INSiGHT - October 2018

October 2018

OPENING INSiGHT is bold, audacious and daring. It is meant to provoke thought, challenge stereotypical worldview and invite perspectives to contend.

INSiGHT offers a shared platform for reflecting and celebrating our encounters along our diverse journeys in God’s mission.

Monoculturalism is the other side of religious fundamentalism and both have led to our inability to embrace diversity and celebrate the plurality that defines God’s creation. Traditional values go unchecked; metanarratives dominate impressionable minds and the bible is often used to support patriarchy, racism, homophobia and xenophobia. Whilst respecting the traditions that have nurtured human beings through the ages, it is in order for us to remain open to the possibility that there are other ways to reason, hence to live in community. INSiGHT is inviting us to consider the possibility that our teachers could have had only part of the story and that there is more light and truth to be revealed, to enlighten the eyes of our hearts and to prompt us to live more hospitably and generously towards each other.

In launching INSiGHT, Council for World Mission (CWM) is inviting persons to enter into dialogue with the bible and other sacred texts, with a view to glean relevance and/or dissonance for our time and circumstances. In this space, CWM is inviting us to dare to put our guard down and simply hear and see each other in a way that is best articulated with a with a tale that is told by Henri Nouwen in his book, “The Wounded Healer”.1 “Looking in the Fugitive’s Eye” is the tale of a young fugitive, who trying to hide himself from the enemy, entered a small village and received the kind hospitality of the community. However, no sooner than he was offered shelter that the soldiers came in search of him. Receiving no cooperation from the villagers, the soldiers threatened to burn down the community; at which point the villagers went to seek advice from the minister.

The minister was faced with a crisis of options – whether to hand the boy over to the soldiers and watch him killed; or to continue to provide him a safe haven and watch the community destroyed. Torn between a rock and a hard place, the minister “withdrew to his room to read the bible, hoping to find an answer by dawn”. As the minister searched the scripture he came upon the text: “It is better that one man dies than that the whole people be lost”. Satisfied that he had found the answer he closed the bible, called the soldiers and handed over the boy; whereupon “the soldiers led the fugitive away to be killed”.

The village threw a big party and there was celebration everywhere. However, the minister did not join in the celebration; he was “overcome with deep sadness”. That night the minister was visited by an angel, who enquired of him: “What have you done?”

This was the same question asked of Cain who killed his brother, Abel. Having told the angel what he did the angel promptly informed him that he had just “handed over the Messiah”. “How could I know?” asked the terrified minister.

This is the response of the angel, which takes us to another way of looking at the discipline of discernment: “If, instead of reading your bible, you had visited this young man just once and looked into his eyes, you would have known”.2 So, it is my pleasure and privilege to welcome you to INSiGHT, a bi-monthly newsletter of Council for World Mission. Here, all views will be given space and everyone encouraged to share her/his insights. We may disagree with each other, provided we do so respectfully, bearing in mind that history is no more than “his story”. I look forward to read and be inspired, challenged, and provoked by your insights on this platform. To God be the glory.

Nouwen, Henri: The Wounded Healer, Doubleday, NY, 1979 See Nouwen, pp 25-47 for the full tale as well as Nouwen’s reflections and insights

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Rev Dr Collin Cowan General Secretary

DEVOTIONAL

GOD

Scripture: Exodus 20:2; Deuteronomy 5:6

LIFE

It is a painful reality that a number of people are being marginalised on certain grounds all over the world today, one such example being the tribes of North East India. There are over 400 tribes or indigenous communities in India who are faced with the problem of isolation from the mainstream/dominant sections. This began with the industrialisation and economic development of the country and has been destructive of their natural environment. The government continues to take their land, denying their rights, and allowing commercial use of their land by multinationals and big business concerns.

This process of modernisation makes tribal people merely the objects and not the subjects of modernisation.

Thus we ask - is God at work among the tribal people? Is God’s will being fulfilled in this process of marginalisation of the tribal people? Is God in solidarity with the tribal people while their very survival is in question?

The Bible affirms life rather than destruction.

God is revealed as the God of liberation of the oppressed in the Exodus event who delivered the people of Israel from Egyptian bondage.

God took side of the oppressed - the people who have been denied human dignity and earth’s resources, alienated, dispossessed, and oppressed. The God who saw the pain of his people in Egypt, suffered with them in their suffering, and revealed himself in the midst of their oppression, is also still at work among the tribal people. Through his Son he has given liberation to all.

Scripture has rightfully attested that God used the marginalised, the less recognised, the servants, and maids in his economy of salvation. Following this great tradition, we may say that even today the poor and marginalised groups can be the vehicles of God’s revelation. We must join hands together to fight against all forms of prejudice, estrangement, domination, deprivation, marginalisation, and stigmatisation for a total liberation of God’s people. Everyone has an equal standing in the eyes of the Creator, and therefore we must treat everyone with equal respect.

Prayer Lord, may my freedom in Christ be a channel to liberate those who are under physical and spiritual bondage. May joy, peace, and comfort of being liberated be upon each individual on earth. In Christ’s name. Amen.

Ms Lalmuanpuii Hmar, Presbyterian Church of India

AT A GLANCE

IN THIS SECTION //

Legacies of Slavery

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Face to Face

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NIFEA

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Regional Assemblies

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Deep Sea Mining Consultation

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NIFEA Strategic Planning

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DARE

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World Watch

As part of CWM’s continued pursuit of its vision statement of helping individuals and communities achieve fullness of life through Christ for all creation, and working ecumenically to enable its member bodies to develop missional congregations where the affirmation of life and hope are experienced, it kicked off 2018 with a new programme, Legacies of Slavery Hearings in Ghana. A project that looks and assesses CWM’s own story and complicity with the systems of slavery, the Hearings also helps shed light and better understanding of the urgency of racial justice, and the issues which intersect with it and its member churches. Significantly, it is a platform for the voices of hurt and anger to be heard, and for CWM to discover afresh what post-colonial mission movements need to be addressed.

AT A GLANCE

At the Ghana hearing, participants paid a visit to Elmina Slave Castle where they listened to perspectives from tribal chiefs, inter-faith partners, African scholars and a community of African-American returnees, who had left the United States to make their homes in Ghana. From there, the hearings moved to Jamaica in Feb. They met with various communities including the Maroon and Rastafarian, and National Commission on Reparations, and spoke about raising awareness of contemporary legacies of slavery that manifested itself in the treatment of the Windrush generation and more. In Alabama, U.S – the project’s final stop, they concluded their last Legacies of Slavery Hearing. Dr Jim Winkler, the President and General Secretary of the National Council of Churches (NCC) in the U.S spoke about the anti-racist work of the NCC, and participants visited the Southern Poverty Law Centre, Equal Justice Initiative Museum and the National Peace and Justice Memorial for victims of lynching.

This Legacies of Slavery Project is part of the journey in which we have acknowledged that religious piety and theological niceties will not solve the problem of a broken world and that there is need for us to look critically at ourselves. ~ Rev Dr Collin Cowan

AT A GLANCE

As one of its ways of facilitating a wider global dialogue on theology, spirituality and mission through cross-cultural exchange, CWM’s Face to Face programme participants headed to India in Feb. They tackled pluralism, interfaith relations and economic injustice through three separate but integrated aspects of immersion, reflection and teaching. The second NIFEA Pacific colloquium on Economy of Life was another Feb highlight, where resource persons discussed social financial schemes, ethical investments, and approaches to advocacy. Various churches also used the opportunity to present their implementation reports after the first NIFEA in 2017 and the various challenges faced.

The NIFEA concluded the programme with a collective action plan to work towards for the third colloquium in March 2019. A clarion call for churches to stand united against empire and forces that are spiralling beyond control, the NIFEA colloquium encouraged member churches to focus on poverty eradication, ecological injustice, ethical investments and advocacy. It further urged member churches to take initiatives, activate their plans and relate to the bible study lessons for guidance and inspiration.

AT A GLANCE

Hoping to equip and influence the way its member churches interpret their context and develop their own programmes that equip and build missional life-affirming communities, CWM’s GS spoke at the Conference on World Mission and Evangelism in March. The first of CWM’s Regional Assemblies was also held in March.

