Focus april 2015

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FOCUS April 2015 Vol. 3 No: 2

Repetition and Recollection - Dr. Zac Varghese, London - Page 14

Cover Photo – Jesus and Samaritan Woman

A Publication of Diaspora FOCUS

Contents

Editorial - Revisiting Culture and the

Gospel - Page 3

Gospel and Culture, Rev. Dr. Valson Thampu, New Delhi - Page 15

Christ and Culture, Rev. Dr. K. A. Abraham

Metropolitanʼs Message - Page 5 - Page 18

Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby Easter Message - Page 7

Dr. Stanley Jones, Re-collections by granddaughter, Dr. Anne Mathews-Younes - Page 8

One God and One Creation - Rev. Dr. M. J. Joseph, Kottayam - Page 11

Impact of Migration on Home Churches, Yesudas M. Athyal - Page 22

Christ and Culture, Lal Varghese, Esq., Dallas - Page 25

Christianity and Kerala Culture – Page 28 Dr. Titus Mathews, Calgary

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Editorial Revisiting Culture and the Gospel The relationship between culture and the Gospel is a continually recurring theme. We partially dealt with this theme in part IV of the series on ‘Everyday Theolgy’ .

Familiarity with words often prevents us to search for real insights, and we take things for granted. We draw out conclusions without proving the premises, and often assert the premises without examining the terms. Therefore, let us make sure what exactly we mean by culture and the Gospel.

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The classical meaning of the word ‘culture’ was the cultivation of the soul or mind. Kroeber and Kluckhohn compiled a list of 162 different definitions for culture. One of the earliest definitions of culture was from Edward B. Taylor. In his work on ‘Primitive Society,’ he defined culture as a complex whole including knowledge, belief, art, morals, laws, customs and any other abilities and habits acquired by people as members of the society. Culture is not something genetically inherited, but learnt from the environment one finds oneself in. Culture of a specific community is valuebased and shared among its members. Culture is often thought of as high culture or popular/folk culture. High culture is intellectual or artistic achievement and propagation of a privileged few; only a small social group has high culture; they maybe the people who have trained themselves to enjoy classical literature, music, paintings, and such. On the other hand, popular culture is open to all, irrespective of class. The acquisition and propagation of popular culture is the characteristic of an age and a society. Culture has both universal and distinctive characteristics. Cultural traits are often acquired from people one interacts with as one is socialized. No culture is static, it is evolutionary. Hence historical account of the culture of any society is a snapshot view of a particular epoch. Cultural changes occur through a variety of processes including: discovery, diffusion, and imposition. Cultural imperialism imposed western cultures on others during the colonial period. Group culture is the result of the collective programming of the mind, which distinguishes the members of one group from another.

However, everyone is simultaneously a member of different cultural groups due to professional, religious and social engagements.

Therefore, no community can be characterized as a people with a monoculture and everyone is exposed to or part of multiculturalism. In Jesus’ day, Palestinians were exposed to multiculturalism because of Judaism, pagans, Greeks and Romans. Most people worked as shepherds and farmers, and this too is reflected in Jesus’ parables and teachings. The main socio-political question for the Jews of Jesus’ time was how much Greek and Roman domination and influence should be tolerated?

We understand the Gospel as the good news of the record of Jesus’ life and teaching in the first four books of the New Testament. In Acts Chapter 6, Verse 42, it is written: ‘…., they never stopped teaching and proclaiming the good news that Jesus is the Christ.’ By Christ they meant the anointed one. The Gospel is all about God and His eternal purpose in Jesus to redeem this world and the creation of a new

humanity with values of God’s kingdom on this earth. Jesus challenged cultural boundaries that people had constructed.

He did not accept the culture of the social institutions of the day on face value. He questioned purity laws, family values, Sabbath observances, gender inequality, and the treatment of marginalized people such as tax collectors, poor people and widows. Jesus was a cultural revolutionary and some of his actions were counter-cultural. Jesus did not allow the prevalent culture to influence him, but he influenced and challenged the culture of the Pharisees, the Sadducees and the Scribes. Jesus spoke Aramaic, a common lingua, which the Jews acquired during their Babylonian captivity. He was also well versed in scholarly Hebrew, Greek and Latin because a Greco-Roman culture was prevalent in that time.

Jesus had no difficulty in worshipping both in the Temple and local Synagogues, which were not biblically prescribed.

In today’s term it is feeling at home both in the chapel and the cathedral. He practiced inclusivity to reach out to people from all strata of the society. This inclusivity is very important in our Christian living and interaction with communities around our parish boundaries. Revd Dr. Valson Thampu has addressed the paradox of the Gospel-cultural encounter in his scholarly article in this issue. He says, “The Cross is the mediator between Gospel and culture. And it is laden with the paradox thereof. Materially, a cross is only a cultural product. But not so, the Cross. It stands in culture, but goes way beyond.”

Church history and reformation movements demonstrate that one of the challenges of Christianity is the encounter with multiple cultures. Where should the Church stand?

Inside or outside the culture or ignore it? Richard Niebuhr addressed these questions in his book, Christ and Culture.’

His descriptions of five ideas of relationship between culture and the Gospel is helpful in discerning the conundrum of

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how Christianity has been appropriated in various geographical and cultural contexts. Revd Dr. K.A. Abraham in his article in this issue touches Niebuhr’s five concepts: a) Christ against culture; b) Christ of culture; c) Christ above culture; d) Christ in culture in paradox; e) Christ the transformer of the culture. These five perspectives on the relationship between culture and Christianity are also currently present in the context of the Mar Thoma Diaspora Christians. This is causing certain tension between generations in our parishes. It is often presented as the young verses the old or as the domination of men over women or language used in liturgical worship and so forth.

One of the most important gifts which we can give both ourselves and one another on the ecumenical journey is the knowledge of what it is that sustains and strengthens us along the way. What are the wells or meeting places that we draw from when we are feeling tired and thirsty? Where are we able to be re-sourced? Each community generally has its own well. We might say that each of our denominations is a well and most of the times we drink from our own well, but our young people are exposed to other wells too. Jesus’ encounter with the Samaritan women at the well has much to tell us about inter-cultural and inter-faith relationships.

Jesus drinks from a well, which is outside his own community and his own tradition.

The idea of enculturation may be helpful is solving some of our problems. Christian liturgy and forms of worship bear the mark of Jewish origins and influence. The very concept of church ritual is indebted to the example of the synagogue.

The reading of passages from the "Old" and the "New" Testaments is a Christian version of the synagogue reading from the Torah and the Prophets. The Psalms, in particular, play an immense role in both Catholic and Protestant liturgy.

St. Thomas Christians has accepted certain cultural practices from the surrounding culture such as ‘Minnukettu and Manthracodi.’ Enculturation for us is the insertion of Christian ideas into different cultures and the establishment of a new kind of Christian living. Enculturation is an evolutionary dialogical activity, which indicates a dynamic relationship between culture and the Gospel. In this process the Gospel becomes inserted in a given culture transforming it from within by challenging certain cultural expressions. In these conversations, it is possible that an alien culture may offer positive means, which can enrich the way the Gospel is presented, understood and lived. Therefore, instead of totally rejecting an alien culture one needs to be sympathetic in appreciating, understanding and respecting cultural norms and symbols. Enculturation is not always the task of the Mother Church, but the local parish is the workshop of enculturation. The laity’s role is of paramount importance because it is they who are called to transform communities by living out the Gospel in everyday encounter with their neighbours. Enculturation is not about rewriting liturgy by inserting fashionable cultural elements. Enculturation is placing the good news about Jesus Christ in the centre of our existence. Our cultural transformation by God’s grace is a slow process; enculturation takes time. It is a process of growing up from ‘being-in-itself’ through ‘being for-itself’ to ‘being–for-others’ ; it is a simple existential reality. A generation growing up in the immediacy of consumeristic and cyber culture might find the slow process difficult to 3

accept. Since Pentecost, God’s vision for his people and kingdom has expanded, from ‘Jerusalem’, to ‘Judea’, to ‘the ends of the earth’ (Acts 1:8). The ‘Promised Land’ no longer has defined borders, but it is wherever people’s hearts are open to God’s kingdom values (Luke 17:20, 21). Our obligation is to live faithfully, wherever in the world we find ourselves. We are to cultivate the Christian culture of love, justice for all, and the custodianship of the created world so that people see our behaviour and praise God (Matthew 5:16). We are Christ’s letter to the world in the present time.

We conclude this editorial by quoting from the Nottingham Statement of 1977 on Evangelism. “We long to see churches developing that are culturally, racially and socially mixed and that are evidence of the power of Christ to reconcile, through his Cross, people of all kind to each other and to God. We believe for this to happen, Christians throughout Britain need to accept their responsibility towards multiracial communities of our country. The result of such a concern will be a desire to understand, to support and to pray for churches in these areas. Some Christians will be called to move to join such churches and to share in the life of multiracial communities. Where there are black-led churches and other churches from minority racial groups, we understand the reasons for their existence and positively seek opportunities for worship and witness together with them.”

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References: 1. Zac Varghese, Everyday Theology Part IV, FOCUS Vol. 2(3), July, 2014 2. Richard Niebuhr, Christ and Culture, New York: Harper and Row, 1951 3. Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness, translated by H. Barns, New York, 1956.

4. The Nottingham Statement, the official statement of the ‘Second National Evangelical Anglican Congress, April, 1977.

The Editorial Board Note: Please remember that we need your constant prayer and support to make our online ministry fruitful for the glory of God. Please send the following URLs of this online magazine to your friends and relatives: http://www.issuu.com/diasporafocus http://www.scribd.com/diasporafocus Disclaimer: Diaspora FOCUS is a non-profit organization registered in United States, originally formed in late Nineties in London for the Diaspora Marthomites. It is an independent laymovement of the Diaspora laity of the Mar Thoma Church; and as such Focus is not an official publication of the Mar Thoma Church. Opinions expressed in any article or statements are of the individuals and are not to be deemed as an endorsement of the view expressed therein by Diaspora FOCUS. Thanks. Contact: www.facebook.com/groups/mtfocus E-Mail:mtfocusgroup@gmail.com

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Synopsis of Metropolitanʼs Pastoral Letters in the ʻSabha Tharakaʼ January, February, & March 2015 Jan. 2015

gives us a new hope. This is the promise God has given to the world through the first Christmas. The belief that God is with us always is the one only consolation that we have in every crisis. God is the one who does not change His promises, and let us move in to the New Year with God and with that ever living hope.

Let us thank God for being with us through the different circumstances of our life. Let us repent for the failures happened in our life. Let us make changes to our life according to Godʼs plans. We should be able to pray like an ancient church Father who prayed like this: ʻGod please give me the wisdom to understand that what I have done is wrong so that I can move forward with the changes to be made in my life.ʼ We should be able to discern the right and wrong in our lives and to live a life worth to God. The baptism of Jesus is the incident by which He is submitting himself to the fulfillment of His fatherʼs will in this world. That was an occasion declaring himself that he is ready to face the death on the Cross.

Jesus became the bread only when he was crucified on the Cross. We celebrate January 9th as the day of St. Stephanos, who was the first martyr of Christianity. His life and fearless attitude was a model for any Christian.

He also prayed before his death for those who stoned him. Let us submit all our needs and wants in to God. God knows what is best for us and with that hope let us enter the New Year.

When we say goodbye to 2014, the fearful thoughts of the mass murder in Peshawar, Pakistan, is haunting us.

Terrorists usually avoid killing of children, but in Peshawar, there was no such inhibition. They killed brutally 132 children and their teachers without any mercy. The question that remains with us is this: what kind of mistakes did these children did for to be brutally murdered by the terrorists? It is not because they did anything wrong, but it seems that it is a retaliation against someone else whom these terrorists think as their enemies. In 1969, a similar incident happened in Malaysia where a group of people killed school children returning to their homes in a school bus. All these incidents remind us of the Psalms which says: when man loses his wisdom he falls to the level of wild animals. What is the solution? There should be a transformation in the minds of those who lost their wisdom in order to become wise and humane. When Christ is born in our hearts, there takes place a transformation of our hearts. We have celebrated the birth of Jesus Christ who prayed to the Father to forgive those who assaulted him both physically and mentally.

