Current Projects in Global Awareness and Engagement

In the summer of 2017, the Lilly Endowment through ATS awarded grants to forty four seminaries for faculty development for the facilitation and implementation of new educational models and practices. While the summaries of these projects show an array of activities and goals, a few common themes emerge. e majority of the seminaries were interested in online, hybrid, and other innovative ways of course delivery. Because enrollment of non-United States citizens in ATS accredited seminaries has risen from 3.3% in 1995 to 18.5% in 2018 ( e Association of eological Schools), these seminaries took very seriously the issues of global awareness and engagement, acknowledging the need to address their diverse classrooms in culturally relevant ways in order to prepare the students for the global engagement of ministry.2

Asbury eological Seminary had as its goal to improve faculty understanding on how to best engage a student holistically though cognitive and asocial methods. To this end, they conducted faculty seminars to augment their skills and techniques. As a result of this project, they have recommended that ATS add Continuing Education Units (CLE) as a requirement to help with faculty development for new realities in a changing world.

Boston University's school of eology’s project was to build faculty intercultural competence through the “Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI). ey found that building intercultural competence couldn’t be sustainable without creating a culture for faculty development in this area, both individually and in peer groups. In other words, the whole institution needed to be invested and developed towards this goal as its ongoing vision. is concept reinforces what Qiang has stated: “Internationalization must be entrenched in the culture, policy, planning, and organizational process of the institution so that it can be both successful and sustainable” (2003, 257–258). Church Divinity School of the Paci c also used the IDI and found that it was merely a starting point to open opportunities of development within their faculty.

Columbia eological Seminary had the goal of helping students make connections between theological disciplines and the global church through three speci c interdisciplinary classes with the same learning outcomes: 1) to critically engage the culture and theological forces that shape our personal faith, 2) analyze social contexts using a variety of methods and tools, 3) work and appreciate unfamiliar contexts and cultures, and 4) create an implement courses of action to contexts of change. ey found that while teaching integrative courses involve many of the same pedagogical skills as teaching within their own discipline, very few were actually trained to think in multidisciplinary ways. e Institut de Formation éologique de Montréal’s project was to explore the idea of the “ ipped classroom,” where the teacher changes role from actor to observer while students change from observer to actor. is concept of the “ ipped classroom” was also explored by Sacred Heart Seminary and School of eology with the goal to understand speci cally the cultural contexts and learning styles of their millennial students. is is an interesting concept when applied to teaching mission as we consider the ethnic and cultural diversity of our students and what they can bring to the classroom as far as their experiences and their access to literature in languages to which the teacher and other students may not have access.

Grace eological Seminary’s aim was to ensure that all faculty understood the goals and best practices of competency-based theological education. is required faculty to assume the posture of a student exploring new pedagogical paradigms. eir key recommendations were to 1) embrace collaboration, 2) involve faculty stakeholders early, 3) invite all institutional parties to the table, 4) realize that just as technology must be updated so must CBTE programs, and 5) good communication and delivery or promise outcomes are essential.

Meadville Lombard eological School’s goal was to develop faculty with an intercultural mindset able to teach in a global learning community. Some recommendations from their project were to create and implement a universally designed syllabus that would aid international and disabled students in interpreting the class and its requirements, create a policy that would make course bibliographies more accessible to international students, and to nd a learning/teaching platform that would be more accessible to international students. e also learned that they need to make their pedagogy more explicit so that international students would have greater understanding of how courses are taught and the reasoning behind assignments and assessment. Finally, they realized that they need to shi from a transactional model of education to a more mutually transformative one. e same could be said for our pedagogy. One of their recommendations was to “maximize the organic resource” or in other words, use the people resources you have available in your learning community. is includes amplifying, at times, the minority voices in the classroom. As a result of their project, they developed eight strategies for diverse education: 1) e library will assist professors to select readings from a diverse range of voices. e School of eology and Ministry at Seattle University sought to develop new skills in contextual education with a greater emphasis on public theology and ministry which they understand to have a collaborative posture with multiple areas of theological and ministry engagement. ey intentionally engaged community organizations, encouraged faculty to attend non-theological and non-ministerial conferences, and trained faculty in online pedagogy and course design. One of the innovative features of this project was “ePortfolios” which create an online WordPress shell where students can display their “learning artifacts.” ese WordPress blogs not only help students develop and share their own beliefs but allow them a creative platform to express a “public” theological voice. is is an important public connection for seminary students who live in a digital age but are still encouraged to publish and express their voice through analogue media. e two key learnings were

At Northern Seminary (Lisle, IL), their goal was to address multiculturalism in the classroom to help students deal with multiculturalism in their ministry contexts. ey found that people are conditioned to think of their own culture as normal and natural and others as strange and exotic.