At the Europe Regional Assembly, member churches were challenged to re-think their approach to mission and consider “being with” those in need, rather than “being for” or “working with”. Besides introducing and using this new term of “being with”, there was also an exposure visit to Sanctus St Mark’s, a support group for refugees and asylum seekers in the UK. Confronting and challenging traditions, structures, ideologies and theologies was part and parcel of the Caribbean Regional Assembly, where the theme of human sexuality was explored. Churches were encouraged to be honest, and talk openly about real issues with their congregations, and be guided by the bible and theology to focus on building affirming inclusive communities. Ideas were proposed for building awareness against gender-based violence, child abuse and stigmatisation of persons with HIV/AIDS. The Programme concluded by affirming “that every individual is made in the image of God regardless of choices in life, identities and diversity”, and committing to “continued prayer, discernment, discussions and explorations as we seek the mind of God on issues related to human sexuality”.

In April, the Africa Regional Assembly was held in Zambia, while in Singapore, the East Asia Regional Assembly kicked off its subtheme for 2018 “Healing Relationships: Hope for a New Spirituality”. Delegates were challenged to grapple with God’s mission within this scope, and they surfaced and discussed key issues of broken relationships including gender discrimination and sexual injustice, doing mission from the margin (e.g. the poor and broken, the migrants and persecuted Christians), young people as full participants and contributors in God’s mission, and prophetic witness for peace, justice, reconciliation and geopolitical stability in the region.

AT A GLANCE

In fulfilling its vision and mission as a justice-centred global mission organization, CWM facilitates listening and responding to the cries of a broken world ravaged by life-denying forces. To this end, the South Asia Regional Assembly was held in May at Cox’s Bazar in Bangladesh - a location chosen as it provided a crucial space to the reality of the Rohingya crisis issue. Guest speaker Tahmina Rahman covered women and children’s rights, as well as advocacy against trafficking and forced labour in South Asia. The immersion programme included a solidarity visit to the Rohingya Refugees Camp and group reflection by the delegates.

Climate change is one of CWM’s global themes worked out through programmes such as its Deep Sea Mining (DSM) Consultation. Held from Apr 30 – May 1, it was themed Healing the Broken Body: Tending and Mending ‘Our Sea of Islands’ to educate and advocate on DSM in the Pacific region. DSM is a new mineral retrieval process where hydraulic pumps or bucket systems take deposits of precious metals created by vents near the ocean floor to the surface for processing.

Geologists, scientists and other subject matter experts presented scientific and technological perspectives on DSM, its potential economic benefit, and environmental and social impact.

Image via www.gaiafoundation.org

The Consultation was also the conversational platform to the Pacific Regional Assembly in Nadi, Fiji. As CWM participates in God’s work with others, churches are called to prophetic witness, and the Regional Assembly focused on re-imagining mission in emerging contexts. The highlight of the Assembly was a time of mutual celebration, solidarity and support as they shared stories of successes and challenges in their churches.

Queues at Rohingya Refugee Camp

AT A GLANCE

Ecumenical panel meets for strategic planning on a NIFEA According to a 2018 Oxfam report, 82 percent of the wealth generated last year went to the richest 1 percent of the world’s population. Those who make up the poorest half of the world – 3.7 billion - had no increase in wealth.

Executive Director of Oxfam International Winnie Byanyima said: “The billionaire boom is not a sign of a thriving economy but a symptom of a failing economic system. The people who make our clothes, assemble our phones and grow our food are being exploited to ensure a steady supply of cheap goods, and swell the profits of corporations and billionaire investors.”

Working on an ecumenical action plan for a new international financial and economic architecture (NIFEA), General Secretaries of CWM, World Council of Churches, World Communion of Reformed Churches and Lutheran World Federation met in New York in April 2018 to review tasks, identify emerging and persistent signs and elements of economic and climate injustice, set priority actions, make new alliances, update the NIFEA plan and advocate the analysis and transformation of NIFEA.

Committed to building a world that looks more like God’s true kingdom, the ecumenical panel released a joint public statement presented at a side event around the UN Financing for Development Forum. Their view was that God’s vision for unity, peace and plenty for all of His creation has been marred by single-minded pursuit of profit, and they identified the social, ecological, political and global cost of the current financial system. They also called for changes in financial architecture, especially national and international systems of taxation that reward work and enable wealth-sharing; bigger investments in “public goods” such as infrastructure that creates employment. Also, for rich, industrialised countries to share renewable energy technology with poor, climate change-exposed countries.

AT A GLANCE

Discernment and Radical Engagement (DARE) is a CWM initiative that helps churches in its public witness by facilitating listening and discernment opportunities. This leads to missional responses to address current life-denying issues and socioeconomic problems. The 2018 DARE Forum was held in Mexico, and was organised around five themes: scripture, election and rejection; people, pilgrimage and poverty; body, normalcy and indecency; religion, walls (both ideological and physical) and supremacy; and media, ideology and occupation.

Over 70 world-renowned Biblical scholars, theologians, and social activists from all over the world attended this event.

“DARE is bold, audacious and an uncompromising declaration of CWM’s commitment to justice and engagement with a world infested with thieves and robbers, a world gone mad. DARE compels us to interrogate entrenched theological notions and perspectives that negates contexts and peoples’ struggle and search for life,” said CWM’s General Secretary Rev Dr Collin Cowan during his keynote address.

He also added that through DARE, CWM seeks to transcend the realm of mere academic or theoretical discourse - to have greater connection between human suffering and systemic evil.

Dr Tara Tymes, one of the participants, shared that the event is an important platform of bringing together minds for struggle to take in scripture and apply it in the 21st century. She added that it provided the opportunity for her to reaffirm herself as a theologian with a capacity to think and interrogate and use the process to bring life to people especially in this time where we are experiencing complex and multiple issues.

WORLDWATCH Humanity WINS You Might Have Missed…

Germany has rolled out the world’s first hydrogen-powered train and is ready for serial production. It produces electricity through a process that leaves steam and water as the only emissions. Excess energy is stored in ion lithium batteries on board the train.

And over in Sweden, the world’s first electrified road that recharges the batteries of cars and trucks driving on it has opened. This electric rail stretches for about two kilometres near Stockholm, and the government is already busy drafting a national map for future expansion.

A new mobile app that was co-developed by the Bangladeshi government and Plan International has stopped over 3,700 child marriages in just six months after its roll out.

Child brides are more likely to die during pregnancy or childbirth, face domestic and sexual violence, or trapped in a lifetime of poverty. The mobile app enables marriage registrars and solemnisers to digitally verify birth documents and determine the true age of a bride or groom.

Despite limited tech knowledge, five Nigerian girls won a Silicon Valley contest for building a mobile app that spots fake drugs, hoping to be part of a solution to the widespread sale of counterfeit drugs in Nigeria. Their mobile app called FD-Detector, is built from scratch and helps users identify fake medicines using a drug’s barcode to verify its authenticity and expiration date.

The Thailand cave rescue saw a community rallying together, united in hope. Villagers pitched in to donate money and food, farmers were happy to sacrifice fields to clear paths to rescue the boys, and the Thai goverment’s move to give citizenship to three stateless boys rescued from the caves was welcomed by the UN refugee agency.

Papua New Guinea received its largest-ever conservation area, after 32 years of work by local communities, with the support of governments and conservation organisations to get the country’s rainforests zoned as a protected area.

Indigenous communities in Indonesia are using GPS technology to map out and demarcate the boundaries of their ancestral lands, guarding forests they depend upon for survival. The digitised community maps have been accepted. Many believe that securing indigenous peoples’ land rights plays a part in sustainability and mitigating climate change by preserving Earth’s forests, which are seen as the lungs of the planet.

Training in Mission

(Diploma in Mission Studies) 2019 PROGRAMME BRIEF

The Council for World Mission (CWM) has been investing in equipping the young people for the ministry and mission of its member churches since 1981. Through the Training in Mission (Diploma in Mission Studies) Programme, ten to 12 participants from the churches are brought together for about seven months of intensive mission training.

The pedagogical process of the Traning in Mission (TIM) Programme is the action-reflection model of learning.

Over 350 young people have so far been changed for life with a new practical and radical understanding of what witnessing to Christ means. In every church, TIM participants are to be seen as living expressions of CWM's understanding of partnership in mission.

The TIM (Diploma in Mission Studies) will be held on May 1 to Nov 30, 2019. *The closing date for the submission of applications is on Saturday, Dec 1, 2018.

AIM OF TRAINING IN MISSION

• Provide training for life. It is intended to be a stage in Christian formation which helps each participant in a life–long involvement with the mission of the church.

• Offer training which provides wider vision; deepened commitment; and a strengthened sense of fellowship and partnership with other Christians around the world, particularly through CWM member churches.