When our life is filled with fear, the birth of Jesus Christ

Feb. 2015 We are waiting for the Maramon Convention, which enables us to rethink about the possibilities of the church. Let us glorify our Lord who led us throughout past. God asked in the beginning of creation ʻwhere is your brother? Questions such as “where are you and where is your brother?” are still relevant in our lives. The question ʻwhere are you?ʼ reminds us about where we are now; it points out to the direction where we need to be in the future. What is our relationship with God? The question ʻwhere is your brother?ʼ reminds us that we are the keepers of our brethren. Individuals, families, and countries need to move into a fellowship of brotherhood.

When countries are going through several conflicts, this question has a greater relevance. Poly Carpus, a disciple of Apostle John, who refused to renounce his faith is still able to provide us the much needed power in our faith life. He faced the end with a smile and became a martyr for Christ. The witnessing of Stephanos, the first martyr of the earlier church, is also same. Those who are receiving the call to be witnesses of Christ must

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realize that they are taking the responsibility to become martyrs for Christ.

Metropolitan thanked God for allowing him to complete 57 years in the ordained ministry of which 40 years as the Episcopa. He wrote, “When looking back with thankful heart, I recollect the providence with which our Lord has carried me all these years enabling to serve Him.” When we attend the Maramon convention this year, the messages should be able to provide us with clear direction both in our family and church life. This year we have eminent leaders to give us the messages including Rev. Dr. Sam Kamalesan. A commission has been established to find out the areas where both Malankara Mar Thoma Church and Malankara Jacobite Church can work together, The thought for this month is based on the healing ministry of Jesus. We begin the Great Lent on Feb 15th, and it should enable us to transform our lives in to a new phase. We see this healing ministry during the public ministry of Jesus Christ. Encounters like curing the man with leprosy and healing the daughter of the Centurion are all examples of Jesusʼ healing ministry. We need to recognize the humility of the Centurion when he approached Jesus with a request to cure his daughter.

The true witnessing is when others witness about us, and this is was true of the centurion. Jesus has accepted his faith declaration when he said: “I have never seen such a faith in Israel.” Do we have this kind of faith in our lives? We need to examine our faith during this Lent.

The Nazareth manifesto (Luke 4:16-20) was selected verses from Isaiah 61. May our Lord help us to be partakers of this love of God shown through Jesus Christ.

March 2015 The days of Maramon convention had the effect of transforming and renewing lives of thousands of believers. The visit of the Antiochean Patriarch was a blessing for both churches and hope that we will be able to initiate programs and projects together without sacrificing our basic faith, practices and belief. 2015 is a historic year since it was in 1665 that the representative of Antiochean Patriarch came to Kerala for transferring apostolic succession and authority by ʻlaying on of handsʼ upon the Metropolitan, Mar Thoma 1st. This year we have completed 350 years after that glorious blessing.

Metropolitan reflected upon his own faith journey; he has completed 40 years as Episcopa of the church on 8th February, which included 7 years as Metropolitan of the church. In June this year, he will be completing 60 years

of his commitment for the ordained ministry of the church. Our Lord is faithful who has called me and He is providing me with all the strength to continue the faith journey of the church. I still remember a letter of appreciation written by late Yuhannon Mar Thoma addressing me as ʻIraneus” in which he has written like this – ʻbe ready to enter into circumstances which may give mental torture and agony. In all circumstances move forward by recognizing that God is always good.ʼ It is heartbreaking to hear that Islamic terrorists killed Christians in Egypt. All religions faith creed is love, but those who kill others in the name of religion are a disgrace to their religions. Both political and religious leaders as well as the consciousness of the society must be very vigilant against these types of atrocities.

We are entering into the Great Lent. We are thinking during these days about the faith which helps us to lead our lives for the mission of God. The bringing of a paralyzed person on a bed showed the faith affirmation of the people who brought this man to Jesus under trying circumstances. They were declaring their deep concern for the paralyzed person. The number of people, who think that to become more religious is by killing others, is increasing. But it is not killing another but caring for another one is the real faith, and real religion. We are celebrating the World Day of Prayer in March. It is only through prayer that we can be closer to God. Our generations are not seeking the blessing by prayer, and they are after worldly things. We are also thinking about the healing of women – who was bent for 18 years, on the Sabbath Day, which is criticized by the religious leaders of that time. We are also thinking the healing of the blind person by Jesus during the Lent We need to follow the path of the Cross so that we can be healed.

On 40th day of the Lent, we are thinking about the challenges faced by Jesus before the devil. But Jesus was able to overcome these challenges with strength from the Word of God. The way of the Cross is the right way to redeem the human race. We also need to travel through this path. We end up the Lenten thoughts with the journey of Jesus on the donkey. The two areas of Jesusʼ servant ministry are of importance: Jesus washing of the feet of the disciples, and blessing of the bread and wine to give to His disciples. These incidents should have a profound impact and on our individual, family and social life. We need to be ready to offer ourselves to be taken by God and broken by this world and collected and distributed by God. This is the way of the Cross. Let our prayers and meditations during the Lent lead us to the way of Cross and to the reality of the resurrection of Jesus the Christ.

Compiled by Lal Varghese, Esq., Dallas (Summary of the pastoral letters appeared in ʻSabha Tharakaʼʼ Jan. – Mar. 2015 issues and not a word by word translation)

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remembrance is also focused particularly on the Armenian people who a century ago were driven to their death and into exile because they were Christians.

MESSAGE FROM ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY The Archbishop of Canterbury's Ecumenical Easter Letter

"Rejoice, O Mother Church! Exult in glory! The risen Savior, our Lord of life, shines upon you! Let all God's people sing and shout for joy!"

These words of triumph are sung out across churches as Easter dawns. For centuries such sounds of joy at the Easter festival have echoed and continue to echo around the globe in a multitude of different tongues and cultural contexts, making a deep impact on the lives of Christians and Churches. With the confession of Jesus having conquered death we proclaim that we have been raised to new life in him.

In the 15th chapter of the First Letter to the Corinthian Christians St Paul couples the resurrection of Christ with confidence in the resurrection of Christ's people. The Apostle clearly states that the resurrection of Christ is a beginning, and that the hope of our own resurrection can only be in Christ. He argues; if the dead are not raised, then Christ is not raised; and if Christ has not been raised, then his proclamation is empty and our faith is in vain. Having laid out all the arguments that would dispose of the Christian claim to the risen Christ, he continues: 'But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. ' This is the faith that is also proclaimed in the Byzantine opening to the Easter Liturgy and which has been the confession of Christians down the ages.

The resurrection of Christ is the great hope, not only for each of us individually, but also for today's troubled world - a world in which violence and violation of human rights describe the day to day context of people in many parts; a world in which moral and spiritual values often seem hopelessly inadequate against the forces of selfseeking gain in every sphere of life. It is also a world in which our brother and sister Christians are still a beleaguered and even persecuted community in many places, as they have been at different times and places in history. We continue to remember the suffering Christians in the Middle East. This year our

It is into this world that the message of the Church at Easter remains constant over the centuries, proclaiming in the midst of hopelessness the hope of Christ, triumphant beyond death and the powers of evil; living and life giving amongst us.

In this resurrection faith we follow the saints and martyrs throughout the ages who have proclaimed the Risen Christ as their Lord and Savior, who believe that in Christ there is abundant life and that death and suffering will not have the final say. The Easter faith strengthens us with the hope in life, here and now and in the world to come. This hope is not an illusion, which turns out to be empty; rather, it is the tested cantus firmus over the ages for all Christians. Beyond human imagination, the power of the resurrection overcomes disparate, conflict-laden and destructive forces. We are called to proclaim God's Good News in confidence and obedience to Christ to bring healing and reconciliation.

Christ's resurrection, therefore, also compels us to ever closer bonds of Christian fellowship with one another the saints in the here and now - to seek greater unity and work together with Christ, as his Body, in the newness of life already begun by him.

It is in this spirit that I greet you with this letter. I will continue to pray that the hope and joy of the resurrected Christ will deeply move our hearts and souls, that it will heal relationships between individuals, communities and nations, and that it will banish fear, overcome suffering, broker peace and bring reconciliation.

I close with the Song of Zechariah (Luke 1:78): "By the tender mercy of our God, the dawn from on high will break upon us, to give light to those that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, and to guide our feet into the way of peace."

I embrace you with brotherly love in the Risen Christ.

The Most Reverend and Right Honorable Justin Welby Archbishop of Canterbury Easter 2015Lambeth Palace, London SE1 7JU

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Dr. Stanley Jones: Recollection of a Granddaughter Dr. Anne Mathews-Younes, USA (Part-1 of Four Part Series) Half a century ago or more now, four world figures were spoken of in almost the same breath.

All were able persons; all were peacemakers; all highly esteemed; all were deeply and devotedly religious.

All have been severely criticized by revisionist historians but all have risen above this ungenerous treatment – almost by the power of the cross.

One was a German; one, Japanese; one an Indian; one an American. Three of them were Christian; one a Hindu, though deeply influenced by Christianity. They were Albert Schweitzer, Toyohiko Kagawa; Mahatma Gandhi and E. Stanley Jones. The following is a short recollection of E. Stanley Jones, my grandfather.

Growing up in one’s family, I think that one tends to take so many things for granted. There is often little understanding of why the adult members, particularly, have arrived at certain stances or beliefs. So it was with me and my grandfather E. Stanley Jones. He was just my grandfather who traveled a lot!

But now it is fascinating and rewarding to see and understand him as a real person and realize just what an exceptional person he was. Though in his day, my grandfather was known all over the world, it was India that gave him the ultimate challenge and India was the anvil on which he tempered and solidified his faith, but let me first tell you a bit about his early years and how he arrived at what was to be his life’s work as an evangelist for Jesus Christ.

He was born in 1884, in Clarksville, Maryland, a rural community not far from Baltimore. He was one of four children. By his own acknowledgment, his background was ordinary in appearance, education, gifts, all quite ordinary. His autobiography tells us that as a teenager, he ran with a gang –obviously his parents did not approve, and maybe his “gang” was more benign than the ones in our day. However, despite his outer rebelliousness, my grandfather was receptive; when a visiting evangelist spoke on what Christ meant to him. It was a night this young rebel (my grandfather) along with his friends had planned to disrupt the service.

That disruption did not happen and to the astonishment and annoyance of his young friends, my grandfather responded to the evangelist’s call; something extraordinary occurred that evening and a dramatic “first” conversion changed his life.

Jones spoke of two conversions. The first was what he called his “horizontal” change – on the outside only. The second, the authentic one – the vertical one came two years later (1901). He was then radically and enduringly changed on the inside too. He never got over this transformation; never ceased to try to grasp the totality of its meaning; never tired of commending the experience and Savior to others. Conversion became the main theme of his life and ministry. It gave him a sense of reconciliation to God, an at home-ness with himself and others, a new direction, a new personhood, a sense of grace and wholeness. E Stanley Jones had planned to be a lawyer but instead entered the ministry. Once he assumed the

responsibilities of faithful discipleship he never turned back. He plowed a straight furrow to Asbury College, to evangelism, to missionary service in India, and to world renown as a witness to Jesus Christ.

He went to India in 1907 as a missionary and he was just 23 years old. It is amazing to learn how casually mission boards treated their new missionaries in those days. No orientation was given, either for the country, its customs or climate or even how to get around. He was given a one way ship passage from New York City to Bombay – and the voyage took six weeks.