2) Add more women and people of color to the faculty. 3) Faculty will be more intentional listeners in the classroom. 4) Develop a curriculum that is relevant in a diverse number of cultural contexts. 5) Increase number of courses for marginalized or minority students. 6) Consider adding a new orientation course to inform students of the importance of listening to an array of voices. 7) Create a multidisciplinary environment by bringing students from di erent degree programs together in the same classroom. 8) develop better ways for students to provide feedback on the curriculum.

Oblate School of eology sought to design a program for professors to more e ectively teach culturally, linguistically and theologically diverse students. eir key recommendations the following were: 1) Build assignments that allow students reading choices from their own distinct tradition. 2) Faculty become comfortable with asking students to explain how their tradition understand certain things. 3) Allow students to work in their rst language as much as possible. 4) Faculty must develop knowledge about how learning take place in di erent cultures. 5) Finally, faculty are encouraged to imagine success and unity.

At the San Francisco eological Seminary, their focus was on providing high quality online classes. ey found that it was important to create “curriculum roadmaps” that were tailor-made for each course. eir project also served to convince the faculty of the importance for online theological education for future students to thrive. Additionally, the faculty developed a greater appreciation for need to implement diverse alternative ways of learning and teaching.

1) collaboration with other centers is key and

2) “theological education must continue to evolve to help students claim a public voice that is bold and accessible.”

Conclusions

e conversation around globalized education is not a new one and yet as our world changes and expands, so too must this conversation. We have seen that over the years several key elements have surfaced repeatedly as educators have attempted to address the issues that have arisen as a result of globalization and realized that no one culture owns exclusive rights to knowledge and information and that there is no one way that all people learn or teach. e common themes from both secular and theological education sources are collaboration with sources in and outside of the classrooms, intentionality of engagement and selection of resources and modes of delivery, interdisciplinary pedagogy, a relational model that diminishes power distances between educator and student as well as cultures, and a university-wide commitment to a globalized education that transcends disciplinary silos.

No longer can higher education o er “sage on stage” methods where an educator ponti cates all knowledge that students must then absorb as singular truth bounded by historic power structures. Because culture is not static, our pedagogy must not be static. William Shakespeare wrote, “All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players” (As You Like It 1623, Act II, Scene VII). As image bearers of God, we have all been created

Haynes | 157 to perform our part in God’s grand narrative, which is played out in this world and in theological education. e voices, stories, and experiences of all people make a valuable contribution. When educators move from being sages to fellow actors in God’s grand theo-drama, the entire educational experience is transformed, dynamic, and enriched. “In the 21st century, robust learning requires knowledge to be constructed from global dialogue, collaboration, and mutual experience” (McAuli e and Sutton 2012, 14).

Endnotes

1 See Bantock, G. H. 1968. Culture, Industrialisation and Education. Students Library of Education. London, New York: Routledge & K. Paul; Humanities P.

2 Complete summaries can be found here: https://doi.org/chromeextension:/oemmndcbldboiebfnladdacbdfmadadm/https:/www.ats.edu/ uploads/resources/current-initiatives/educational-models/summariesfaculty-development-grants.pdf-2018. “Faculty Development Forum Project Summaries.” Lilly Endowment, Inc. Grant Report. Denver, CO: e Association of eological Schools in the United States and Canada e Commission on Accrediting. is is a pdf document of combined reports with various paginations.

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Storytelling And Hospitality As A Communication Strategy For CrossCultural Relationships With MiddleEastern Diaspora

Victoria Siela

Abstract

One of the leading sociological hindrances preventing the church from befriending the Muslim Americans leaving Islam today includes a disdain or contempt toward religious others di erent from ourselves. Along with changing the lens through which the American views religious others, one of the trending approaches to e ectively sharing the gospel to those of a Muslim background in the twenty rst century includes the use of storytelling as an orality strategy. is paper explores the facets of e ective orality strategies that will help build relationships with those with MiddleEastern and Muslim backgrounds located in America.

Introduction

Preparing the American church for mission in the current and upcoming years requires a cross-cultural aptitude for connecting with the diaspora from Middle Eastern cultures. e LifeWay report (Cook, 2018) states that one in four American Muslims who were raised in Islam leave Islam, while three of those four American Muslims switch to something other than Christianity. is trend provides a signi cant opportunity for churches to engage Muslims, yet the question each biblically-based church must be held accountable to answer includes whether or not the gospel is on the table for their Muslim background neighbor. Keeping pace with the changing landscape of mission in the United States requires a robust ecclesial response creating a movement by Gospel in uencers genuinely befriending Muslim background diaspora from the Middle East.