Further, “training” in TIM is aimed at formation - and the formation is for life. Recognising the locus of mission as the “public space”, TIM is a learning process of enabling participants to discover perspectives and to develop skills for a life of witnessing. TIM is an enabling experience that allows the participants to have an adventure of faith, rooted in God and enacted in the world. TIM is also a journey of transformation: dialectic of self and society.

Though initiated three decades ago, CWM is constantly re-defining the content and methodology of the Programme.

SELECTION CRITERIA

1. All CWM member churches are encouraged to nominate maximum of four participants - two males and two females, for the TIM (Diploma in Mission Studies) Programme. Applications should be endorsed by the General Secretary and/or Church Moderator of the sending church, following its respective internal selection process.

2. Duly accomplished applications must be submitted to CWM at (e-mail): empowerment@cwmission.org or hard copy at (address): 114 Lavender Street, #12-01, CT Hub 2, Singapore 338729 on or before Saturday, Dec 1, 2018. Late and/or incomplete application forms will not be processed.

3. All the applications will be processed by the CWM Research and Capacity Development Unit, ensuring balance in gender and regional representation in the Programme.

4. Upon notification, the selected participants are expected to process their passport and visa requirements, if necessary.

VIEWPOINTS

DELIVER US

by Pastor Joseph San Jose (Manila, Philippines)

To witness and experience first-hand their living conditions and environment, and later write liturgical resources to draw the church to have a deeper connection and communion with the poor and oppressed.

These were the twin hopes arising from the recent liturgy workshop CWM organised for scholars, pastors and students in the Asia and Pacific region in Manila, Philippines.

Pastor Joseph San Jose, a former Face to Face participant, recounts his experience and shares his reflections from this immersion experience.

Immersing with the oppressed people is good for any middle class and elite person’s soul. Many of us who participated in the week-long immersion and workshop are from a privileged social class.

Everyone had education. 95 percent of the participants are already PhD holders and are experts in the various fields of theology. Some are church leaders. So the first thing and also my motivation in joining is the opportunity to disturb and discomfort myself with the reality of life for the poor and the marginalised, being a middle class, fair skinned, educated pastoral leader of my local church. I felt that I was being called and drawn to go to the Church that is amongst the poor and experience God there. Called to witness and experience the liturgy of the people in the reality of their daily struggles, their moments of suffering and despair, and the injustice they live with night and day.

My group was the one which went to Valenzuela City for exposure with the peasant labourers, particularly those of NutriAsia, which lately had received public backlash because of the violent dispersal of their picket line. I was with Dr Cici from Shanghai, China, Dr Propetai from Samoa, Rev Fr Sanjeev Thomas from India, Dr Karl from Dumaguete and Dr Prompt from Thailand. We were led and facilitated by Br Anthony Balbin of Church People and Workers Solidarity who coordinated with the local community and labor organisation in Valenzuela City.

I will not go through the extensive details of the experience but rather go straight to the feelings and thoughts I have had during and after the three days and two nights’ experience.

Since entering seminary in 2014, I have been made aware of the many social justice issues of our country and the world. My eyes were widened to better see the current national and global system of oppression. I was able to see and experience the issues of the Indigenous Lumad farmers of Mindanao in 2015 as part of our summer immersion program and as funded by UMC-GBGM. I know that there are labour issues and oppressed peasant workers amongst us yet I never fully realised the full scope and prevalence of labour exploitation until I went to Valenzuela City, the city of factories – the city of modern day slave labour.

After each peasant worker or their spouse or parent spoke about their experiences and struggles, I felt sick to my stomach because of the depth of human exploitation and abuse they narrated and the data they have provided. Even as I write this reflection paper, I feel my chest tightening and getting heavy remembering the stories of Tatay Berhel, Antonet, Kuya Toy and others, as well as the stories of their friends that they relayed. The story of the Kentex Factory Fire that killed 74 people; the video of the violent dispersal and the stories of the NutriAsia workers we visited in Marilao Parish. I recall the heaviness of my chest and the sickening of my stomach and how I tried to also hold back tears from flowing as they spoke of their struggles.

VIEWPOINTS Valenzuela City seems to be a modern day Egypt reminiscent of the Exodus story. Today thousands of people in Valenzuela work for 12 hours or more under hazardous working environments, full of chemicals and toxic fumes. They work on subsistence payments. No benefits, job security, or vacation leave. Workers are cheated of Social Services contributions required by law.

The company will not take financial responsibility for employees who are injured or worse, killed in the factory that does not follow health and safety standards. Tatay Berhel lost two fingers because of a factory injury.

Another older guy who worked for a demolition company that earns no less than 11 million pesos per project speaks in a voice that shows lung and throat damage. We were told of stories of workers manually melting and stirring aluminum and other chemicals without any proper protective gear; not even a proper gas mask against the fumes. All such working conditions for 380 pesos a day. Some receive even less.

The community we came to was Barangay Pulang Lupa, “Red Soil”. Immediately I recalled that in the Genesis story of creation, God formed the first human, the “adam” from the adamah – which is Red Soil. God formed the first human from the red soil by the strength and craftsmanship of His hands, perhaps in the same manner that many factory workers produce and form many grocery, household and almost all other products by the strength and skills of their hands; products we often take for granted. I also recall the so-called fall of the adam and contrast that with the peasant workers.

The peasant workers represent our fallen humanity; fallen and pressed down by the hardships of their lives; fallen by back breaking work they do six days a week,12 hours a day. They are fallen not because of petty sins and their inability to live up to the elite’s standards of decency and education. They are fallen because of modern day task masters and pharaohs who disobey and violate their dignity as human labourers; companies and owners who does not follow even the bare minimum standard of what the law requires. They are fallen not because they ate a forbidden fruit but because their employers are gluttonous and greedy beasts that suck out the life of them. They are fallen and cursed not by divine ordinance but because of our corrupted government that has often taken the side of the rich and the powerful. They are fallen and driven away from the abundance of ‘paradise’ not because of an angel or a flaming sword, but because of a middle class and elite society that blames them for their poverty. They are fallen and cursed with the chains of death not because of God, but because of business owners whose only god is money, and whose only lord is themselves.

35,000 listed and registered factories in Valenzuela according to the local labour organisation all have labour issues one way or another. There are a lot more that are not government registered.

Thousands upon thousands of fellow Filipinos working in slave-like and dehumanising conditions in Valenzuela and many other places in our country.

Poor, uneducated, with so little to no options at all, many of them accept the chains of their oppression. Even as I write this, some of them have just left work after 12 hours. Some are going to work for the night shift. I pray, God will hear the outcry of the people. I then hear the opening song of the Prince of Egypt “Deliver Us” – and it proclaims: “Elohim, God from on High can you hear your people cry?... Deliver us!”

And I begin to try to hold back once more tears for my people, enslaved and dying, day and night even as I write this reflection paper.

VIEWPOINTS

O Lord our Lord, how majestic in your name in all the Earth! These words best describe the extent of my experience in Tuvalu, islands of pristine beauty and grandeur.

The land, surrounded by the enormity of the Pacific Ocean, is a telling reminder that the world’s eyes are on Tuvalu as a place to be enveloped by the rising sea levels, the impact of climate change, within a matter of years. And yet the people of Tuvalu, led by the Rt Honourable Prime Minister, are defiant in their determination that they will not succumb to such predictions and that they will not allow fear to interfere with their capacity for hospitality nor their resolve to save Tuvalu.

“Save Tuvalu, save the world” is the relentless cry of the Tuvaluan people. They believe that if the international community will make good on their public pronouncements about climate justice, then they must make Tuvalu a practical and positive case study in climate change mitigation, such as land reclamation, coastal protection and sustainable living for the people of Tuvalu. Whilst “Save Tuvalu, save the world” is the song of the Tuvaluan people, they are not sitting, waiting for the international community to heed their call.

Indeed, there are signs everywhere of robust interventions by the government and people of Tuvalu to protect the coastlines, reclaim land and bolster the hope and confidence of their people. The newly erected bungalows, in which I was accommodated, courtesy of the Prime Minister, are situated on reclaimed land, a testimony to the tenacity and determination of Tuvalu and an audacious statement that they will not sit back and wait to be swallowed up by water.

I said my prayers in Tuvalu

by Rev Dr Collin Cowan

I landed in Funafuti on Thursday, Aug 16, and was warmly greeted with the characteristic hospitality and graciousness of the people of Ekalesia Kelisiano Tuvalu (EKT) and the wider community of Funafuti.