While he was given the name of his ultimate destination, (Lucknow), getting there was up to him. Stanley Jones tells the story of that 20-hour train journey to his final destination, Lucknow – in the northern part of the country. He found himself in a compartment with a well-educated, English speaking Muslim gentleman. With full of enthusiasm for his missionary work, he read this gentleman the Sermon on the Mount, expecting the man to be overwhelmed and immediately converted. Instead the man said, we have the same thing in our Sacred Book. This was the first time my grandfather had come up against the very familiar philosophy “all religions are the same -- only the paths are different.” It is an attitude so widely held by many in the non-Christian world. It shook him for he wasn’t prepared to deal with such attitudes. But it also made him face squarely, at a very early point in his missionary career, the question of whether he was going to argue or debate with non-Christians and try to prove them wrong and Christianity right or use some other way. He was led to consider another way. I think that this was a crucial decision, which contributed to his great effectiveness.

His first church was a British, American, Anglo Indian church in Lucknow and he was very successful in adding members to the church, but felt a sense of constriction for the great masses of India were beyond his reach. Additionally, he felt uneasiness and alarm with what was happening in the Christian convert community. Too often in changing their faith, the new converts were also encouraged to take with their new faith a new foreign culture and essentially reject their identification with their Indian culture. Since Indian culture and religion are very closely identified, this is understandable. Also many converts were fleeing the insecurity of their outcaste social status.

Westernization offered the open door for a slightly better life. It was a time when British India was struggling with independence movement and nationalism and so some Indian Christians were becoming aliens in their own country because of their conversion to Christianity. Urging Indian Christians to remain truly indigenous was, I feel, one of my grandfather’s important contributions to Christian missions; my mother tells me about the vehemence of his condemnation for that position. Very early in his career, E. STANLEY JONES urged Indian Christians to remain within their culture for he was convinced that Christianity could be truly indigenous in India and for that matter anywhere in the world – I believe that this conviction was an important contribution to both mission work and evangelism. As an American in India, it was impossible for my grandfather to speak against British imperialism. However, the non-Christian Indians

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instinctively knew where his sympathies lay. They considered him a brother rather an alien.

After he married my grandmother, Mabel Lossing Jones (1911), an educational missionary, they went to Sitapur; a city of about 40,000, which became the center of their service for the next 40 years, here the Joneses became district missionaries in charge of education, evangelism, finance, disaster relief, minor medical service and some editorship thrown in. At first he worked almost exclusively with the outcastes, the ‘Harijans’ as Gandhiji called them. He had great respect for these people’s cleverness and ingenuity, and his desire to convert them to higher purposes grew accordingly. Later some of the best Indian-Christian preachers came out of this caste.

It was in Sitapur where he first came into real contact with educated non-Christians. A casual remark by a Hindu judge made him ponder his whole approach to the non-Christian world. Always a good athlete, he played tennis with high-caster doctors, lawyers, judges, and administrators. It was after a game of tennis that a Hindu judge asked why he seemed only interested in the outcastes of India and not the high castes or educated classes. Missionaries had felt that only the outcastes’ door was open, and my grandfather said as much. My grandfather responded that he thought that they would not be interested. The Judge said, “This is a mistake. We do want you, if you come in the right way.” This comment “provided you come in the right way” really changed my grandfather’s focus because he said, “ I began to see where my life-work lay.” I was being called to give my life to be an evangelist – for he had to decide what was really essential and what was non-essential in the system which had grown up about Jesus.

He added, “I had to struggle with my own mental attitudes. I had been brought up as a theological conservative with a neatly packaged and tied up theological system, my mind was not free to follow the Truth wherever it led me. He studied the philosophical thoughts of the great religions, particularly Hinduism. He wrote: “When I first went to India I was trying to hold a very long line, a line that stretched from Genesis to Revelation–on to the Western Civilization and to the Western Christian Church and even the Hebrew Bible. I found myself bobbing up and down that line fighting behind Moses and David and Jesus and Paul and the Western Civilization. There was no well-defined issue. I had the ill-defined but instinctive feeling that the heart of the matter was being left out. Then I saw that I could, and should, shorten my line, that I could take my stand at Christ and before that nonChristian world refuse to know anything about Jesus Christ. I saw that the gospel lies in the person of Jesus, that he himself is the Good News that my one task was to live and to present him.

My task was simplified.” For Jones it was not the superiority of Christianity but the all-sufficiency of Christ that was the foundation of Christian mission.

Thus began his great adventure throughout India. He was speaking constantly to ever growing audiences of educated non-Christians. He presented Christ as a disentangled Christ, apart from the trappings of Christianity, apart from the Western Civilization.

Christ was presented as a universal Christ, belonging to all cultures and races and the answer to all human need. His audience was interested in this Christ. His first book, Christ of the Indian Road, published in 1925, made this point clear.

My grandfather had a unique and three fold approach for presenting Jesus.

First, he held his lectures (not sermons) in public halls, a neutral ground for non- Christians. They were in English for all educated Indians spoke English. Prominent nonChristians were invited to preside. After the lecture, the next two hours were reserved for questions from the audience. With 50-200 lawyers in each meeting, the questions were always penetrating. I remember when I traveled with him and heard him speak in very crowded halls – people were hanging at the windows to hear him. And when he finished speaking, then the questions came and like my mother before me, (for she also traveled with her father) I was appalled at the questions and was certain that he could not answer them, they were hard questions. I remember slipping lower and lower in my seat, waiting for the humiliation. But to my real surprise (and relief) not only did he answer them, but answered them well and never in a provocative, testy or argumentative way. He was well able to take care of himself and did not need me worrying about him.

A more intimate approach to presenting Jesus to the nonChristian world was his Round Table Conferences; - Jones felt strongly the he had no right to teach others if he was not learning from them. He wrote: “I came to India with everything to teach and nothing to learn. I now learn as well, and I am a better man for having come into contact with the gentle heart of the East.”

The Roundtable meetings were a more intimate approach – than the public lectures. Leading representatives of different faiths, including agnostics and atheists (30-40 people) would be invited to share what their faith or lack of faith meant to them in experience. He would ask, “Tell us what you have found through your faith – What does it do for you in your everyday life?” He wrote: “In looking back at the Round Table approach, I see now how daring and decisive this approach was: Here we were putting our cards on the table and asking the nonChristian world to do the same. Suppose our ‘hands” with which we were playing the game of life should turn out to be inadequate; and suppose other ways of life should prove more adequate. This was a showdown, and the stakes were high. In every situation the trump card was Jesus Christ. He made the difference. The people who followed him might be spotty and inadequate, but they had hold of the spotless and adequate or better Christ had hold of them!”

Dr. Anne Mathews-Younes is currently a psychologist working for U. S government. She is the granddaughter of Dr. Stanley Jones. Dr. MathewsYounes was initially trained as an occupational therapist.

She later received her doctorate in Counselling and Consulting Psychology from Harvard University and is a licensed psychologist.

Dr. Mathews-Younes has also completed a Master’s Degree in Theological Studies at Wesley Theological Seminary in Washington, D.C., as well as a Doctoral Degree in Ministry from that same seminary. Both of her theology degree theses focused on the life, mission and theology of her late grandfather E. Stanley Jones with whom she travelled extensively through India and Africa. Dr. Mathews-Younes is the President of the E. Stanley Jones Foundation (www.estanleyjonesfoundation.com) and has served as the Vice President of the United Christian Ashram Board, a spiritual retreat organization founded by E. Stanley Jones. Her book, Living Upon The Way: Selected Sermons of E. Stanley Jones on Surrender was published in 2008. Anne can be reached at amathews1@verizon.net

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Pearls of Wisdom from Down the Ages-7 [A reading from the Commentary on the Gospel of St. John by St. Cyril of Alexandria. Cyril of Alexandria (c. 376 – 444) was the Patriarch of Alexandria from 412 to 444. Cyril wrote extensively and was a leading protagonist in the Christological controversies of the later 4th and 5th centuries. He was a central figure in the First Council of Ephesus in 431, which led to the deposition of Nestorius as Patriarch of Constantinople. Cyril is counted among the Church Fathers and the Doctors of the Church.]

The mystery of Christ is revealed to us I will raise up a prophet for them like yourself, one of their own race. I will put my words in his mouth, and he will speak to them as I command him. Anyone who will not listen to the words the prophet speaks in my name, I will punish.

Here, in the Book of Deuteronomy, which is a kind of a review and the summary of the Mosaic books, the mystery of Christ is gain revealed to us by means of a subtle allegory, for we see in Moses the likeness of Christ. For the Lord your God, said Moses, will raise up you a prophet of your own race, like myself.

Between God and the people those days Moses was the appointed mediator; it was his task to help their infirmity by communicating to them the divine decrees. This again is only a symbol, but if we interpret it in terms of reality which if foreshadows, it will teach us that Christ is the true mediator between God and man. For our sake, Christ was born of a woman, and he communicated to his disciples with a human voice the Father’s will, which none but he knew or could declare; for in his nature as a Son of the Father and as Wisdom he knows all things, even the depths of God. The divine, the inexplicable glory of the Supreme Being was beyond the power of moral eyes to behold, pure and unveiled, for it is written, No man can see my face and live. Therefore, the only- begotten Word of God had to share in your weakness, an in accordance with the mysterious design of divine providence, to be clothed in a human body, for only in this way could he make known to us the divine will, the will of God the Father. As he himself said, I make known to you all that I have heard from the Father, and, I have not spoken on my own authority; the Father who sent me has told me what to say and how to speak.

So it is that Moses can be considered as a type of Christ, for by faithfully communicating the divine decrees to the people of Israel, he fulfilled the office of a mediator. The mediation of Moses, however, was that of a mere servant, whereas the mediation of Christ is not only free but also deeply mysterious, for since Christ is by nature both divine and human, he is intimate contact with those whom he reconciles. He is, so to speak, the bridge that restores communication between the human race and God the Father. Towards him the whole teaching of the law is oriented, for as scripture says, Christ is the fulfillment of the law and the prophets. *Collected by Dr. Zac Varghese from ‘A Word in Season’ edited

by H. Ashworth, 1974; The Talbot Press, Dublin, page 195-196

First Woman Bishop Ordained in the Church of England Archbishop of York, John Sentamu, presided over the ordination and consecration of Revd Libby Lane, 48, as Bishop of Stockport in York Minster on Monday, 26th January 2015. She is the first woman bishop in the Church of England. The debate over whether to ordain women as bishops has long proved divisive.

More than 100 bishops travelled to York for the service. Although Bishop Lane is the Church of England’s first woman bishop, within the global Anglican Communion there are 30 female bishops, most notably the Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church in the US, Dr. Katharine Jefferts Schori.

Brutal Murder of Coptic Christians in Libya It is with deep feelings of sorrow and pain that we received the brutal murder of Coptic Christians in Libya at the hands of Daesh (IS). While every life is sacred and every death tragic, the particular brutality demonstrated in this instance and others like it shows not only a disregard for life but also a gross misunderstanding of its sanctity and equal value in every person. Our prayers are particularly with the families of these young Coptic men, who were fathers, brothers, sons and friends of many within their tight-knit rural communities, in which their absence will cause significant loss and sorrow. Their families are not only deprived of breadwinners who had travelled to Libya to support them, but of the joy that they bring when they return.

While it may seem illogical or incomprehensible, we also pray for those who have carried out these horrific crimes, that the value of God's creation and human life may become more evident to them, and in this realization, that the wider effects of pain brought by this and other acts of brutality may be realized and avoided. We pray for an end to the dehumanization of captives who become mere commodities to be bartered, traded and negotiated with. In the midst of this sorrow however, we must continue to dig deeper for the joy that comes from an understanding that this life is but a "vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away" (James 4:14), and that true glory and joy are found in an eternal life prepared for all those who live in and for love and peace. It is only through this understanding that we can continue to live according to the words of 1 Peter 3:15 as demonstrated in the life and witness of the Coptic Church and her children over centuries, "...always be ready to give a defense to everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you..." More can be found at web site: www.Youtube.com/CopticMediaUK

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One God and One Creation (Biblical and theological perspectives)

Rev. Dr. M. J. Joseph, Kottayam Introduction “O Creator God, how great thou art” The very talk about God is a talk about God’s creation and His gift of life. In ‘God-talk’, we search for the reverence of life and interrelatedness between humans and other living beings.

