wfn.org | World Mission Conference Affirms The Gospel

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9-January-1997 
 
 
97012      World Mission Conference Affirms The Gospel  
           Must Be "Rooted in The Culture of a People" 
 
                         by John Newbury  
     Press and information officer, World Council of Churches 
 
SALVADOR, Brazil--Around 600 Christian mission leaders from 80 countries 
adjourned the World Council of Churches (WCC) Conference on World Mission 
and Evangelism in early December acknowledging "cries of pain" from some of 
the historic targets of Christian mission.  They also declared that the 
gospel of Jesus Christ must both challenge a culture and be "illuminated by 
it." 
 
     Under the conference theme "Called to One Hope -- the Gospel in 
Diverse Cultures," delegates explored the results of the WCC's extensive 
worldwide five-year study examining the ways cultures and the gospel have 
influenced each other. 
 
     Sigrun Mogedal of the Church of Norway, co-moderator of the 
conference, said the papers and statements issued by the conference show 
"the urge to take the gospel and move it on, but not in a way that carries 
with it the things that have hurt people." 
 
     In a "conference message" approved by delegates at the conclusion of 
the conference, delegates described themselves "with hearts on fire with 
the beat of mission and a prayer on our lips that many will share with us. 
 ..."  But the message also admitted that missionaries of the gospel have 
sometimes harmed the cultures to which they have been sent." 
 
     Not only continued racism in church and society, but also the enforced 
slavery of African peoples and the "near extermination" of the culture of 
indigenous peoples were cited in the message. So, too, was the fact that 
North American and European mission agencies have related to Christians in 
other countries in "paternalistic" ways.  "Full partnership in mission is 
reciprocal," the statement asserted. 
 
     Still, delegates renewed their commitment to the Christian commission 
to spread the gospel throughout the world.  They applauded when veteran 
mission and ecumenical leader Lesslie Newbigin, now retired, told them 
early in the conference, "The gospel is certainly the most important fact 
in the world, and one which we cannot keep to ourselves." 
 
     But rather than export northern cultures or engage in "aggressive 
evangelism which does not respect the culture of a people," the delegates 
promised to "seek the insight of the Holy Spirit in helping us to better 
discern where the gospel challenges, endorses or transforms a particular 
culture." 
 
     As the WCC study process progressed, it became clear that Christians 
in the industrialized, market-driven Northern Hemisphere have different 
ways of interpreting the gospel message of life and liberation than their 
sisters and brothers who live in severe poverty or political oppression. 
 
     Delegates affirmed "Acts of Commitment" for the future, promising each 
other to "continue to explore ways of addressing the tensions and divisions 
which arise when churches are confronted with the legitimate aspirations of 
the oppressed" and to "continue to explore fresh ways of drawing out the 
gifts of the Spirit in all members of the body of Christ, that they may 
fully participate in the total life and mission of the church." 
 
     Two keynote speakers said human suffering and moral decay are the 
central challenges faced by those who proclaim the gospel. 
 
     In Africa, said Musimbi Kanyoro, a Kenyan theologian on the 
Geneva-based staff of the Lutheran World Federation, human suffering is 
making "our times ... ripe for flirting with hopelessness." In addition, 
Kanyoro said, cultural imperatives have silenced many African women while 
imposing on them social practices such as child marriage, female 
circumcision and harmful "rites of passage." 
 
     Russian Orthodox Metropolitan Kirill of Smolensk decried the 
"ecumenical disaster" of proselytism in which outside Christian mission 
groups seek to "convert" Orthodox and other Christians. Proselytism is "a 
new, no less difficult situation" than Communist rule, he declared.  After 
the fall of the Soviet Union, "a crusade began against the Russian church. 
 ...  Hordes of missionaries dashed in." He described the onslaught as 
"invasion by another culture" bent on recasting Russian culture "in the 
Western mode." 
 
     Panel discussions also helped the delegates explore the challenges 
they face as mission is carried to different cultures.  The Rev. Robinson 
Cavalcanti, an Anglican priest and professor of political science at the 
University of Recife, Brazil, said Christian mission in his country's 
colonial period justified genocide, slavery, patriarchy, authoritarianism 
and exploitation. 
 
     Even so, he said, in more recent history mainline Protestant churches 
have provided a home for the emerging middle class and Pentecostalists have 
offered new opportunities for migrants and workers. Pointing to the 
dominance of mystical and erotic elements in Brazilian life, he asked 
whether evangelists could sensitively "acknowledge that Anglo-Saxon 
asceticism is ... not necessarily Christian, and that the Latin, African 
and Amerindian life of the senses" might lead to a faith that is "more 
joyful, less morbid and neurotic." 
 
     Prathia Hall-Wynn of the American Baptist Churches told how 
African-American slaves "were inspired by the gospel to take flight for 
freedom and to fight for freedom."  Yet more than 130 years after the 
abolition of slavery in the United States, African-Americans "continue to 
be bound by racism, sexism, classism, poverty, drugs, domestic abuse, 
street violence, as well as governmental abuse and abandonment." 
 
     Quoting Ephesians 4: 7-10 and its reference to captives, Hall-Wynn 
said Christ "has left to the church the task of chain removal." 
 
     Aaron Tolen of the Cameroon Presbyterian Church reminded delegates 
that the guilt in the years of the slave trade did not belong to Europeans 
alone.  "Dear African sisters and brothers, we have heard words of 
repentance," Tolen said.  "But those who brought us here were not alone in 
the making of this tragedy.  We Africans share in the responsibility.  We 
have degraded ourselves by selling our brothers and sisters as goods." 
 
     Newbigin admitted missionaries have made serious cultural errors in 
the past.  The church must apologize, he said, but not cease proclaiming 
the gospel.  "The specific responsibility given to the church is to bear 
witness to the reality of Jesus' victory. ...  That must be the center of 
our mission," Newbigin declared. 

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