Postmodern America. (New York: Paulist, 1996) 16,17

45. Phan, Proclamation, par 16

46. Ibid. par 20

47. Ibid. par 27

48. RM  2

49. Gittens, Clouds, p 40

50. Ibid. p 163

51. Ibid. pp 42, 163

52. DP 86

53. Pope Paul VI, Evangelii Nuntiandi, Apostolic Exhortation of Paul VI, On Evangelization in the Modern World. (Sydney: St. Paul’s Publications, 1989) par 21

54. Anthony Kelly, Lecture notes: Mission and Trinity

55. Ibid.

56. Hoedemaker, Secularization, 60

57. RM 28

58. Schreiter, Contemporary Approaches, pt 3.

59. Richard G Cote, Re-visioning Mission: The Catholic Church and Culture in Postmodern America, (New York: Paulist Press, 1996) Ch 5

60. Ibid. 68, 43

61. Ibid. 75, 68

62. Ibid.  74, 84

63. Ibid. 49

64. Ibid. 85

65. Anthony J. Gittens, Ministry at the Margins: Strategy and Spirituality for Mission. (Maryknoll, New York: Orbis, 2002) p. 2

66. Burrows, Concluding Reflections, p. 243

67. Gittens, Ministry, 2

68. Cote, Re-visioning Mission, 153

69. Ibid. 60

70. Ibid.154-156

71. Ibid. 32

72. Phan, Proclamation, par 31-36

73. RM 30

74. Gittens, Ministry, 162

75. RM 90

76. Ibid.

77. Gittens, Ministry, p xi

78. Ibid. 2

79. Ibid. 3

80. Peter Phan,  Crossing the Borders: A Spirituality for Mission in Our Times from an Asian Perspective 1. Available from  http://www.sedos.org/English/phan_2.htm

81. Gittens, Ministry, 164

82. Cote, Re-visioning, 160-161

83. Ibid. 160

84. Ibid.

85. Anthony J. Gittens, Gifts and Strangers: Meeting the Challenge of Inculturation. (New York: Paulist Press.1989) Ch 5, pp 111-135.

86. Cote, Re-visioning, p. 157

87. Phan, Crossing, p. 12

88. Ibid.

 

Biographical Details.

Patricia J. Crockett MGL received her MA Theology ACU in 2004. She has extended experience in intercultural ministry in both PNG and Australia. In 1979 her original research on “Conception and Birth among the Markru-Mansuku” was published in Powers, Plumes and Piglets, The Phenomena of Melasesian Religion, Ed. Norman C Habel. She received her BA (anthropology) from the ANU in 1988, and Certificates in Spiritual Direction, Adelaide 1998, and Siloam Melbourne 2004.

Email: mgldunstan@iinet.net.au

 

 

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