As appreciation leads to adoration, we look for the buckle that binds all human beings with the flora and fauna on this planet.

This is in tune with the compassion of the Lord (cf.Sib.18:13) .We read in the Bhagavad Gita that the Supreme (or the Almighty) is pleased with a gift from nature, be it a flower or a fruit. “Whomsoever shall offer Me a leaf, a flower, a fruit, water, in the spirit of devotion and with purity of mind, that offering I accept”(IX, vs.26) The prayer is a hymn of praise and gratitude to the one God of creation: leaf is a symbol of life and growth; flower is the fulfillment of becoming; fruit represents the ultimate goal of being, and water is that which refreshes all living beings on this planet. In a bio-centric attitude to life, there is always praise and thanksgiving from all living beings. (Cf. Ps.150:6). The cultural slogans of India such as vasudaivakudumbakam (the whole world is one family) and Loka smastha sukino bhavantu (Let the whole world be happy and prosperous) find a fitting place in the affirmation of one Creator God. A Sanskrit prayer dated 7 C. quoted below affirms an ecocentric attitude to one human life in terms of mutual appreciation, recognition and adoration: To quote: “O Earth, my mother, Air(wind) my father fire(Light) my friend, Water my kinsman, Sapce my brother, here do I bow before you with folded hands”(From the Vairagyashtaka of Bharatrahari). Thus the panchaboothas, the symbols of life, which represent the mystery of creation, affirm the abiding presence of the invisible God around. The wonder of creation as exclaimed by the Psalmist in 104:24, “O Lord, how manifold are thy works; in wisdom hast thou made them all” is a golden thread that runs through all the religious Scriptures of the world. th

Let me illustrate the above point with excerpts from a song of Jim Reeves: “We thank Thee each morning for a new born day, We thank Thee for the sunshine and the air that we breathe;…We thank Thee for the river that runs all day;…We thank Thee for the flower that blooms, birds that sing; fish that swim;…We thank Thee for the pastures where the cattle may mow;…We thank thee for the love so pure and free, O Lord”. The lessons that we learn from the order of creation is that life is meant for giving and that nature is the best gift of God to all across any religious or cultural divide .So Jesus said “for he(the heavenly Father)makes his Sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rains on the just and the unjust”(St.Matt.5:45) The Psalmist adds a note of exclamation, as “the heavens are telling of the glory of God; and the firmament proclaims his handiwork(19:1).The above words of wonder could be summed up in the famous hymn, “ All things bright and beautiful; All creatures great and small; All things wise and wonderful; The Lord God made them all”.

The veil of nature is rendered transparent and helps us to breathe afresh in a world choked by the noxious gases of greed, lust and profit making. Ecology is a science of biology, which speaks of “the ways in which living things interact with each other”. As a branch of biological science, it deals with the study of organisms in their environments, social behavior, conservation and adaptability. In our understanding of flora and fauna, there are quite a few unraveled mysteries. We could count the number of seeds in an apple. But none is able to say with absolute certainty the number of apples could one harvest from a sampling of the seed. So also God’s raised bud. None is able to open the petals of a rose bud by hand without crushing its great is the unraveled mystery of creation. In the book of Job 38-41 one may find texts which throw a fled of light on the Urbis of man.

The Bible speaks of a relationship among the created order of the Universe in terms of an oikos concept: Human above nature, human in nature, and human with nature. Man and nature could be conceived in terms of a functional relationship, which could be termed as interrelatedness, interdependent, and independent. The Web of life is woven with invisible threads of life. “We are all birds of the same nest”. As ecology is an art, we need to develop esthetics for adoration and appreciation.

The words of the French Philosopher Paul Caudal are worth recalling when he replied to someone who said that “everything in the world is illusion”. The French poet said, “No” “everything is allusion.”

Ecology thus becomes a platform for the affirmation of life across religious or ethnic divide. In our affirmation of One God and One human family, nature paves the basic thread of life. The research of the Indian scientist Sir Jagadish Chandra Bose in the 90’s have proved without a ray of doubt that the plants are also sensitive to heat, cold, light, noise and other external stimuli. His book, Response in the Living and Non-Living (1902) confirms this. Kofi Annan, former general secretary of United Nations has rightly remarked: “All of us have to share the earth’s fragile ecosystems and precious resources and each of us has a role to play in preserving them. If we are to go on living together on this earth, we must all be responsible for it. Let us be good stewards of the earth we inherited”. May I add also the word, “parents” to the word “stewards”?

God-man-nature relationship The emergence of the “ecological man is the great new fact of this century”. As man is “a rational animal” (Aristotle) created in the image of God (as read in the book of Genesis), it is quite legitimate to examine the nature of his relationship with other living beings on this planet. The relationship is to be explored in the philosophical category propounded by the German philosopher, Immanuel Kant, “the moral man within and the starry heavens above”. They are two sides of the same coin. It is widely held that the greatest sin of humankind today is that it has transgressed the sacramentality of creation and thereby lost the sense of interdependence. Therefore, we need to raise questions for correction related to an eco-vision for human

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survival. This is possible if we entertain a new vision of One God and One Human family on earth. In this respect, we need to talk about ecosophy. “Ecosophy implies a new world encountered not as “it” but as “thou” (Thomas Manickam). One may have to drive a note of dissent to the philosophy of Martin Buber when he speaks of I-IT and I-Thou relationships in the order of creation. If we opt for one existence in this planet, the question of I-It relationship does not arise as ecosophy is a “passionate concern for the well-being of all beings” (cf.Gita.12:4), the ecological man will have to see his role as one of being a parent of creation. A steward is not the owner.

The concept of an ecological universe where every created entity has an intrinsic value may serve God’s purpose of creation. God is concerned about the falling of “even a sparrow” (Matt.10: 29). Christian ethics should be one of conservation ethics and the connectivity is to be celebrated as we all belong to “the web of life.” God’s question to Cain, “where is your brother” is a question of human connectivity conceived in terms of ecological values such as conservation, not consumerism; need not greed; enabling power not dominating power; integrity of creation not exploitation. These values are for a genuine spirituality. The biblical and theological challenge is to build structures for maintaining the ethics of solidarity (K.C. Abraham). In Eco-dharma, God and Creation are integrally related. So also man (Adam) and earth (Adamah).

The ecological crisis today, particularly climate change, is due to human intervention in the order of creation in an irresponsible way. This is due to human failure to exercise a caring attitude to all under his stewardship. For a common better tomorrow, we need to bear in mind that in an ecological community, there is no distinction between the haves and the have notes. As ecology is concerned with the harmony and integrity of one cosmic home, the cosmothenadric unity of reality (S. Painadath) is to be affirmed. “Dust thou art, to dust thou shall return” is an age-old truth and is addressed to one human family. The life style of the industrialized nations is a violation of human rights. We need to adopt a pattern of consumption, production and distribution that respect and safeguard Earth’s regenerative capacities. This is the message of giving rest to the earth in the Jobel year( Lev.25 23-24).The challenge is to simplify our lives and to integrate our knowledge with love and compassion. In order to improve the quality of life on this planet, we need to strive for a culture of peace and cooperation. The infinite possibilities of a world governed by love and justice have to be captured by humankind, if it is to survive. As co-workers with God, the humans are accountable before the Creator/ the Divine for what has been entrusted to them through divine wisdom... The religious resources of the peoples of God will have to be polled together and treasured for a vision of development that can be sustained in the long run environmentally and ecologically. The primary concern for us should be that the world should not go back to its original state of null and void.

Biblical vision for a Green-Theology In the first verse of the book of Genesis, we read “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth”. God is able to create things “out of nothing” and man, “a little lesser than God (Ps.8:5)” is endowed with the wisdom to assemble or to make things out of what is already there. If this proposition is maintained, we are bold to affirm that the divine design of all

things falls within the oikonomia of the universe (Jer.10:12).

Gen.1:27, “being created in the image of God” is a biblical and theological affirmation that the human beings are expected to reveal the attributes of the divine in relational categories .The divine attitude to creation is well stated in Gen.1:31 where we read “ God saw that it was good:’. This is because God will not betray himself as “by wisdom the Lord founded the earth, by understanding he established the heavens, by the knowledge the deeps broke forth, and the clouds drop down the dew (Proverbs 3:19-20).

In the order of creation, God manifests his ultimate will for all living beings. After the creation of the human beings, God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over…. every living thing …” (Gen.1:28).In Gen.2:15 we read, the Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden “to till it and keep it”. The three fold responsibility, “to till, to subdue and to guard” goes hand in hand and a caring attitude to nature alone will free the nature from its groaning. The reference to the brooding of the Spirit of God in the creation story speaks of the immanent presence of God in the universe.(cf. The book of Wisdom 1:7;7:24).The creation story of Genesis makes it abundantly clear that there should be harmony in God- man and nature relationship .

In the New Testament, the Christ of creation is conceived as the Christ of redemption and reconciliation (cf GK. propositions en, dia and eis in Pauline theology). Reason and faith will have to play their complementary roles in opening the mind to the One Mystery who is the creator and sustainer of the Universe.

In the ecological Psalm of 104, particularly verse 24-30, we get a glimpse of God’s love and care manifested in the universe.”…O Lord, how manifold is thy works. In wisdom hast thou made them all…?” (V. 24). (cf.Ps.24:1-2) According to the Psalms, God is not immanent in creation, but he is imminent in a personal way with humankind” (N. H. Snaith). There is a theological unity between the ecological awareness of reality and the personal realization of the reality. “Nature by itself does not reveal God; it only serves as a means of revelation”.

“Nature is a constant reminder of the reality of God to those who have the eyes of faith” (KV Mathew). In the Psalms we do not find any natural law as independent from God. The humans are asked to learn from nature (Pro.6:6-11).As nature is God’s peculiar language (Robinson), creation and ethics should go together. According to Ps.147: 16ff, nature is the creative word of God that is at work in the ongoing process of growth and change in nature. This gives “order and regularity in the ecosystem”. It is God’s faithfulness and love that sustains the world (Ps.139). A sacramental approach to nature is the key to the poetic insights of the Psalmist. The humans and other living beings come together as partners in praising God, the creator.

In a theology of the Sacra mentality of Creation, creation carries the footprints of Christ. Any disrespect to creation leads to the defacement of the image of Christ. Therefore, the pollution of any kind is to be considered as sin against the Creator and Christ.

Nature is God’s media of communication In Romans 1:20, St. Paul writes, “Ever since the creation of the world, his (God’s) invisible nature, namely his eternal power and deity, has been clearly perceived in the things that have

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been made.” A search for the unity of all creation will ultimately lead us to a vision of God’s invisible nature in creation. In a larger view of religion (i.e. the concept of panentheism-God is involved in creation, but not identified with the cosmos), we find a combination of the best of science and the best insights of religion” (Mathai Zachariah) what we need today is an ecological model of God. This vision alone will give us the required spirituality for human survival. As nature is an open book for all to read, man should celebrate diversity in the very texture of creation. To discover, to appreciate and to promote the rich diversity in the order of creation takes us to the divine.

The book of Job chapter 12 verses7 and 8 make it clear that the flora and fauna carry a message for the wellbeing of the humans (cf. Proverbs 6:6-9).

As plurality is integral to reality, there is always a challenge before us to live with the knowledge of unity in diversity. The great theological task before us today is to affirm the unity of purpose in God’s order of creation. The riddle of the philosophical question of the “one and the many” can only be answered through Ecology. The ecological model of God leads us to a larger view of religion and religious life .The words of Cerdric Wright are worth quoting: “A tree is a symbol of nonviolence. From its mute form there flows poise in silence, a lovely sound of motion in response to wind…Trees do not scream for attention. A tree has no pretense A tree retains its deep serenity.” It is widely maintained that without an earth ethics, the possibility of creating world community and peace is faint (See Larry Rasmussen’s book Earth Community, Earth Ethics, WCC 1966).” It is a naked truth that the most oppressed are most intimately connected with nature. For example dalits are related to the land; tribals to the forests and fisher folks to the sea. The indigenous community regards violence against nature as a matter of violations of human rights. New social conflicts arise out of the frustrations of “the wretched of the earth”. The Creation story as depicted in the book of Genesis makes it clear that land, water and people belong one cluster of human existence.