This welcome did not come by surprise, as I have grown accustomed to this kind of generous and extended welcome in the Pacific; and my first visit to Tuvalu four years ago, reminded me that I should expect no less. However, it was very special and meaningful to me to experience the love and care of the people and to observe the cherished place of CWM in their consciousness.

The days that followed, with meetings with leadership of the State and Church, opened my eyes to the power of partnership so very evidenced in the way the Church and State cooperated, while keeping their roles distinctively defined and segregated. In the Fogafale (meeting place), where we gathered for daily meals, the whole community comes together and the indigenous traditional culture comes alive.

In the words of the Prime Minister, at the closing farewell function, “such gatherings are known to produce many mad people, such as you (referring to me)”, intoxicated by the spirit of the traditions and the energy of the music and dance.

VIEWPOINTS My conversation with the Church leaders provided clear lenses through which to view the work of EKT and to engage with their struggle and search for meaning and relevance in their context.

This meeting of their General Assembly will elect and appoint new leadership for the Church under a proposed revamped staffing structure to allow for tighter fiscal management and more cost-effective use of resources. My visit provided an opportunity to celebrate the leadership of Rev Tafue Lusama, CWM Director and former General Secretary of EKT, who is now on study leave pursuing his PhD in climate justice at the Pacific Theological College. It was also an opportunity to share information about CWM, including a call for support of our 2020-2029 strategic planning process.

CWM is etched in the consciousness of the Tuvaluan people, with over 80 percent of the population being members of the EKT. So significant is CWM in the consciousness and regard of the people that His Excellency the Governor General of Tuvalu took time from his busy schedule to attend the session of the Assembly where I was making my presentation on CWM; and at my farewell function the Governor General and First Lady, the cabinet, parliament and diplomatic Corp were all present. What a spectacle of welcome, appreciation and affirmation!

And finally, I said my prayers in Tuvalu. In the middle of the Pacific Ocean, with no life jacket in the little speed boat that carried me from Funafuti to Funafala, surrounded by the beauty of the Earth, I felt ready to make peace with my Maker, the God of life. So I said my prayers, borrowing words from Simeon – “Sovereign Lord, as you have promised, you may now dismiss your servant in peace.

For mine eyes have seen…” (Luke 2: 25-30, NIV). There on the high seas, the Assembly theme of EKT, “Sailing with Christ in the currents of change”, impacted me in a most profound and life-transforming way. I realised that the answer to the fear of the disciples, on the stormy seas (Mark 4: 35-41), was wrapped up in their own reflective question (“Who is this?” :41), as Jesus responded and restored calm to the sea (: 39). I conceded that the predictions of science and the prophecies of religion are all subjected to the plan of God. That is faith at work, my Tuvaluan encounter and experience.

VIEWPOINTS

By Rev Huang Hsin-Lien, from The Presbyterian Church in Taiwan

What are some human rights issues faced by women today?

During CWM East Asia Regional Assembly in April 2018, delegates engaged with the CWM Assembly sub-theme “Healing Relationships: Hope for New Spirituality”. Women delegates were invited to share their thoughts on human rights issues they face, and how they can be partners in God’s call to mission. In this series, two delegates from the Presbyterian Church in Taiwan (PCT), and the Hong Kong Council of the Church of Christ in China (HKCCCC) share their thoughts.

It is of my opinion that the current human rights issues faced by women are: devaluation, constraints, and “reasonable” harassment.

The issue of being devalued occurs when women have access to issues of education, public seating and job security. Lack of rights to education in many countries such as in early Taiwan, many girls were unable to attend school or could only continue to read a certain position.

The framework's limitations include the fact that women are to prioritise family duties above all else. When there are parenting issues, women are also sacrificed first for their work, space and time; within the group relationship, women are always seen as assisting in cleaning up, cooking or completing work “belonging to women”.

Finally, there is reasonable harassment.

Recently, following the #Metoo Movement in the world, the PCT Women’s Department also promoted “Thursday in Black”. The movement is a peace initiative developed by the World Council of Churches (WCC) since the 1980s. It is mainly “supporting women in the world”.

The reason why such a campaign needs to be deliberately developed is because many women are often subjected to reasonable harassment in their education, workplace, and even their families.

How can we build a true community of women and men in church?

In the Bible, true community is often based on the fear of God. Because of the nature between human beings (the men and women hypothesised by the subject here), we are intrinsically human, in that we have competition, jealousy, possession, and injury.

VIEWPOINTS The only thing that allows us to stay true and yet to get along peacefully is to learn to love in Jesus Christ. However, love is fragile unless we can deny ourselves. We choose who to show love to instead of to everyone. There are even different kinds of men and different kinds of women.

We can’t love all. It is impossible. But what if we are the one who is unloved?

Therefore, in addition to knowing more about God’s religious life through Bible revelation, we are able to establish a better community by sharing, understanding, and accepting more sincerely, and even more by discussing the limitations of people.

However, if there is a great deal of injustice, extreme violence and injury in group life, it is another subject of transitional justice.

How can both women and men be full participants and contributors in God’s mission?

First, we must affirm that God leads everyone in His mission. We should not practice gender discrimination in God’s mission.

In 2012, the PCT General Assembly annual meeting passed the motion：One-third of the members elected by the General Assembly are required, among all board of directors and committees of the PCT except the Women's Ministry Committee, to be women. The gender statistics of all work committees, 2017 chairman：male-15，75 percent；female-5，25 percent. committee member：male-280，63 percent； female-161，37 percent. This ratio allows us to see that we need to encourage women to participate in missions more than to give them to men.

Although, there are still substantial difficulties. In my pastoral church, women have the ability, but based on the role played - it is difficult for women to truly implement the leadership of a mission.

In being true to Jesus’ calling to heal broken relationships between human beings and among groups of human beings, what is the role of women in social justice?

Jesus is a son of a humble woman. Even if his twelve disciples were all men, he had countless strong women's groups. Some of these women came to Jesus, talked to Jesus, and Jesus healed them. This is what those men at the time rarely do. Such gentle and humble companionship healed the "exclusion" of injury in the mainstream society.

In my understanding, the emergence of feminism and feminine theology is meant to reflect on male centeredness and male theology. The rise of women’s consciousness and the efforts of women’s theology are to deal with this exclusive defect of exclusion. Social justice has always faced a great deal of harm you have been fighting for and you have lost. I think women's tolerance and diversity can make up for this exclusion. However, whether women can be truly tolerant and pluralistic, rather than patriarchal systems that recognise hegemony and rule out other creations, remains a challenge for women to play such a recovery role.

God has endowed women with natural qualities to mend, restore and nurture the world that is broken. I believe that God will increase women’s confidence so that the world can be renewed in the face of lack of resources, fighting for power, and extreme harm.

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By Rev Chan Suk Yee, from the Hong Kong Council of the Church of Christ in China (HKCCCC).

What are some human rights issues faced by women today?

The status of Hong Kong women has been increasing, the contradiction between the status of women, in recent years has also caused much discussion and concern.

Stop sexual violence! "#Metoo" campaign has also spread to Hong Kong. The Hong Kong Hurdles athlete Lui Lai Yiu was one of those affected, calling out her former coach for sexual assault. Social media has been the medium of exposing many suspected of sexual harassment. The women's rights movement works to challenge this situation that is rooted in the patriarchal system, the "blaming the victim" culture.

Eradication of female poverty.

In addition to sexual violence, women in the marketplace continue to be subjected to oppression.

According to Oxfam Hong Kong, "The Hong Kong report on women in poverty – 2016",one in every six women live in poverty. The average gender income gap is 24 percent according to a UN report. Poor women's long working hours, and also duties to take care of the family, often lead them to engage in casual and part-time work. The Government provision of public childcare services and female asylum is also very low, and home sexual violence occurs. Women have no economic independence and can only continue to be silent. Sexual violence and cultural and economic oppression are connected.

Eliminate social prejudices against women and ‘styling’.

In recent years, a term of Hong Kong has come up - "sheng nu". "Sheng nu" literally means "a leftover woman", and refers to a single woman who is above the age of 27. The issue of unmarried females, often stigmatised as "sheng nu" or "leftover women", has long been a topic of concern in a society that prioritises marriage and motherhood for women. This label has become a social issue, and has become what a community, especially men, use to ridicule such females. Women feel inferior and a sense of contradiction because work is not an object to marry.

How can we build a true community of women and men in church?

Understand God created men and women in the same glory.

Genesis Chapter 1:26-28 “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him, male and female created he them.” The men and women are created in the image of God, in the same distinguished and honored way with the same purpose that we all can be like God. It also similarly receives God’s promise and blessings, there are no differences. In God, men and women are equal.

