wfn.org | Gospel and Culture

[Sheila MESA <smm@wcc-coe.org>]

World Council of Churches
Press Release
For Immediate Use
15 September 1997

CENTRAL COMMITTEE      No.   7

LET GOSPEL TAKE ROOT IN WORLD'S CULTURES, CHURCHES TOLD 

Christians must recognise how cultures past and present have shaped
their faith, and how that faith must be reinterpreted to make an impact on
fresh cultures, the World Council of Churches' (WCC) Central Committee
was told Sunday (14 September).  

"We have learned more clearly than ever before how essential it is to
winnow out the kernel of the wheat of the Gospel from the chaff of the
culture in which it is encased," Professor Alexandra Johnston from
Canada told the 156-strong Committee, meeting in Geneva.  "None of us
is free from our own cultural imperatives."

She was describing the lessons of the WCC s 11th Conference on World
Mission and Evangelism, held 24 November - 3 December 1996 in
Salvador, Bahia, Brazil, where nearly 600 people from nearly 80 nations
tackled such questions as: "How does culture shape and colour the
response of Christians to the voice of Christ? How can Christians
witness authentically in their own context?"
 
Brazil was chosen for its own rich diversity of races and cultures, in
which colonisation, the importation of African slaves and later
immigration had added to the traditions of  indigenous peoples. The
mission conference ended with the assertion that "the Gospel, to be
most fruitful, needs to be both true to itself and incarnated or rooted in
the culture of a people." Those taking part committed themselves to
continue exploring the implications of various and sometimes competing
cultures in the world and the Church.

Speakers at the Central Committee, which is the WCC's governing body
between its seven-yearly Assemblies, acknowledged how past cultures
had influenced Christianity.  Professor Johnston, an adviser to the WCC s
Churches in Mission Unit,  pointed out how the world Christian community
has come to accept a diversity of church polity and government, which
she said is the prime example of a cultural interpretation of the
Scriptures.

Landesbischof Eberhardt Renz (Evangelical Church in Germany)
acknowledged that he started rethinking his Western theology only when
confronted in South Africa with black theology and culture.

Dr Peter Lodberg (Evangelical Lutheran Church of Denmark) stressed
that the Bible itself was a book of many cultures -- Jewish, Hellenistic
and others.  Now, however, the Church had its own culture: "Come as
you are, but be like us."  Within the church, Lodberg noted, are
sub-cultures, such as youth and adult groups, or the traditions of
Protestants, Orthodox and Catholics. 

The problem of competing denominations was raised by Father Vsevolod
Chaplin (Russian Orthodox Church) who said that his country had
suffered in the 1990s from a massive invasion of evangelical
"pseudo-missionaries" who had descended on the people, "bought their
souls with gifts," and then left them.  He called for a missionary "pact of
non-aggression".

The Rev. Donald Elliott from the United Kingdom, an adviser to the
Churches in Mission Unit, said that his Russian colleague's painful
experience underlined the need to widen the discussions about mission
so as to include more missionary and evangelical bodies.Dr Park
Johng-Wha (Presbyterian Church, Republic of Korea) brought the
discussion to a close by challenging the WCC to ask: "What does the
Gospel say to a political culture where violence prevails?  To an
economic culture, a market economy, where the poor get poorer and the
rich, richer?  To a social culture where alienation is becoming deeper and
wider?"

**********
The World Council of Churches is a fellowship of churches, now 330, in
more than 100 countries in all continents from virtually all Christian
traditions.  The Roman Catholic Church is not a member church but
works cooperatively with the WCC.  The highest governing body is the
Assembly, which meets approximately every seven years.  The WCC
was formally inaugurated in 1948 in Amsterdam, Netherlands.  Its staff is
headed by general secretary Konrad Raiser from the Evangelical Church
in Germany.

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