Kingdom of God-Call to live with ecological sensitivity The teaching of Jesus gives us a blue print of vasudaivakudumbakam with concern for all .In the parable of the Mustard Seed (St.Mark.4:30-32), there is a divine call to care for the least and to value the inherent potential of all that is good and noble. To live in the midst of flora and fauna with an ecological sensitivity is indeed the celebration of life. For Jesus, all that is seen and unseen unfold the face of true humanity in its pristine form. The reference to the Sun and the rain (Matt.5:45).;the scorching heat and the south wind(Lk.12:55);the clouds and the showers(Lk.12:54);the earth and the sky(Lk.12:56);the flashing of light;(Matt.24:27);the rock and the sand (Matt.7:26); the seeds and the grains(Matt.4:28)the lilies and the grass(Matt.6:28-30); the thorns and the thistles(Matt.7:16); the figs and the grapes(Matt.7:16); the moth and the rust (Matt.6:19-20); the sparrows and the eagles(Matt.10:29); the dogs(Lk.16:21) the fish and the serpent as well as the scorpions(Lk.11:11); the sheep and the goats(Matt.25:32). etc are imageries taken by Jesus to illustrate God’s care of the universe. The eco paradigms in his teachings of the Kingdom make space for all in the household of God. The scientific and economic assumption of development is a

myth unless we take into account the ecological dimension of relationships, which includes the whole cosmos. Therefore it is to be affirmed that “defending the earth is not a project, defending the earth is a way of life” for our corporate survival.

The concerns of the WCC today are geared to a theological assumption that the world that we seek should be ecologically sustainable and socially just. This is indeed the challenge of the Lord’s Prayer. The “kingdom on earth” is conceived as the heaven on earth! The mandate of the 10 Assembly of the WCC at Busan to invite all to join a pilgrimage towards justice and peace is indeed a call to live with eco-centric attitude to life.

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The groaning of creation A strained relationship in the order of creation is a matter of violence experienced by the living beings on this planet due to human activity (see Is.24:4). “Globalization with its financial markets as its engine” (Martin Robra) has contributed to environmental degradation in many ways and has in fact advocated for a monoculture, which is totally against the integrity of creation. The sacred writings of Christianity, Hinduism, and Islam speak of violence meted out due to greed for wealth, power, glory and pleasure. The groaning of creation is only symptoms such as floods, cyclones, earthquakes, droughts, pollution, global warming etc. The flora and fauna are in birth pangs. They are groaning because of chemical weapons, atomic power plants, deforestation, industrial pollution etc. The groaning is meant to create right relationship in God’s order of creation and to bring about soukya (well –being).In Romans chapter 8:19ff. St. Paul speaks of the three-fold groaning: the whole creation groans (19-22); the Christian groans (2325); and the Spirit groans 26-27).The groaning of creation is for its freedom from the shackles of mortality and to share the liberty/splendor of the children of God. This is described in a poetic language. The Holy Spirit is the One Spirit of God, which is active everywhere, initiates and supports the search of creation and humanity for the realization of harmony, justice, freedom and love. This is meant to create the household of God on earth. Reason and faith have to play their complementary roles in opening the mind to the One Mystery who is the creator and sustainer of the universe. Let us live by the so-called 11th commandment, “Thou shall not invite nature’s fury by pricking and punching the earth.”

Editorʼs Notre: Rev. Dr. M.J. Joseph, M.Th., D. Th, is the former Director of the Ecumenical Christian Centre, Bangalore. He has also served as Professor and Principal, Mar Thoma Theological Seminary, Kottayam, India. As a former member, Faith and Order Commission of the World Council of Churches, he is widely known for his ecumenical and ecological contributions. He has served as Secretary Board of Theological Education, Senate of Serampore College (University). He currently serves as Convener, Ecological Commission, of the Mar Thoma Church. Dr. Joseph has also authored several articles, poems and books available both in English and Malayalam languages. E-Mail: drmjjoseph_65@yahoo.co.in.

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Repetition and Recollection Dr. Zac Varghese, London The title of this short reflection is based on a quotation from the Danish Philosopher, Soren Kierkegaard. In his essay on ʻRepetitionʼ he wrote: “Repetition and recollection are same movements, only in opposite directions; for what is recollected has been, is repeated backwards, whereas repetition (properly so called) is recollected forwards. Therefore repetition, if it is possible, makes a man happy, whereas recollection makes him unhappy.” This is not an easy quotation to understand because of the way it is constructed. The important aspect is the forward and backward movements of memory of various incidents in oneʼs life. Mere recollection is just a memory check, possibly a mental exercise.

Forward movement of recollection is an active reenactment of an experience long forgotten. What does this mean?

One may have a recollection of oneʼs wedding on a wedding anniversary celebration, but it is a totally different experience to live out the moment of the very first meeting of oneʼs lifeʼs soul mate and partner. Life would be amazing and magical if one can repeat and live out that beautiful, magnetic, emotional moment of that first meeting again and again. This may be also true of the birth of a child and such experiences. For few, it may be possible to remember the inexplicable joy of obtaining a perfect ten during a mathematical exercise or obtaining a first rank. Our inability to recollect these events in a

forward movement is the beginning of a tension in many relationships.

Recollection is a journey from here to there, in a backward direction, a return journey; but repetition is a journey from there to here and now; it is in the now we live and love and have our being. It is the magical transformation of ʻbeing-for-itself to ʻbeing-for-othersʼ experience. It is that momentous decision to live within the life of the other, a lifelong friendship of a divine kind. It is a forward journey; we are leaping back to the beginning of time and starting that journey again. Such experiences are not measured or remembered in chronological time, but they are timeless kairos moments.

Greeks have two understanding about time, chronos and kairos; chronos is quantitative, measured in seconds, minutes, and hours; whereas kairos is qualitative; it is a timeless experience. We forget time when we have a really good time with a friend. Further, it refers to a right, perfect moment. We can become a timeless traveler through chronos time of traveling from here to those golden perfect moments in our lives. This is reliving in absolute joyfulness. This what St. Paul probably had in mind when he wrote to Thessalonians, “Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is Godʼs will for you in Christ Jesus (1Thessalonians 5: 16).

The point is that it is not possible to embrace the repetition of an entire life because there are situations and incidents we may want to forget or edit out. This editing out is repentance and kneeling on our knees and asking forgiveness to our God. The good news is that God in His abundant mercy is always willing to wipe out these transgressions; it is God who is in control of the delete button. The redness of our sins are wiped out with His blood on the Cross to make us as white as snow, and He gives us the freedom to start reliving all the golden moments under the grace of God. It is to this heaven He always invites us to enter. He is at the door knocking to come in and share the experience of travelling forward with us. He is willing and ready to walk with, but are we ready and willing to walk with Jesus? This sort of awareness helps us to bring a new life and dimension into all relationships. This is the ʻLiturgy after the Liturgy;ʼ it is the Eucharistic experience of everyday living; it is simply and experience of receiving, thanking, breaking, and sharing. This is indeed the everyday theology of life.

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Gospel and Culture Rev. Dr. Valson Thampu, New Delhi “Be you perfect, even as my Father in heaven is perfect” (St. Matthew 5: 48) Jesus was born in a culture, but not as a culture. He grew up within a culture, but he grew out of it. He mastered that culture and transcended it. By doing so, he became a benchmark, for all times, for redeeming culture.

Culture is a domain of imperfection. The dynamism of culture stems from the neurosis of its imperfection. Culture is in a state of unending struggle against its own limitations. A perfect culture has never existed. But every culture has had pretensions to perfection, even to ultimacy. Perfection, though a cultural nightmare, is a spiritual imperative.

Jesus of Nazareth was a headache to cultural entities. He was crucified for endangering the Jewish culture. But his goal was to renew it (Matt. 5:17). This illustrates the Gospelculture interface. Culture is programmed to decay over time.

There are two telltale signs of religious and cultural decay: authoritarianism and intolerance.

Authoritarianism denotes the decline of authority. It is controlorientation passing off for authority. It is a form of charade, sustained by the ignorance of the people. The less enlightened the people are, the more authoritarian the leadership they invite. The converse also is true.

Authoritarianism is harmful to people. They embrace or endure it because they lack understanding. And because they embrace it, they will never develop any understanding.

The classic expression of authoritarianism is “the blind leading the blind”.

Intolerance is endemic in culture. No culture has ever given, or will ever give, the freedom to its members to question its core tenets and trends. It is heretical, for instance, to critique technology today. Technology is the engine of modern culture. Technology is to the present culture what the Holy Spirit is to the biblical faith, minus the intolerance that goes with technology. It is easy, therefore, to know if religion has ceased to be a spiritual entity and become a mere cultural establishment. Orthodoxy is culture pretending to be religion.

“He who is in Christ Jesus,” wrote St. Paul, “is a new creation”. These cannot be the words of orthodoxy. New wine cannot be put, said Jesus, into old wineskins.

The Gospel-culture interface is paradoxical. The paradox is on account of culture, not of the Gospel. A symbol, wrote an English critic, has two legs. It stands on one and, with the other, it kicks the stars. Similar is the difference between Gospel and culture. Culture, unlike spirituality, stands on both legs firmly planted on the earth. Or, let me put it in the words of Jesus. Culture is like a mustard seed kept in a container.

Gospel is like a mustard seed that, being sown, sprouts and sends its branches to the end of the world. This hyperbolic growth (the outcome of which is universality) is anathema to culture. Culture is local. It has well-defined boundaries. It is fiercely protective of its boundaries. Boundaries, in contrast, are a liability to the Gospel, which is a tiding of great joy “for

all mankind”. In the parable of Sheep and Goats, ʻnot receiving strangersʼ is a point of condemnation. How can this be, unless boundaries are an offence?

It is in this light that we have to see denominationalism. Each denomination guards its territory like demons guarding treasures. Denominational boundaries are less porous than international boundaries. Correspondingly, denominational poachers are smarter and more persevering than infiltrators.

The paradox of Gospel-culture encounter must now be addressed. The Gospel must exist within a culture. In that sense the Gospel could seem to be a subset of culture. This is assumed as axiomatic in the secular context. But the Gospel is truly universal. What is parochial cannot be the Gospel. We could theoretically conceive of parochial editions of the Gospel. But it will not be the Gospel but mangled bonsais that by their very existence reject the Gospel. Hence, the stern warning is given against adding or subtracting a word from the Word. Hardly anyone realizes, though, that we do just that all the time.

We are mostly comfortable with the fact that the Gospel stands rooted in a culture. So, we have Indian Christians, European Christians, African Christians and so on. But this is only one-legged Gospel. We have great difficulties with the other leg of the Gospel: the leg of outreach, the leg that walks the face of the earth and makes light of man-made walls and boundaries.

“How can you, a Jew, ask of me, a Samaritan, for a drink?” is the classic question. Within a strict cultural matrix, “you cannot”. But within a spiritual matrix, “you have to” because the cultural matrix cannot understand, much less quench, your thirst. The Gospel-culture contrast is the contrast between Jacobʼs well and Jesus (the living waters). There is a thirst, which cannot be quenched with the resources of culture. Culture is not all embracing and must not pretend to be so. Man does not live by bread alone. Bread is, in a limited sense, symbolic of cultural resources, but only in a limited and purblind sense.

The Gospel-culture opposition is a cultural delusion. “Bread” for instance is not, in the final analysis, a mere cultural product. It is a godly gift packaged in cultural wrappings. It is, as the old prayer recognized, God who brings forth bread to eat out of the earth. The Earth is, surely, not a cultural product. It is the stage of culture, but it belongs to the Lord.

God does not disdain culture. Why should He? He validates culture and intervenes redemptively in the dynamics of culture. He sent his Son into the Jewish culture in order to “fulfill” it. God loves the world (Jn 3. 14). He favors all of mankind with his rains and every other form of blessings. So, culture has a place in the plan of the Gospel. The Gospel is not against culture. But the Gospel is also not an adjunct to culture. In a sense the Gospel is what culture should have been; and would have been, but for the fall and the perversity of human nature it inflicted.