Use the gifts of each other.

Galatians Chapter 3:28 “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.” Men and women in the body of Christ, have to work together. Therefore, in the Church of Christ, all the difference, whether status, valued features or functions should have completely eradicated. According to the needs of the church, the gifts among themselves is to be maximised for completion of the mission of God. Love Each Other.

• 1 John Chapter 4:19 “We love him, because he first loved us.” This means we love each other and we love God. • 1 John Chapter 4:20 “If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?” We have a problem with God if we have no love, and therefore are not able to love brothers and sisters.

• Philippians Chapter 2:3 “Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than themselves.”

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iv. Matthew Chapter 25:40 “...In as much as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me”. This teaches us to treat others like Jesus. If we can really do that as the church, disputes will naturally be significantly reduced.

Today if we received brothers and sisters like the reception Jesus Christ has for us, we will be able to truly implement the command to love one another in life.

How can both women and men be full participants and contributors in God's mission?

In recent years, the ordination of women pastors in Hong Kong is on the rise. In 2018, the HKCCCC has a total of 83 pastors, of which 31 percent or 26 pastors are female. The church is not only responding to the concept of social equality between men and women, but also the Bible’s New Testament teaching in Galatians 3 Chapter 28. Therefore church, from the perspective of the exegesis, should be in the process of transforming the attitude towards the female.

Ordination and the admission of females in the church is only the beginning, as we should continue reflecting, so that the women in the church can serve fully. This depends on the congregation and the pastoral team’s own awareness and practice, the church’s deepening education in gender equality, the male pastoral members to be willing to empower women pastors and sisters to fulfill their accountability.

Sisters, give yourself the opportunity to reassess, seek and choose to serve in the role which you are gifted and competent in.

In fact, whether male or female, for one to serve in that post, is not a gender issue but an issue of gifting and faithfulness. If you have the gift and are faithful, you can assume the role.

Missional roles for both genders are continuously changing today. It takes playing our roles and mutually complementing one another’s functions, to achieve the common mission in a church’s life.

In being true to Jesus' calling to heal broken relationships between human beings and among group of human beings, what is the role of women in social justice?

In the Bible, a lot of women respond to God's call: live according to God’s purpose in her mission, with love to serve the community, (e.g. Esther, Dorcas, Deborah, Maria etc). From their examples, we can learn to: • • • • •

Listen: Hear their stories, understand their needs.

Help: Provide appropriate help, solve their immediate needs.

Accompany: Let them no longer be lonely. Share their difficulties. Understand their struggles.

Train: Develop each individual’s potential, in order for them to be economically independent.

Educate: Provide training in gender awareness, understand their own role and rights, guard against the negative social images and information.

• Sound Out: Stimulate discussion and concern in society, as they fight for reasonable rights.

• Love: Keep the love of God with them. Spread the gospel of the love of God, let them be hope, let minds be comforted.

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Gender Justice

A United Church of Zambia Woman Minister’s Perspective

by Rev Dr Kuzipa Nalwamba

Post communion, St. Margaret's UCZ Kitwe, with elders and student minister Chileshe Chepela

n I opted to enter ordained ministry because I believe God has a place for women like myself and God affirms our work and deepens our joys through it. That however does not take away challenges we might face.

The United Church of Zambia (UCZ) has a relatively long history of ordination of women.

That, however, is not to say the marginalisation of women is a thing of the past. It remains imbedded in varied cultural guises.

This reflection is based on my experience at my first placement to a rural posting from 2004 to 2007.

Women in Society and Church A clergywoman’s, like other women’s self-perception is informed and shaped by how society views her.

Society generally discriminates against women. The Church subtly does the same.

Churches in Zambia are committed to the fight for justice and freedom of all. But the Church is often not outspoken on gender justice. The church’s teaching makes no deliberate effort to present each woman and man as equal in God’s sight. If that were recognised and taken seriously, it would lead to bold steps towards equality.

The UCZ has women-majority church membership and attendance, yet form the minority in Synod meetings. That is the context in which a clergywoman ascends to leadership.

Power-sharing remains a prospect despite women being the majority in the church.

Women clergy, therefore have to be aware of covert opposition and mindsets conditioned by societal and church practices that relegate women in decision-making. When I experience that, I am reminded that as a woman I am yet to be fully admitted into the leadership sphere.

Challenges to Women Ageism I entered ministry as a forty-year-old and yet I was considered young. If I was married and/or a mother, my experience would be slightly different. Ageism is a culturally conditioned bias single women and men in ministry encounter.

The only difference is that there are not many single male clergy in their forties.

Culturally-derived ageism and disdain for singleness have been uncritically accepted in the Church. Jesus was single and he completed his earthly ministry before he turned forty.

Culturally, when a woman is considered young, the implication is that they are immature and uninitiated. It is an ingrained mentality which will not just go away without serious theological reflection. As long as we continue to attach maturity and age to marital status, we continue to undermine a section of Christian leadership.

Sexism The UCZ leadership is male-dominated, which entails a certain distortion. God created us male and female to share the responsibility of 'stewarding' the earth. That complementarity is missing. Women leaders in the Church only have mostly only male role models. Women are considered to be aggressive when they express their leadership according to the ‘male code’.

Women leaders need alternative role models.

The UCZ is yet come to nurture enough women leaders at a high enough level for them to be those models.

The lack of female leaders at high levels further entrenches sexism because members’ full confidence in women clergy lags behind that of their male counterparts.

VIEWPOINTS Skewed View of Marriage The UCZ for a long time ordained only men. Church members saw women only as wives supporting their husbands’ ministry, thus, an extra unpaid worker. The minister's wife provided hospitality at home and was mother-figure of the congregation. It was positive role in itself, albeit adjunct to the man's.

Arising from that, a woman clergy is expected to play a dual role - to be the minister and the minister's wife - without consideration of the woman minister’s other tasks! As a single minister I struggled to find a healthy balance. My work as a minister in a congregation was not evaluated based on my hospitality skills but on those entailed by the role of a minister.

UCZ Gathering at Chipembi Girls’ Secondary School

As the institution of marriage is considered to be dignifying, the unmarried, woman minister has to deal with this additional bias. Despite the biblical affirmation of the single life, marriage is exalted as the state that qualifies one for maturity and the secrets of the initiated. In rural areas particularly, even a married adolescent is considered mature and “older” than her unmarried counterpart. There are many occasions in my ministry when I was reminded of those skewed social distinctions.

Overtly, clergywomen are regarded as dignified by virtue of our role. Yet socially constructed views of women remain the same and prevails indirectly or otherwise.

Women’s Experiences: A Lens for Theology and Missional Response As a woman minister serving in a rural area, I found that I could not be indifferent to the plight of women in society at large. I was exposed to the daily struggles of women. They are poor and helpless and they struggle with fear, hunger, oppression and marginalisation.

With St. Lukes' UCZ Kasama Women's Choir

In Zambia (and Africa in general), we are generally not hung-up about God's gender pronouns. What women long for is a decent life and room to express their experiences. Many times, circumstances limit women who struggle to fend for their families. The question I often asked myself was, “How can I, as a woman church leader create room for women’s experiences to shape our theology?”

Their theology arises from wisdom and feeling, as a theology of the heart and lived experience. We need an expanded sphere for a creative living faith that accommodates women's experiences and takes them seriously as lenses that shape the Church’s missional response.

Women are a gift from God and our experiences are part of the larger religious milieu. I pay tribute to my fellow women of all denominations who are living out their reality in faithfulness to God. As we move to embrace new spaces we must aim to make our own unique contribution.

Mbuy Beya (2001: 198), a Congolese woman theologian asked, “Daughters of my people, are you good fortune or bad fortune for my people?” (Mbuy Beya, 2001). Women who have taken up a vocation in Christian ministry, like I have, whether ordained or lay seek to honour God and to be good fortune indeed.

Rev Dr Kuzipa Nalwamba is ordained in the United Church of Zambia and is a research associate at the Faculty of Theology, University of Pretoria. She is currently serving the Council for World Mission as Project Consultant.

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Amongst an Exiled People:

A Solidarity Visit to the Rohingya People

by Rev Dr Allan Samuel Palanna

Presence and witness are powerful experiential postures in discerning the depth of pain of communities. Representatives of the member churches of South Asia Region of the Council of World Mission (CWM), were invited to Cox Bazar, Bangladesh to immerse themselves amongst the bordered lives of the Rohingya people. The objective was to witness the ongoing dehumanisation of the most vulnerable communities in the world, fleeing the devastating ethnic cleansing.