Along with changing the lens through which the American views religious others, one of the trending approaches to e ectively sharing the gospel to diaspora peoples in the twenty- rst century includes the use of storytelling as an orality strategy. In Christianity Today Online Jerry Wiles (2017) reports ministries in Houston, Texas were nding orality methods e ective for reaching refugee populations, street gangs, prison inmates, the homeless, and others. Once people have experienced orality, the Holy Spirit o en inspires creative and innovative strategies beyond the content of the training. Stetzer notes another new movement, Orality in Business Network, as e ective in the states as well as interculturally in the West African bush.

While the end result of applying any of the orality approaches must include conveying the gospel and discipling, the caveat to this involves an issue of timing—knowing when it is wise to take the step to present the gospel. Tensions and tides exist within any cross-cultural relationships, especially in the context of building interreligious communication. Storytelling within a hospitable context allows for an exchange of sharing each other’s stories and eventually rebuilding one’s story. Or as author Tom Ste en refers to it, “restoryation” (Ste en 2018) is the development of a new life story through coming to Christ. rough two interviews with religious others, I discovered that the telling of one’s story allows for revisions of the story’s conclusions. Sharing stories is done in an atmosphere of God’s Spirit moving in the created event, space, and time to bring the dignity of listening to the religious other. When one provides an appropriate, caring response to o en tragic and traumatic events, Christ’s incarnational presence begins to build a corner of the “restoryation.” Without the dignity of listening to religious others and their stories, little if any opportunity for cross-cultural witness will develop among the diaspora stateside.

In listening to the stories of those from the diaspora, one must hear and respond to the wrongdoing toward immigrant or refugee background community members from the Middle East. If the church were to take an advocative role, serving as the living intercession between the evil demonstrations of hate among racist Americans and the loving embracing church, she may help to prevent those social injustices from happening again, rewriting the story of the American church’s historical failings while reinvigorating Christ-centered hospitality in the following generation among those giving dignity with space and time for listening.

Innovative use of storytelling strategies occurs across many disciplines for di erent purposes. Storytelling by senior executives is popular in the corporate businesses for training individuals and new executives. Executive coaching uses storytelling as a way to help workers to see their blind spots through the story’s character portraits. Education has always used storytelling as a means for literacy development, and storytelling is especially e ective in case studies in which stories train students in the complexities of problem solving across law, medical, and social science elds.

Preparing the Ground of Trust

Trust building is an essential element to any lasting discipleship relationship and must develop in order to provide a safe atmosphere for life-changing decisions. e attempt to share the Gospel with another person prior to emotional trust development could inadvertently pre-empt receptivity toward the salvation message. A more nuanced approach, with an extension of relationship and trust development prior to presenting the gospel, serves as a necessary pre-requisite to the orality strategy used to convey the Gospel and provide discipleship. Multiple life stories in a context of hospitality may need to be shared before a Muslim friend could trust the Christ-follower in a religious conversation. Sustaining an interreligious and cross-cultural dialogue requires the foundation of trust in which the atmosphere allows for consideration of life-altering change and the ensuing discipleship. Cristian Dumitrescu (2019) introduced the model that best suits reaching the religious other including three facets: belonging, behaving, and believing. Dumitrescu explains the resistance to the Gospel felt by those with other worldviews and that it is only when they rst belong to a group with a di erent worldview that they will begin to behave as a Christian and then only a er they belong and behave will they adopt Christian beliefs.

Other hierarchial dimensions of the relationship may need attening as well, including those of perceived greater community status versus those with less community status and those who are independent versus those who need assistance. Trust must be a key development on the road to longterm discipleship communication if one does not want to be dismissed from the relationship. Further detriment extends even to the entire family or clan members when trust is broken in collective and honor-shame cultures such as in Middle Eastern cultures. Seeking and receiving trust is culturally de ned and can disrupt the entire community.

Approaches to reconciliation following con ict is a key in building sustainable cross-cultural community. Elmer (2006, 85–86) points out that the western approach to repairing a relationship when trust has been broken is through directly stating an apology to the injured party. ose from a collectivist society have an indirect approach, waiting for a mediator who talks with each party to help build a bridge when they tire of the broken trust in the relationship. Forgiveness is accomplished through an attitude and behavioral change rather than through words of apology in order to indicate forgiveness.