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The Gospel-culture interface is dominated by Mammon.

Jesus knew this only too well. You cannot, he warned, serve God and Mammon. There you have it, and it cannot be put more simply or comprehensively. Culture is the kingdom of Satan, at the gate of which God stands knocking (Rev. 2:20).

It is easy, therefore, to discern if religion has accommodated itself to culture. All one has to do is to measure the extent to which Mammon dominates religion. Jesus came without a shirt on his back. He turned the world right about without a Denarius budget. Today money is our savior. There are exceptions, but they are far too few and they are diminishing too.

So, there are chasms in the Gospel-culture interface. They have to be crossed, if we are to become Christians. “Jesus invites us,” wrote Bonheoffer, “to come and die”. These chasms are the ultimate challenge. Reaching the other side seems tantamount to death. Lacking this courage and commitment, we manage to reach to the threshold, at best, of ʻnominal Christianity.ʼ This was the problem with Nicodemus. He was eager. He came. But he came, like a poignant confession. Why do you think he came ʻat nightʼ? (Think of the irony of it. Jesus is the light. And he wants to meet him at night! As though the best time to meet the sun is the dead of night.) Jesus saw through it in a flash. So he said Nicodemus had to be born again. He was too deeply embedded in culture, in Judaism. Culture does not kill our spiritual urges; it only paralyses it.

irreducible mystery. No man has authority over it. Such authority belongs to God, and God alone.

A Christian is obliged to be discerning. There is no place for prejudice in our discipline. We must understand culture without the colored glasses of preconceptions. Culture is immensely valuable, even though extremely limited.

(Whatever is wholly useless cannot be diabolic!) Culture is a product of time and, like all else that exists in time, will perish with time. But the Gospel of Jesus will endure. This imperishability has its root elsewhere than culture. The Gospel has the resources, as well as mission, to redeem culture. Culture, especially in its advanced stages of degeneration, could easily mistake this to be interference or subversion. The wafer-thin distinction between redeemers and anarchists could be lost on culture. It often is. No prophet, said our Lord, is without honor, except among his own people. Prophets and reformers will be stoned to death.

From the perspective of culture, Crucifixion was, is and will be, imperative. Jesus will be crucified again and again. Else, he would not have had to resurrect. Why else did he say, do you think, “I am with you always”? It is a statement of the willingness, and the acknowledgement of the need, to be crucified again and again.

That is why there is art in culture. Art is the outlet for the sublime. The sublime cannot be accommodated, routinely, in the framework of culture. It has to be canonized and assigned safe grottos. Art is some such. In religion we have worship and fellowship. We have Sundays. We have the gifts of the Spirit (but not the fruit of the Spirit!). All these belong to the “art” of Christianity. This is not bad, but not sufficient.

“God is Spirit,” Jesus said to the Samaritan woman, “and they that worship him must worship in spirit and in truth.” (Jn. 4: 24). The Samaritan woman knew the Gospel, if you like, as art. Art must have its stages and galleries. The temple on Mount Gerizim, like the Jerusalem temple, or our churches, simple or grand, are such stages and galleries. The “spirit and truth” part cannot be confined thereto. “The Spirit blows,” Jesus said to Nicodemus, “where it pleases”. The Spirit knows no stage or gallery. Or, life is the gallery of the Spirit.

The authentic artistic expression of the Gospel is “life in all its fullness” (Jn. 10: 10).

While we are on the subject of life, let me say this. Culturally ʻlifeʼ is a physical entity, which gets incorporated into demography. You become one among many. The more you conform the better it is. But this is a lie! Every new life is a new expression of the inexhaustible possibilities that God has written into creation. This is far too complex for culture even to take cognizance of. Culture must function in terms of types and stereotypes. Individual uniqueness is too much of a burden, a sort of cultural puzzle. But this is the foremost redeeming feature of our species. We are not, thank God, clones and carbon copies. We are unique. That is why the Bible says God calls us “by our names”. Life is, in the end, an

The Cross is the mediator between Gospel and culture. It is laden with the paradox thereof. Materially, the cross is only a cultural product; but not so the Cross. It stands in culture, but goes light years beyond culture. This is the challenge of the Cross. What did Jesus mean when he said, “If anyone would come after me he must deny himself, take up my cross and follow me.”? It means, please consider, something like this. A Christian – a disciple of Jesus- has to exist within a cultural context but has to transcend the limitations of his/her culture.

The cross of culture has to become, through the life of a Christian, the Cross of the Gospel. That is how we become witnesses. In comparison, it is such a cheap and dishonest thing to degrade the Cross into an ornament or insignia of

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ecclesial authority. The Cross is not to be worn, but to be “taken up”. To take up the Cross is to walk and to follow.

Everything else is a cultural charade.

Enrichment of Women in Church Activities of the Diocese

I do not know whether to laugh or cry when people sound or look shell shocked at the hostile reactions to their evangelistic enterprises from the world out there. Did they expect a rousing reception? Instant popularity? Ready reception? Did they expect the slaves of culture to applaud the exposition of principles utterly contrary to the very foundation of their life? If they had this grandeur of the spirit, they would not have been ʻslaves of the far countryʼ in the first place. We must expect hostility and persecution. But we must ensure that we are “reviled and persecuted” for Christʼs sake and not for our insensitivity or parochial stupidity.

One last question and I am done.

Nirmala Abraham, Philadelphia MTC

What, do you think, should be the outcome of our outreach?

“Conversion? ”What do we mean by conversion? Have you read what Jesus said about conversion? (He spoke only once! Read chapter 23 of the Gospel of St. Matthew.) “Follow me,” said Jesus of Nazareth, “and I will make you fishers of men.” (Mk.1: 16-18). Culture knows “fishers of fish” but not “fishers of men”. Those who, in culture, catch men catch them like fish. Or, men become fish in the markets of culture.

Except for their godliness, that is.

Migration to North America - A Historical Perspective: A small number of Mar Thoma women came for higher studies in the early sixties. In the late sixties, with the passage of new Immigration laws in the United States, a large number of Kerala women migrated here due to the availability of jobs in the health care field. The pioneers were brave enough to face the totally different culture, racial prejudices and long hours of work. In a book recently published by Sheela George titled ʻWhen Women Come Firstʼ, it is stated: ʻthis migration created a major transition in the gender roles of Kerala families.ʼ These pioneers were primarily instrumental in bringing more family members to North America. As the number of Mar Thoma families grew, the need for organized Church also grew. It is fair to give tribute to these early settlers, especially our women, who financially supported the establishment and building of the Mar Thoma parishes in North America, Canada and Europe in the seventies and eighties.

There is a story of a man who went round recruiting members for the Italian Fascist party in the 1920s. He accosted a rural fellow and urged him to join the Fascist Party. “How can I?” he protested. “My father was a Socialist.

My grandfather was a Socialist. How can I join the Fascist party?” “What strange logic is this,” retorted the Fascist recruiter. “Suppose your father was a murder and your grandfather too was a murder. Then……..” “Ah, then, the rural fellow said at once, “I would join your party readily.”

Is it possible to preach the Gospel without motivations of recruitment? Like ʻcasting your bread upon the waters” (Eccl.

11.1). Like sowing the seeds. Like casting the two mites into the temple treasury.ʼ Like addressing the winds saying, “He who has to hear let him hear.” Like the Lost Son (Lk. 15), we have strayed into ʻfar countryʼ. We are too deeply embedded in culture. We are filling our stomachs with the fodder for pigs, bought, no doubt, from glittering super bazaars with almighty credit cards. But, in respect of the thirst of our souls, we are in the company of pigs. And hunger is snarling in our souls. “He who drinks this water,” Jesus said to the Samaritan woman, “will thirst again and again.” He who eats this food, likewise. Come home, says the Father. The fatted calf is killed. The Feast is ready.

It is a Feast that goes beyond bread. Life is nothing, if not a Feast.

Rev. Valson Thampu is an educator, theologian, Principal of St. Stephen's College, Delhi. He is an ordained minister of Church of North India and a member of the National Minorities Commission in India and Delhi Minorities Commission. He can be reached on his email address at vthampu@gmail.com

The history of the Mar Thoma Church like any other denomination of the East will undoubtedly reveal the commitment and dedication of the women from all walks of life. From the time of its inception, women have played a significant role in defining the ethos of the Church. As the church membership grew and spread to other countries across the oceans, including our Diocese, the womenʼs contributions became even greater.

Women have truly enriched the Mar Thoma Church at the local, diocesan, ecumenical and global level. What follows are my thoughts as I reflect on the four decades of my lifeʼs journey in the USA.

Upholding the Spirituality in the Church Community - Prayer with Action: Women have traditionally given great spiritual support to the church and the family. During times of major illness, death and other crisis, women have gathered to support one another through prayer and action. Many women have served as mentors to younger women. Since the majority of our women work in the medical field, they have helped many church members during times of health crisis such as providing relevant information on medical coverage, associated health benefits, preventive care, after care and other valuable information.

Leadership Roles and Participation in National and Global Organizations - Net Working with the Mainline Churches and Organizations: Mar Thoma women have provided key leadership roles in international meetings such as the World Council of Churches (WCC), the United Nations Conference for Women in Beijing in 2005 etc. They have represented the Mar Thoma Church at national boards of organizations such as World Day of Prayer, Church Women United, and the Episcopal Womenʼs group for Women of Color. Mar Thoma women continue to serve as delegates to WCC and the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA (NCCC-USA). They have also taken an active role in securing membership in NCCC-USA and Church Women United. A team of Mar Thoma women who attended the Church Women United Leadership meeting in Puerto Rico were responsible for planning and forming the first National Sevika Sanghom Conference in Dallas fifteen years ago. The initiative and efforts behind this conference is a reflection of the vision and prayerful action of our women. (Contd. on Page 24)

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Christ and Culture Rev. Dr. K. A. Abraham Human beings are basically cultural entities. Decent behaviors, refined language, healthy male and female relationship, reverence towards the old and differentlyabled self-understanding etc., are all culture- ridden aspects. In the words of S. Kappen, culture is the organic whole of ideas, beliefs, values and goals, which condition the thinking, and acting of a particular community. Culture finds expression in ethics, philosophy, art, cult, myths, law etc. In a way, these are all ʻculture systemsʼ. Religion is the substance of culture; culture is the form of religion.(Paul Thillich). More than food, dress and life style, culture involves oneʼs thought-forms and communal life.

Basic components of culture Every culture has three dimensions: value system, worldview and symbol system. This needs some clarification.

I Value system All values are caught; they are never taught. Values are basically two-fold: instrumental and intrinsic. Our lives have both these values: e.g., our family status, job, and education, social positions-all belong to the instrumental, whereas our character, lifestyle, commitment, and faith life etc., comprise of the intrinsic. When we make choices in life, especially when we look for a life-partner, which are the dominant criteria?

II World-view

to understand their master. When Jesus approaches them in the midst of a crisis, the immediate response surprisingly is “It is a demon and screamed with fear”! This shows that the disciples were enslaved by a cultural myth, which says that the ocean is the citadel of evil and satanic powers, which is not within the purview of Godʼs salvific regime.

Biblical scholars would say that the purpose of this “nature miracle of Jesus” was to challenge this myth and to prove his sovereignty over the whole creation.

III Symbols There are verbal as well as non-verbal symbols and in all cultures and special meanings are attributed to certain symbols: e.g. Right hand side is considered to be good and left hand side is considered to be bad. Even we say that Godʼs right hand side symbolizes life and salvation and left symbolizes condemnation and judgment (Mtt.25:31-46).

Based on this literal understanding of the Bible, in Kerala aborted attempts are made by parents to change the left handlers to the right! The girls are mostly the sufferers here and the justification is that they are to serve on tables. (As if boys canʼt serve on tables at home and buffo wonʼt work!).