After the arduous process of getting administrative approval to visit the refugee camps, the rickety jeeps traversed through the narrow lanes to the camps of refuge. What met our eyes were waves of distressed people, jostling for space to get a share of provision distributed by the UN World Food Programme. Underneath the blaze of the relentless and unforgiving mid-day sun, the never-ending serpentine queue extended through the landscape bereft of a single vegetation. Women, men and children competed with one another to gain space in the crammed bylanes of the camp. Panning from a small hillock, one could see flimsy, hastily-constructed hutments spread across the dry horizon.

As the group conversed with the people, tales of torture and massacre, whispers of abuse and hunger rent the air. To be a stranger in one’s own land because of an ethnic identity is indeed incomprehensible. Those involved in the everyday concerns of human beings and nature must be doubly anxious of the adverse changes affecting the most vulnerable communities and the environment across the world. What are the intersections between religion, politics, economics and their societal implications, most pertinently on the lives of the most vulnerable people and nature? are questions that demand a credible response. We are to be aware that Kutupalong refugee camp in Bangladesh comprises of one of the largest habitations of the Rohingya people. The expansion site had a combined population of 547,616, making it the world's largest refugee camp, even much ahead of Dadaab in Kenya.

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The dehumanising vocabulary such as “human refuse” and “human waste” indicating refugees are emerging. The recycling of refugees is being talked about, reflecting a paradigm shift from the settlement model to the penalty model wherein special buffer zones and no-go wastelands are identified to dump “unwanted” human beings.

Amidst the current highly-charged rhetoric of what constitutes citizenship, it is crucial to draw perspectives from the scriptures. Leviticus 25:23 offers an image of the refugee status of all people before God. Theologically, it may be construed that no one can claim authentic citizenship over against the other, since the land finally belongs to God. The ones who reside in the land do so as a blessing and a provision of God, rather than possession in the earthly sense. This conditional residence is subject to the openness to the alien, the refugee.

In India, Rev. Canon Subir Biswas (1933-1977) characterised healing as social and relief intervention in the city of Kolkata as vicar at St. Paul’s Cathedral by founding the Cathedral Relief Service (CRS). His example of healing is held as a towering instance of spontaneous action overcoming institutionalism in churches. In 1971, people from Bangladesh fleeing the war of independence sought refuge in the then, Calcutta. Through the agency, an estimated 1.5 million refugee people were helped through daily distribution of food and clothing, access to health care and education.

Canon Subir Biswas’ diaconal call to action in throwing open the doors of St. Paul’s Cathedral to welcome the refugees has echoed in Indian Christian memory for many decades now. He is remembered to have said, “Some people in India would be quite happy to see the church just keeping to itself, maintaining the beautiful grounds in the midst of violence and tension. Yet we ourselves who are within this feel we can’t do it. We have to expose ourselves, to put our property and our church in jeopardy. It is a way of asking repeatedly, what does the incarnation mean in our lives?” Embracing the refugee must not be a one-sided, unequal phenomenon wherein there is a giver-receiver, the benefactor-recipient dynamic that operates in relationality. The refugee not only calls us for a response, but provides the dialogical space for our own self-understanding and, perhaps, with great humility, we may encounter the incarnated Lord in the faces of the bordered people.

Rev Dr Allan Samuel Palanna is an ordained Presbyter of the Church of South India, Karnataka Southern Diocese. He is Associate Professor in the Department of Theology and Ethics at the United Theological College, Bangalore, and received his Ph.D from the University of Kent, Canterbury, United Kingdom.

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GEM SCHOOL STUDENTS TO CONTEXTUAL INJUSTICES

by Anam Gill

Photo by Anam Gill

Governance, Economic and Management (GEM) School participants were taken on exposure visits to centres for indigenous people (Centro Nacional de Ayuda a las Misiones Indígenas A.C. (CENAMI)) and for migrants (Casa Mambré) in Mexico City on Aug 20.

“The migrants were just welcomed in that place as Jesus would have been welcomed,” said Manasseh Musa, a GEM School student from Nigeria, while visiting Casa Mambré, a centre for migrants in Mexico City.

“It was an eye opener to see a space where everyone is accommodated, a place for relief for everyone facing economic and political challenges, standing in solidarity with each other,” Musa said.

The exposure visits offered first-hand knowledge about the economic and political injustices and challenges being faced by the migrant and Indigenous communities in Mexico, allowing students to better understand the local context around which the GEM School is formulated.

During the visit to Casa Mambré the participants had an opportunity to discern the link between migration and how it responds to a range of economic, socio-political, cultural and environmental factors. It gave the participants an insight into the complex migratory processes to large cities like Mexico City.

Casa Mambré has provided medical, psychological and counseling services to migrants since 2013.

The GEM School participants met the members of the migrant community, listened to them and learned about the economic and political reasons that led to their migration.

“I was really intrigued by the worship service happening there for the LGBTQ community,” said Alana Martin, a participant from Canada. “It made me think of how many people migrate because of their gender identity. The reasons for migrating varied but their well-being was emphasized in that space; nobody was there to judge each other.”

At the centre for indigenous people, participants met with José Luis Sánchez García, CENAMI’s secretary, who provided insight into the work of the 50-year-old organization. He informed the GEM School participants of the increased economic hardship faced by Indigenous people in Mexico, one of the largest and most diverse indigenous populations in Latin America.

“Today, an oil well is worth more than the lives of indigenous people,” he said. “To extract oil, the government will simply displace indigenous communities. We try to assist these people by trying to find loopholes in the existing laws in the country.”

The visit to CENAMI gave participants an understanding of the history of the indigenous community in Mexico and how colonization has shaped and defined their current culture and economic challenges.

“If we are searching for the economy of life, the relevance of us visiting CENAMI is to be attuned to the realities that our brothers and sisters from varied backgrounds derive from,” said Pearce Robinson, a participant from United Kingdom. “We have to get that personal experience, and sit with them and find out from them how the economic injustice affects them and how we can work with them for an economy of life.”

The Ecumenical School on Governance, Economics and Management (GEM) is a joint initiative of the Council for World Mission, World Communion of Reformed Churches and World Council of Churches. It aims to develop economic literacy within churches by equipping future leaders with a better understanding of churches’ engagement in mission and witness for economic justice.

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Taiwan is an important part of the God's amazing creation. When the cosmos and all beings were created, according to the Bible, "God saw that it was good." It is to say that God's wholeness is perfect and his creation is good. Men sinned because they abused the grace of God's creation. In a heart, that is fraught with selfishness, greediness, and self-righteousness, Taiwan, the beautiful garden created by God, was once ruthlessly destroyed.

In its earlier days, Taiwan was known as "Formosa" (that means "a beautiful island" in Portuguese). The rustic, kind-hearted and diligent residents of Taiwan had been working hard to restore Taiwan to its original beauty created by God. But for more than 400 years of colonial rulings in the past, the invaders did all things possible to consolidate their powers, and exploited extravagantly all resources God had generously provided. Consequently, Taiwan was trapped in the abyss of despair.

And ever since then, endless lamentations had been chanted by the people of Taiwan.

by Rev Omi Wilang

To whom could Taiwanese people make their plea? And who will be able to make a full accusation? How to make a case against the relentless exploitation of colonial rulers for their oppression and destruction? God is merciful and compassionate. He heard the groanings of Taiwanese people. He saw the native Taiwanese people suffered.

God wept with us, just like how Jesus Christ wept with the family of Lazarus as they mourned the death of their brother. The Lord is with those who suffer. We firmly believe Jesus Christ is the master of history and his love persists from the beginning with no end.

Therefore, we are greatly comforted by the mercy of Jesus Christ our Lord who is determined to embrace the indigenous as we undergo calamity. He cries with us. And with his righteousness, he will stand by us to restore our homeland, Taiwan, to its original beauty.

Read and hear more stories from the book Taiwan Indigenous Mission Stories in the next section, Take a Look.

Rev Omi Wilang is Program Secretary for Indigenous Ministries (Society) in the Presbyterian Church in Taiwan.

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TAKE A LOOK

Our revised Common Resource Handbook outlines programmes and resources available through CWM. It seeks to guide members in engaging with CWM programmes and in accessing resources from the common pool as we advance God’s mission both locally and globally.