How people experience the phenomena of storytelling in interreligious contexts as a storyteller and/or as a receptor requires a desire for a planned interaction allowing the necessary time and space. When it comes to communicating while serving in a cross-cultural setting, few see the need to reach out to the refugee with the Middle East Muslim background as the religious other, making intentional relationship connections out of the question for many in the church. In What has your Church Become?, Veroni Kruger (Kruger 2014, 223) quotes David Bosch’s (Bosch 1980) description of the church's beauty and imperfect state of helping whoever might believe in Christ: e church has, since her birth, been a peculiarly ambivalent body. She is in but not of the world. She always moves ‘between salvation history and history’. She is a sociological entity like any other human organization and as such susceptible to all human frailties … Seen through the eyes of the world she is usually under suspicion, disreputable and shabby; in the light of eternity she is a mystery … we can be utterly disgusted at ties with the earthiness of the church; at other times we are enraptured by the awareness of the divine dimension in the church. Usually however, it is the ambivalence that strikes us: the church as a community of people—good people, weak people, hesitant people, courageous people—on their way through the world, dust-stained but somehow strangely illuminated by a radiancy from elsewhere. (Bosch 1980)

“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16).1 e “whoever” in this cited verse is now the religious other; it is this eternal life for the other one must yearn for stemming from the root of abiding in the desires of God and walking by the Spirit.

Storytelling with Dinner Hospitality: An Orality Event

e form of meal-time hospitality in the rstcentury church has continued even into the most recent renewal of dinner gatherings, connecting unbelievers to the gospel message. In looking at the obvious growing immigrant population in the United States and European countries and the shrinking and dissolving of American congregations, there is a movement re-invigorating churches, resulting in expansion in the context of urban and suburban neighborhoods.

Another meal-time church arose in the neighborhood with primarily Middle Easterners, according to a Seattle-based pastor (Interview with Benjamin Hurst, December 17, 2018). e young millennial Pastor Ben was excited to report the dinners set up in the apartment complex housing many Middle-Eastern refugees. Pastor Hurst helps to implement the dinner church initially launched by Verlon Fosner, founder of the Dinner Church, Seattle (Fosner 2017). e national socio-political polarization does not seem to be an issue at this church nor does security in their praxis to the new neighbors of Muslim background. is renewal of biblical hospitality in the form of hosting dinner parties accompanied with intentional conversations occurs on the road to church expansion.

Verlon Fosner (2017, 83) proposes taking a lesson from Paul the Apostle for today’s missional church. Missiologists may bene t from a communication strategy that builds bridges with religious others through the common language of hospitality. Paul, instead of using the right/wrong language of following the 613 rabbinical laws for attaining righteousness, creates a nuanced approach for Gentiles to discover Christ, highlighting its contrast to the right/wrong coercive law to promote righteousness. Paul’s path of grace through Christ would prevent a cultural impasse had he used the coercive law for teaching righteousness to the Gentiles.

To unpack this intercultural communications strategy further, one must unpack the intersection of mealtime hospitality and storytelling. Storytelling by newcomers must be an authentic invitation to those from an orality culture like that of the Middle East. Storytelling for discipleship can be designed for pre-Christian discipleship as well as for discipleship following salvation. Both must involve the contextualized and intentional use of storytelling to connect the Muslim background Middle Easterner with the gospel message through a series of little stories appropriately given in response to conversations. e obvious use of storytelling in literacy across the grade levels in the United States needs little if any explanation when it comes to engaging students. In executive coach training, one to two-minute short stories are strategically used to help clients re ect on various topics. e inroads made with those of Middle Eastern Muslim background were not due to lengthy theological discussions but rather through consistent short-story (some testimonies) exchanges over food, social gatherings, and personal struggles. Short stories such as testimonials may provide mini life lessons. e struggles of living cross-culturally can be eased through the stories of others when it is di cult to resolve one’s circumstances. Sharing meal times and stories allows an equal playing eld cross-culturally, and storytelling may contribute to attening any power distance across cultural barriers and biases. Meal times and stories serve several functions and are illustrated in three conversations (informal interviews) with strategically guided questions designed to bring out more depth of one’s story. e couple with an Algerian and Saudi Arabian Muslim background and a woman with a Syrian Sunni Muslim background are interviewees included in samples of the cross-cultural communication strategies of storytelling during mealtime hospitality.

While the phenomenon of storytelling may provide uidity, the use of metaphors to convey an idea in one culture will be ine ective in conveying the intended idea to another culture. Storytelling e ectiveness must include adaptations. ree major cultures exist: the North American and European western individualistic culture, the Asian and Middle Eastern honor and shame culture, and the African and Asian animistic culture.

Storytelling is a tool that crosses cultures as well various disciplines.