Cultural context of the Bible Biblical scholars tell us that that several of the JewishChristian festivals such as the Passover, festival of booths, Christmas, Pentecost etc. are influenced by the Ancient West Asian and Greeco-Roman Culture .We have reference to such influences in Pauline Letters. Deep cultural influences can be traced both within the Western developments in Theology and the Indian Christian Theology. Those who are familiar with the movement of Enlightenment and Reformation canʼt ignore the contributions of Martin Luther, Schleirmacher, Ritschel and others.

Ever since its inception, Christian theology developed within a cultural matrix; both in the West and in the East.

The early Patristic theologians used Greek culture –its categories and thought forms to communicate Christian faith to the extent that some critics would find some kind of a ʻHellenization of Christian faith ʼ in their system. Indian Christian theologians have used the Indian philosophy and its categories in their theological endeavor.

Negation of the idolatrous elements of the market

All of us are born within a particular cultural milieu. Our world-view gives us certain myths and meaning systems. A Biblical example is Mtt.14: 22-35 where the disciples fail

We have to distinguish between the ʻGod of life and the idols of deathʼ in our post-modern culture. An idol is that which blocks our ultimate loyalty to the God of life. All idols of the OT were symbols of power (e.g. Baal). Let us remind ourselves that an irreconcilable antagonism between the God of life and the idolatry of wealth is at the core of biblical ethics (Mtt. 6:24). The crucial question is whether we can promote the values of the Kingdom of God such as love, peace, justice, righteousness, fellowship and compassion in the context of an onslaught of the values of the market

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such as profit, confrontation?

competition,

success,

pleasure

and

Enfleshment of the Word in culture Niebuhrʼs monumental work in this field highlights five areas: •

•

•

•

•

Christ against culture This was the norm during the colonial period. For example; the so-called “White manʼs burden”!

Hendrick Kramerʼs “Christian mission in a nonChristian world”, written for the Tambaram conference of W.C.C in India (1938) is a typical example of this approach.

Christ of culture “The principle of accommodation”, the dominant Roman Catholic missionary approach is the result of this attitude. For example, Robert DeNobiliʼs work; identifying himself as a Hindu sanyasi and so on.

Christ above culture This is a condescending attitude, which always looks down upon the indigenous cultures and traditions.

Christ and culture in paradox No one can fully understand or explain how Christ works in a culture. In other words, Christʼs presence in a culture can be in subtle ways. Christ and culture are seemingly opposite realities; yet at the very core they tend to be cohesive.

Christ the transformer of culture “The word became flesh and dwelt among us”(Jn.1:14) is the biblical basis for a Christian perspective on culture. John gives us the Christological significance of the Logos, which is a dominant theme in Greek Philosophy .In the Philosophy of Heraclitus, Logos is the impersonal cosmic principle, which is intangible and incomprehensible. We have reference to this in Acts.17: 23.

Dominant culture and counter cultures In the Indian context, the Brahmanical culture is considered to be the dominant one and the tribal, dalit, sub-altern as the protest ones. The main attempt of the Hindutva in India is to glorify the dominant culture and to subjugate the smaller cultural traditions. Very subtle attempts are made in different areas such as the Indian Science Congress, Indian Council of Historical Review, School text book revisions etc. In the words of Dr. K.N. Panikkar and Romila Tapar, well known historians of ancient India, these are nothing but the “saffronisation of Indian history”.

The colonial era was marked by conquests, occupations and subjugations .Colonialism was certainly dependent upon the use of force and physical coercion at different levels. Even after the demise of imperialism, the so-called” colonization of the mind” remains with us. An important post- colonial task is to challenge the prevailing hegemonic assumptions, deterministic attitudes and to participate in ʻdecolonizing the mind ʼat all levels.

The postcolonial narratives on the whole try to decolonize the enslaving cultural myths, ideologies and legacy of the colonial era. This is a process of disengagement from the whole colonial enterprise. Though the latter half of the 20th century witnessed the independence of several countries, the mindset of the colonized didnʼt undergo much change.

Native culture and Diaspora culture Diaspora is a term that is used to describe the dispersed people and finds its expression in the Bible. It literally means scattered and today it is widely used in academic circles and popular writings to refer to globally dispersed communities (Sam Mathew, Malayali Diaspora).

Three approaches can be found among the Malayali Diaspora in U.S: •

•

•

Glorification of the native culture at the expense of the Diaspora context. This results in the authoritarian attitudes of parents, especially with regard to dress patterns, family set up, choice of partners etc. This author even found parents in U.S who would educate their children in Kerala so that they may not be contaminated by the Diaspora culture!

Glorification of the disport culture at the expense of the native culture. Everything that is native /Indian is bad and uncritical acceptance of the given situation is the norm here.

Interpenetration of cultures. The basic approach here is that all cultures have life-affirming as well as life-negating elements. What matters is our choice and discernment.

• Conclusion No culture is static. We shouldnʼt absolute any culture.

There is no Christian culture per se. We have to underscore the interpenetration of cultures. Cultural domination, absolutist claims for a particular culture are all anachronistic. Homogenization of culture shouldnʼt exist.

Diversity is within the plan of God. Hence, we need to highlight a conglomeration of cultures.

In conclusion, let me quote a prayer from the Collects of the Uniting Church in Australia, which is relevant for all cultures: In the midst of hunger and war, we celebrate the promise of plenty and peace; In the midst of oppression and tyranny, we celebrate the promise of service and freedom; In the midst of doubt and despair, we celebrate the promise of faith and hope; In the midst of fear and betrayal, we celebrate the promise of love and life; In the midst of sin and decay, we celebrate the promise of salvation and renewal; In the midst of death on every side, we celebrate the promise of the living Christ.

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Review Article - Joyful Vocation of a Teacher Autobiographical reflections on life and teachings By Dr. T. M. Thomas (USA) Published by CSS, Tiruvalla, April 2011, pages 276+ Price Rs.150/$15 Rev. Dr. M. J. Joseph, Kottayam I am immensely pleased in introducing the above book, Joyful Vocation of a Teacher, under another caption “The feast of life”. Life is meant to be celebrated at the grassroots level. A life well lived for God and for humankind makes it beautiful. This is a God-given mandate for everybody. We should not live to die, but we should die to live. This is possible, if we are rooted in age old values such as satyam (truth), sivam(order) and sundram (beauty).

Spiritual values like dedication, passion, courage, commitment, ethics, humility, excellence, gratitude, love, and Godawareness etc. make life something beautiful for God. In a nutshell, this is the message of the book, Joyful Vocation of a Teacher by Dr. T. M. Thomas.

Let me begin the scanning of the book with the story of the visit of a King to the great Zen Master, Lin Chi. He was astonished to learn that 10,000 inmates were there. Wanting to know the exact number of the monks, the King asked, “How many disciples do you have?” The Lin Chi replied: “4 or 5” at the very most!” This is the case in all the professions whether secular or religious. After reading the book, and the comments of his colleagues, friends and well-wishers such as Dr. Allen Cook, Dr. Geevarghese Mar Theodosius, Dr. Zacharias Mar Theophilus, Dr. Richard C. Harper and his long-time associates or friends, Dr. Thomas Joseph, Dr. Abraham Thomas, Dr. Thomas Koshy, Dr. David R. Conrad, Dr. Nelson Ngoh, Dr. Cathy Rice, Mathew P. George, Rev. Joseph Johney, Rev. Biju P. Simon, Rev. Ninu Chandy and Merlyn Rajan, and Dr. V. T. Samuel, I conclude without a ray of doubt that Dr. T. M. Thomas is a teacher with a “ difference” and there is no copy for him in the professional field. The philosophy of life as written in the book such as commitment to knowledge and wisdom, care and concern for others and the goal to become part of life beyond (p.32) makes this work the crown of his creative works as rightly said by Mar Zacharias.(p.18) “Winners donʼt do different things. They do things Differently” (Shiv Khera, Living with Honour) “It is better to be honourable than to be honoured”. The author makes it clear that God does not call the qualified, but he qualifies the one whom he called.

His movement from Perumbavoor to Bridgeport (rather from the East to the West) is an act of grace, which equipped him to handle real-life situations. It was really an educational pilgrimage, which enabled Dr. Thomas to make a bridge between Athens and Jerusalem (?) The three-month trip

undertaken by the author to the length and breadth of US had indeed widened his knowledge. No life ever grows until it is focused, dedicated and disciplined. The life and teaching of Dr. Thomas drive us to make a right assessment of modern life as said in an anonymous message I read, “The paradox of our time in history is that we have taller buildings, but shorter tempers; wider freeways but narrower view points; we spend more but have less; we buy more but enjoy less” In a consumerist culture with its philosophy of exploitation, manipulation and competition, Dr. Thomas holds (of) a flag of his own with the sayings “simplify your life, choose less and buy truth.” Our lives are to be like rivers, not reservoirs, like channels and not cisterns, if one has to celebrate the feast of life “As his friend Dr. David R. Conrad remarks in the book, “service to students, colleagues, and his Mar Thoma Church” has brought dividends in his life. “Dr. Thomas knew that “service is the rent we pay for our room on earth”. The credibility of the book lies in the obedience of the author as found in Psalm 102:18”Write down for the coming generation what the Lord has done so that people not yet born will praise him”. He has tuned the Fest of life with the vibrations of his head and heart. As Rev. Joseph Johney puts it, in this treasury of Memoirs, “there is a beautiful blending of autobiographical sketches, educational principles and a philosophy of life” (p.273).

The book consists of 6 parts dealing with the authorʼs creative engagement in the wider spectrum of life. Part I, “Stage of my life”, part II “High School Teaching”, Part II “Preparation for College Teaching”, Part IV “Full-time College Teaching”, Part V, “College Work in Four Categories”, and Part VI, “Reflecting on Teaching in Retirement: Some Central Questions” carry several sub-titles and critical comments on the professional purists of the author. In the early part of the book, the author sails in the Perumbavoorship and then finds his lodge in the Bridgeport ship for 33 years! The author always carries a nostalgic feeling as an immigrant from the land of coconuts! It is indeed great that the man behind the book remembers and visits his first grade teacher in Kuriannor, Saramma, whenever he came to his native village. In his job search, there is a period of joy, and sorrow. Untimely death of his mother and the death of his father at the age of 62 have cast deep wounds in his psyche. But he took courage in the words of St. Paul, “sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; poor, yet making many rich; having nothing, and yet possessing everythingʼ (2Cor.610).”The purpose driven life” of a veteran teacher will be written on the sands of time in innumerable ways.” A good deed done is never lost” and it becomes the universal property of humankind.” A unique worldview is evident in the writings of his memoirs, comments Dr. Cathy Rice. As Dr. V. T. Samuel, a long-time friend of Dr. Thomas, has rightly remarked, the author has immensely helped the growth of his mother Church Mar Thoma in the US with the production of teaching materials for Sunday school children there. His successful teaching methods depend on his knowledge of the subject, pedagogical

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skills and his people –oriented approach.. As a role model, Dr. Thomas has left his footprints on the sands of time (Merlyn Rajan). A brilliant book, under the title, In the Beginning (CSS, 2008) edited by Dr. Thomas and Abraham Mattackal speak of the formative years of the Mar Thoma parishes in North America. As a Church history resource material “the book is a valuable contribution in creating records for the Mar Thoma Church in North America”(Mar Chrysostom).

In a chronological setting, the author takes us to the different phases of his teaching career right from Ashram High school Perumbavoor to America. Wherever possible he makes a comparative study of learning in Kerala and in America. In a spirit of humility, the author gives credit to his seniors and mentors with praise and thanksgiving. In his early part of teaching, Dr. Thomas was not just a biology teacher. He also taught English language. He writes, “ I was holding on to the principle of “equal treatment” of all students giving due consideration to the needy or ignored”(p.75).At an early period of his teaching career, the author started writing and publishing articles which he continued throughout his life(19532010)..The publication of the author listed on pages 262-264 under academic publications, Church related materials and selected general articles and book reviews, bear testimony to his scribal skill The author speaks of his progressive growth in academic life and other pursuits due to the abiding presence of God in his life. He coins a word, “God incidence” to explain the guidance of God throughout his former and later years. I am sure the author will subscribe to the prophetic truth of life as found in Jer.29:11: “For I know the plans I have for you, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and hope”.