Download it at: https://bit.ly/2Owes4Q

Even though the Presbyterian Church in Taiwan (PCT) has a third of its congregations being indigenous people, their cultures and languages are disappearing and little is known about these real and original inhabitants of Taiwan. Through CWM’s Hearing God’s Cry Programme, PCT has published the Taiwan Indigenous Mission Stories to give voice to these lesser known stories and traditions of the indigenous people and enhance their profile and leadership.

Email missiondevelopment@cwmission.org for details.

CWM’s General Secretary spoke on the 2018 Assembly sub-theme "Healing Relationships: Hope for a New Spirituality" in his keynote address for the South Asia Regional Assembly, where he explored God's creation as an architecture of harmony and synergy; brokenness as a departure from the epistemology of life; and community as the springboard for spiritualities of trust and resistance. God’s design of creation has been corrupted, but God remains interested in the interconnectivity and interdependence of creation and He is committed to preserving its purity and its power.

Have a listen here: https://bit.ly/2OBvJWg

TAKE A LOOK

The Rohingya crisis poses these questions: Are there crimes against humanity taking place in Myanmar? And is Aung San Suu Kyi turning a blind eye? BBC Newsnight and Our World's joint investigation reveals the extent of the appalling treatment of the minority Rohingya community. Watch at: https://bit.ly/2qJaOnv

This video clip by United Nations Development Programme shows the reality of climate change in Kiribati, a Pacific island country made up of 33 atolls and islands. Kiribati stands just a few metres above sea level, and is susceptible to floods and drought. Scientists believe that it could be uninhabitable as early as 2030 and some of may be submerged under the sea and disappear within this century. In this sobering video, former President of Kiribati Anote Tong said: “We would never wish to be refugees and we would be refugees if we don’t do anything now.” https://bit.ly/2fh2GJ6

The Pacific Adaptation to Climate Change (PACC) programme was the first major climate change adaptation initiative in the Pacific region.

This video, narrated by renowned astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, highlights ongoing PACC projects to reduce the vulnerability of island coasts. https://bit.ly/1FtCIFk

DO YOU HAVE BURNING ISSUES TO GET OFF YOUR CHEST? Looking for an outlet to contribute your reflections on social, socio-political and economic issues which plague our world today? Is your passion taking the stand against the current structures of society, and empire?

If you want to be heard, we invite you to be part of this publication by sending your material(s) to insight@cwmission.org You may also write to: C/O INSiGHT Council for World Mission Ltd 114 Lavender Street, #12-01 CT Hub 2, Singapore 338729 *We reserve the right to edit articles for space and clarity

YOUR SAY

BECAUSE

by FJN, from Malawi

I’m a christian

I was about six or seven years old when I was made aware of my responsibility for the actions of men. I remember even then feeling great disappointment that like Sekani, our pet dog, men could not be held responsible for their actions because they did not have the capacity to choose the way they acted. Only women had.

Their age did not matter, I was told. They all want the same thing, and to that end, my age did not matter either. Just as I would be held responsible if Sekani ate the meat in the bowl I was supposed to be guarding while grandmother went to fetch a knife, it would be no different if a boy or a man touched me inappropriately.

“Do you understand what I am saying?”, grandmother checked. I did not. But I knew then that my dear grandmother would understand my lack of understanding even less. So, I nodded yes. She wanted me to understand that I was not sitting appropriately. My leg placement is what brought about this strange conversation. I was sitting on the floor with legs drawn up and apart, with my elbows resting on my knees. She said that while all I saw were legs drawn apart, what men saw, even through layers of clothing, was a little gaping hole between my legs inviting them.

“Never sit with your legs apart if you don’t want trouble”, she asserted so conclusively. Just like that, the males I loved, my father, who was the centre of my world, and my dear uncle who lived with us at the time and gave free rides on his shoulders, which my sister and I loved, suddenly became men. And I had to get over the sickening suspicion that I now knew was my duty to bear towards the intentions of all men.

Just like many girls before and after me, I had been successfully inducted into the mighty culture of silence. To report any inappropriate contact would be to admit that I had been reckless, that I had invited, or even wanted, trouble. I was not alone in this. I soon realised that ‘understanding’ my grandmother was the right thing to do because it appeared that every girl and woman around me already knew this about men. When I got older and chose to be a follower of Christ in my teenage years, my grandmother’s wisdom was affirmed at every turn. The Bible, I learned, also blamed women for the behaviour of men. And behind every innocent man’s lust and fall, there was a guilty woman. And this was not just limited to my culture and context.

Following the recent drama surrounding the confirmation of the United States Supreme Court Justice nominee, Mr Brett Cavanaugh, an article in HuffPost titled, “I Know Why Evangelical Women Support Brett Cavanaugh. I Was Raised To Do The Same” , caught my attention. In the article, the author, Carly Gelsinger, attempts to provide a background and cultural context for the baffling support that Mr Cavanaugh appeared to receive from evangelical women in the United States even in the light of Dr Christine Blasey Ford’s testimony detailing the alleged sexual assault committed by Mr Cavanaugh in the 1980s. Carly explains that in her context, the “Purity Culture”, promoted by the evangelical movement of the 1990s in the United States has helped to ingrain the ideology that girls bore the responsibility for men’s lust. I was not born or raised in the United States, but the “Purity Culture” that came with my evangelical Christian formation fits the traditional views and patriarchy in my local context like a glove.

Then in my teens and early 20s, came the denial of female sexuality. Men want sex, all the time.

But a good Christian girl must always say “no”.

In essence, sex is something women do for men, but they themselves do not want it so much and, therefore, they are not subjected to the burden of temptation in the way men are. In a dating relationship, we were told to expect our Christian boyfriends to be tempted from time to time, and it was the girls’ responsibility to refuse to go all the way. The 1990s was a bad time for sexual exploration in my corner of Africa. It was the height of the era of HIV/AIDS. “True Love Waits” was the slogan of the day, etched on murals of school walls, along with the red ribbon that seemed to have been pasted everywhere, including on bottled water.

Like in Carly Gelsinger’s world, no effort was spared in mine to teach every girl that she was only as valuable as her chastity and that having sexual experience made her “damaged goods”. Our male counterparts, however, remained undamaged. One might argue that they even grew in value as they became more confident around the opposite sex.

YOUR SAY

I am now in my 30s, and I believe I can begin to avail myself some of the wisdom and analytical advantage only hindsight and self-discovery can give. Looking back, as well-intentioned as was the relentless indoctrination of the purity culture across contexts, in my opinion, it took as much as it gave. It saved some as it sacrificed others.

And it continues to do so. Good Christian girls got unwanted pregnancies and some contracted HIV because they never admitted, not even to themselves, that they would or wanted to have sex. So, they went unprepared. What was worse for a Christian girl than having sex, was preparing to have sex.

It was more understandable to have had sex by accident than to have planned for it. For a good Christian, sex outside marriage could only be explained if it were forced or, at the very least, a regrettable slip at the heat of the moment.

I believe that it was the denial of female sexuality, that at 15 and pregnant, the path to education for Natalia, the quietest girl in our class, closed. We whispered to each other in the dormitories of our Catholic boarding school that surely it must have been rape. Natalia was a good girl and could never have intended to have sex. And at 20, Emma, my young and beautiful cousin, with a smile that could light up a stadium, married a man twice her age because she truly believed that she had no choice but to marry him. No one else would want her, and he was her only chance at marriage, she said. We later learned that she had taken the message of “damaged goods” to heart, and truly believed that since she and Peter had already slept together, he was the only man she could ever have. Peter died shortly after they wedded, as did Emma a few years later, from AIDS.

Today, I wonder whether things could have been different for the hundreds of Natalias and Emmas of this world if, instead of bearing the burden of refusal, they had been taught that choice and consent were indispensable. What if girls were taught that they could not be held responsible for the actions of men? What if both girls and boys were taught to give a bit more credit to boys’ and men’s capacity for judgement and conscious action? What if girls were encouraged to own up to their decision to have sex and prepare for it?

What if they were taught that their value did not start or end with a sexual encounter – it was independent of it? What if they were taught to reject the weaponisation of sex and the male genitalia – that a woman is more than her body and that she could never be de-flowered?

I shocked my youngest sister with my advice after I asked her if she were sexually active. She appeared appropriately shocked by my question and dutifully denied that she was. I thought long and hard about what would have been helpful for me to hear at her age. I told her that if she wanted to have sex, she must make a conscious decision to have it, and not just let sex happen to her. “But you are a Christian!” she exclaimed, expecting me to shove abstinence down her throat instead of what I had just said. I paused and wondered why I hadn’t. I thought of a Christian medical doctor that I knew, who decided to put boxes of condoms in his hospital’s toilets in an effort to de-stigmatise sex as a strategy to fight the spread of HIV. He understood his calling to be to serve and save the bodies of God’s children and to do no harm to them. With each condom used, he had reduced the likelihood of infection. He had served God and God’s children, one condom at a time. The problem with the “Purity Culture” is that it got so hung up on sex and that it forgot all about life.

Especially life after sex. I looked at my sister, and said, “It’s because I am a Christian.”

YOUR SAY

RETAINING 377A in Singapore:

EQUALITY FOR ALL?

by Cheok from Singapore

Here in Singapore, the debate over Section 377A was recently re-ignited by the Indian Supreme Court’s decision earlier this month to strike down a similar law. Section 377A of the penal code is a piece of legislation that criminalises sex between mutually consenting adult men. It states that: “Any male person who, in public or private, commits, or abets the commission of, or procures or attempts to procure the commission by any male person of, any act of gross indecency with another male person, shall be punished with imprisonment for a term which may extend to 2 years.” Since then, petitions by activists, including religions groups, have entered the fray and weighed in heavily on the issue.

I have followed the 377A debate closely since its constitutionality was challenged eight years ago by a lawyer on behalf of his client. From that point on, it has been a passionate, lively and sometimes bitter exchange of words between two distinct camps who show no signs of backing down on their beliefs and position. Both sides have put forward both valid and relevant points, which has made this issue a difficult and often murky one to navigate - always ending in a stalemate stance of “agree to disagree”.

This incident has compelled me to share my view and feelings on the matter – especially on being mis-judged and being labelled as a “Christian bigot”. I feel sad and disappointed when certain members of the LGBT community point accusatory fingers – claiming that leaving Section 377A in place has resulted in them being shunned by society, labelled as “criminals” and treated unjustly. This is certainly not the case and I disagree with their claim.

In my opinion, I feel that Section 377A targets the homosexual act – not homosexual individuals. In Singapore, the LGBT community are free to gather in groups – as seen in their annual Pink Dot day, and they are free to show public signs of affection such as holding hands or having other related lifestyle choices. They are given equal opportunities in Singapore’s workforce, and many hold successful key leadership positions in both private and public sectors. The Singapore government has stated on numerous occasions it will give space to homosexuals and has clearly said it does not target any particular individual or group, but forbids a specific act. However, it has also added that homosexuals should not set the tone for Singapore’s multi-racial and religious society, and actively promote their lifestyles to others as this nation largely remains conservative.

As a Christian, I am not imposing or forcing my religious or moral views on individuals who do not share my beliefs. By voting to retain this legislation, I am keeping to my personal values – a signal to our Government (and the world) that this is how I want the nation I live in to be. I disagree with LGBT activists when they say that moral objection to homosexual behaviour is based on fear, hatred and discrimination as they do not conform to traditional sexual roles and stereotypes. Just because I do not align myself with or support their lifestyle choice means I hate them, or reject them as a friend and fellow human beings. What it means is that I personally do not accept or subscribe to the sexual liberationist belief that homosexuality is normal.

I have many close friends in the LGBT community whom I respect and love. They are fully aware I do not agree with their agenda, and know that I will never force them to agree with mine. Most of all, they know full well that I will stand and journey with them - despite our very different and opposing view on the issue. But just as they proudly stand on public platforms to call for equality and acceptance, I too have a voice as well - and I have a right to be heard and be accepted as well.

YOUR SAY

The Church and 377A CAN WE SPOT THE SIN?

by Isaiah from Singapore

The statements about Article 377A in the media in Singapore, by Christian and other religious bodies, whereby consensual sexual relations between male adults are outlawed under former British colonial legislation, have prompted me to share my reflections on churches as inclusive communities. I think Churches have been silent for too long on these issues and this must feel like complicity and consent for those who face rejection because of their God given sexuality. I write as a Christian, a leader in the church, and also as a brother and a father – all experiences which have led me to wonder what if Christ’s vision of life in fullness for all includes building inclusive and life affirming communities where all feel equal, safe and empowered.

If Christians are to be bearers of Christ’s promise and gift of fullness of life, they must make themselves known in communities which show the radically inclusive love of Jesus. Such life affirming community is a foretaste of the heavenly banquet we see in Isaiah 26 and share in the celebration of communion. The Holy Spirit, which inhabits all of life, is embodied in communities which reflect all of life, including human sexualities and gender identities.

Communities which make space for the full diversity of God’s world become the basis for creating alternatives to the world of exclusion and death which marks out so much of our economic, political, religious and social life. We follow Jesus who was unfairly tried and put to death for politically expedient reasons. Thus, the Church is called to be bearers and defenders of human dignity, which seems to suggest that we ought to support laws which defend the rights of all persons in our societies. As Martin Luther King Jnr said, “Justice denied anywhere diminishes justice everywhere”.

If our communities are drawn fully and deeply from all kinds of people then we can speak authentically and believably of Christians loving the world, with all its diversities.

In such communities, it is homophobia which needs to change, not LGBTQ people. The love we all long for, a love which doesn’t judge, is inspired by God’s grace, which each receive in being affirmed fully as followers of Christ. Inclusive communities empower because they send people into doing justice sensitised by the needs of those we live amongst.

Accepting and embracing God’s love, as revealed in Jesus, helps us to make room for those amongst whom Jesus dwells - the poorest and the marginalised in our societies. Our living in community with diverse people tests whether we are loving like Jesus and reveals our obedience to Jesus whose life was devoted to an alternative way of thinking and being in community. There are vital and urgent contributions to the mission of God which LGBTQ people can make and are making, especially as they challenge churches to embody Jesus’ life of radical love.

Therefore, LGBTQ people should not be cast away by religious communities but be affirmed in all parts of our communities, not least of which is the church, which claims God’s grace as an undeserved endowment.

YOUR SAY

LGBTQ people are made in the image of God just like all other people. However, this is not the experience of many LGBTQ people around the world. LGBTQ people face significant reproach in societies, and religious groups add shame on top of this. By regarding LGBTQ people, people God has made, as sinful in our preaching, the Church has done great harm.

The Church has inadvertently fostered hostility and rejection in the way the Bible is used to make LGBTQ people feel less than God’s people.

The ‘Othering’ and scapegoating of men and women, young and old, is not the central message of Christianity, nor is it the proclamation of the Gospel; yet for many outside the church this is all we seem to stand for.

In some contexts, such religiously sanctioned views have led to violence against LGBTQ people.

That is sin. Churches, followers of Jesus, are called to be communities of hospitality and healing, not communities of hostility and harm, to God’s people. Christian communities speak of loving all of God’s creation, which includes LGBTQ people ‘despite’ their sexual orientation.

However, unfortunately, LGBTQ people are excluded from this love and left feeling stigmatised and judged. Rather than confronting the sinful violence of homophobia, the Church has used the Bible as a weapon to strip people of their God-given dignity and worth because of their sexual identity.

The consequences of this approach to reading Scripture fall heavily on the LGBTQ community, placing them under a shadow of fear, and even depression because we insist that they should repress a God-given part of themselves. Indeed, LGBTQ people are acutely aware that they risk familial and social rejection, damage to their self-worth and family alienation if they are open in who and how they are.

I am afraid that the heavier consequences will fall on the church, who are failing in our calling to be God’s people, loving the world and all who inhabit the Earth. Even where some members within the church community begin to change its treatment of LGBTQ people, it is often too little too late because we have already sacrificed the good faith and example of many, who cannot trust the Church to provide them safe spaces.

There are many biblical texts which can be used to harm others, and they have been so used.

White people have used the texts to justify the enslavement of black people. Men have used it to justify the supposed inequality of women. The Bible has been used to defend the demands of empires to go to war and to take land and life.

The Bible has also been used by religious leaders to create norms which are a product not of the Gospel but the cultural norms of particular times and places.

No biblical text can be treated as the single authority for all our attitudes and actions, because we have seen the great harm that has done to us. We have harmed God’s creation by interpreting biblical texts selectively to suit our prejudices. We, therefore, do not have the permission to privilege some and not others. So, the task of a body of believers is to heighten consciousness as to the reading and use of biblical texts to bring closer the heavenly banquet that God is preparing in our midst for all to come.

It is, therefore, time for the body of Christ to recognise in the LGBTQ members of its churches, families, communities and nations, equal persons whom God loves fully and calls to follow freely as they are; and to advocate for, and take steps towards bringing an end to the culture of homophobia in churches.

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