Chapter 11 &12 do not have the flow, which I have noted in the earlier sections. The author confesses that it is more of an essay. I am afraid the style of autobiography is diminished at this cross road, but the contents of the sections regarding his ALL America Tour (1963-64) are worth reading. The authorʼs travelogue will be a mine of information for one who goes for on a “See America Ticket”. I also did such a tour in 1994 in a very small way moving only in the boundary states of the US. I wonder why the author has not given a brief sketch of his travels outside India and the US. Chapters 13 &14 give us an account of his “Boston experience” Both the chapters are too descriptive in which he had discussed two spheres of his life family concerns and academic pursuits.

Chapter 15 is a recollection of his social bonding. The author writes: “The circle of close friends was widened after we moved from Springfield to the greater New York area”. I do admire the capacity of Dr. Thomas and Mrs. Thomas to win friends around the globe. I have had my first experience of staying with Dr. Thomas and family in 1974 and 2006.The social bonding takes place through the extension of hospitality to their friends and strangers. The family stands in the tradition of Abraham and Sarah! I have kept my friendship with Dr. Thomas all through these years in close and distant quarters.

In my autobiography (Malayalam, Ormakalude Theruveedhiyil, CSS, Dec.2010), I have also mentioned about 300 persons in the book by name. Dr. Thomas and I move in the same direction in this regard. Chapter 16 deals with an overview of teaching at the University of Bridgeport for 35 years. He qualifies this period as “the best of times” and “ the worst of times”. It is indeed great that he continues to keep in touch

with UB even after his retirement.(p.175).In Chapter 17, he accepted the ecumenical axiom, “think globally and act locally” in communicating his perspectives on education. He thus speaks of his college work in Four Categories. In chapter 18, the author seems to be a versatile genius! It is indeed noteworthy that he had donated most of his books to the Indian libraries where he had contacts. This is indeed a noble gesture of a good professor, which could be imitated by others. I am indeed happy to note that Dr. Thomas gives credit to his lifepartner, Annamma (Sahadharmini} for her supportive role in his mission. In Chapter 19, the author creates a lasting impression on us as a researcher and author of books. His Church related publications are indeed sources of information for the origin of the Mar Thoma Church in the US.I congratulate the author for his keeping a record of his early writings (p.202). Chapter 20, carries a covetable title, Sabbatical leaves and visiting professor (pp.203-215) .His Sabbatical pilgrimage did not receive much appreciation in his family circles including his pet Dog,” Duke Thomas” (p.214).! Chapter 21, entitled” Services to the University: Duties during UB Strike, should have found a place elsewhere. The social commitment of the author is vividly brought in chapter 22.The contribution of the author to the on- going ministry of the Mar Thoma Church in the US is laudable. Chapter 23, Retired Life and Aging in America, is a good analysis of his reflections on certain fundamental questions of life in individual and corporate categories. The author writes: “Retirement is the time when we raise questions about meaning and significance by relating to God for which we need more time for meditation and prayer.”(p.241) Chapter 24, dealing with ʻReligion and Education in America; Becoming a Christian Teacherʼ does not truly belong to an autobiographical narrative. Instead, the author could very well classify chapters 24&25 under his general concerns in a separate section. Dr. Thomas writes: “Both the chapters 24 &25 are connected because they represented my two life commitments, one to Christian education and the other to general education, especially my dedication to the profession or calling of teaching (p.260).I wish the author had placed them under another part, say, VII.. The section dealing with ʻAwards and Recognition for Service Activities ʻare indeed monuments of his Feast of life(pp.262-264).Words of appreciation under the section ,Comments and Opinions, have been referred to earlier. The photos, 31 in number, also tell volumes to us and they form an integral part of the autobiography of a person. In the photo album, Dr. Thomas leaves a legacy for the future generation. One should say with a loud voice, “It is because of you, what I am here today”.

The book is a true account of a scholar who has contributed much to the Church and to the society in general. It is worth reading and I am sure that it will be appreciated by the academics and Church people. In the treasury of books (secular and religious), the autobiographical sketch of Dr. Thomas under the title Joyful Vocation of a Teacher, will add its fragrance to other books and human lives.

I wish the author all the best. May the Lord enable him to be creative even in the far end of his life.

“Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like the shifting shadows.” (James 1:17).

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The Impact of International Migration on Home Churches: The Mar Thoma Syrian Christian Church in India (Article by Prema Kurien in, Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion. 2014. 53(1):109–129) REVIEW by Jesudas M. Athyal (Continuation from the January 2015 issue) Demographic and social changes in the lives of the people contributed significantly to shaping a decentralized pattern of administration in the Mar Thoma Church. While Kurien points out that power is concentrated in the various Constitutional bodies located at the headquarters of the Church in Tiruvalla, Kerala, it needs to be noted that the Constitution of the Church also provides for a de-centralized structure where considerable power and responsibilities are delegated to the various regional and local bodies, at the Diocesan and parish levels as well. This is especially true with regard to the parishes in North America where policies that are in tune with the mission of the Church and which suit the local situations have been adopted. Except for the transfer of the clergy and the bishops, virtually all the other decisions pertaining to the Church in the United States are taken by the appropriate bodies within the country. While immigrants continue to affirm their cultural roots in Kerala, one must, therefore, be cautious in over-emphasizing the centralized administrative structure of the Church.

The practice of sending clergy from Kerala for the ministry in America that Kurien discusses in her article (“The Mar Thoma Achens, posted abroad for relatively short terms, faced several demands for which they were poorly prepared. These included living and working in a new environment, driving long distances, coping with different accents, dealing with the hectic schedules of their members, and understanding the problems of immigrants.” ) is a real problem but is likely to change in the future. The policy of the Church for over a decade now has been to groom Marthomites of American origin for the long term ministry here by encouraging them to go for theological studies and be ordained as clergy, to serve the region of North America on a long term basis. The number of clergy coming from India, consequently, is likely to be on the decrease as the Church increases the number of ordained ministers from this land. Already ten such members of the clergy work here and more US- born young people are in the training for ordination. Even now the selection is done locally and is reported to the Church. The Diocese is also currently considering training the candidates in America. The leadership of the Church seems to be committed to promoting this policy elsewhere too, as people from different backgrounds (Singapore, Malaysia, USA, Middle East, UK and the different language areas of India) are being trained for the ordained ministry of the Church.

1

1 Prema Kurien. “The Impact of International Migration on Home Churches: The Mar Thoma Syrian Christian Church in India” in the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion. 2014. 53(1). p.

115 (Subsequent page numbers cited in this review refers to this article).

These changes by the administration of the Church at the policy level have been necessitated by social changes that have been visible among the members of the Church. Roughly one in every three marriages of Marthomites conducted in America today is to non-Marthomites, many of them Caucasians and people of other ethnic backgrounds. And, parishioners of these diverse ethnic-national identities pepper the worship services on Sunday mornings. The presence of a large number of Marthomites who migrated to the U.S. from outside-Kerala contexts, combined with the increasing number of American-born people of Indian origin (Kurien calls them the “second generation” that is often overlooked by the leadership of the Church “who favor the Malayalam-speaking migrants who were its most loyal members and its financial base” ), now constitute the majority of members in many parishes, provide the major source of financial support for the Church and hold leadership positions at the local and diocesan levels, thus setting in motion a process of change that is likely to re-define the very structure and policies of the Church. By its very nature, the Church should be open to accommodate people and embrace the changes that are required in the constitution of the Church. The addition of new members from different language and cultural backgrounds to the Church seems to be the logical step within such a theological framework.

2

Changes at the structural and demographic levels have led to a process of bringing in contextual changes in the liturgy as well. While Kurien points out that the liturgy had been translated into English as “a concession to the children growing up outside Kerala who are often not fluent in Malayalam” , that situation too is now rapidly changing. During the last two years, all the liturgical chants in the Malayalam language, that were earlier present also in the English liturgy, have been replaced with appropriate chants in the English language thus making the service 100% in English. And, regular worship services in English, which was earlier an occasional “concession to the children”, is now mandatory for all the parishes in North America. A related significant change was the selection of ‘Altar Boys’ and ‘Covenant Girls’ from 3

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2 P. 119 3 P. 114

4 The chants were not translated from Malayalam but

composed in the English language, in the American context, for this specific purpose.

5 Geevarghese Mar Theodosius, the current diocesan bishop, who has been spearheading a movement to contextualize the liturgy and programs of the Diocese, stated recently that out of the 50 Holy Communion services he had led in the various parishes of North America and Europe during 2013, only four were celebrated in Malayalam and the rest were in English.

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among the members of the parishes in North America to assist the celebrant during the Holy Communion service. The Diocesan Council is also considering acknowledging Lay leaders from among the new generation, and provides them with training to provide leadership here. Liturgical revision and diversification, to go along with these changes, seems to be going ahead at a small but steady pace.

Headquarters and Branches The Indian roots of the Mar Thoma churches in America are unmistakable; yet, one must be cautious in describing MTC as an institution with “branches” around the world and having a highly centralized structure. In the article, the author enters into a detailed discussion of an administrative pattern where power is concentrated in the “Prathinidhi Mandalam” (the representative assembly of the Church) and the other Constitutional bodies located at the headquarters in Tiruvalla, Kerala. It is further stated that as “branches”, the Mar Thoma parishes around the world function as centers to generate financial and other resources for the headquarters of the Church. The reality, however, is more nuanced. The Mar Thoma Church, while having a centralized organization, always found room for de-centralization by way of appointing Board of Trustees in different countries, Board of Missions in different language areas and providing by-laws for the localized administration of organizations. The by-laws that are in place in the Diocese of North America and Europe is an example. The Council of the Mar Thoma Parishes in Europe (COMPE) is an umbrella organization for the parishes in that region. All the parishes in the Diocese are locally registered entities. Currently, the Diocese is considering regional registrations to make the ministry and mission of the Church more relevant and effective at the State and Federal levels.

Diocese’s priorities and these are being carried out in a nonsectarian manner, as essentially American programs. The parishes too have their own programs and priorities. Many have ‘Neighborhood Mission’, conducted in an ecumenical spirit, in partnership with the local (non-Indian) churches. It is important to note that 90% of the financial resources raised by Mar Thoma parishes in North America are used within this region, mainly for these programs. As such, there is a grave danger in seeing the parishes as mere “branches” that exist to generate financial resources for the Church in Kerala. No doubt, a certain amount of ‘Kerala-influence’ will linger on in MTC in America; however, that is unlikely to be primarily for economic reasons.

Transnational linkages for immigrant groups are unmistakable and there is no doubt that various ethnic and linguistic groups will continue to co-exist in the Mar Thoma Church too. Yet, such linkages are more than those between the “headquarters” and “branches” with the latter existing primarily to support the structure and programs of the former.

Just as the Greek Orthodox Church in America is today more American than Greek, as the African Methodist Episcopal Church is more American than African, the Mar Thoma Church in America too is set on a path that is more indigenous, local and authentic, even as the Church continues to retain significant historic and traditional links with India and liturgical links with the Syrian heritage. Philipose Mar Chrysostom locates this distinction in the context of the theological direction of the Church: “the Mar Thoma Church in America and the American Mar Thoma Church ought to be different…

The Mar Thoma Church in Kerala and the Mar Thoma Church in Chennai or Delhi should not be the same. I mean the Church is the same, but the expression should vary if it belongs to the Church”. Michael Kinnamon, in his capacity as the General Secretary of the National Council of Churches in USA, too affirmed this reality from an American perspective: “The NCC members do not think of the Mar Thoma Church as an Indian Church with branch office in America, but as an American church with deep roots in India.” The Mar Thoma Church is a global Church now sharing the heritage in different countries and at the same time growing on the local areas with the diversified manifestations of its nature.

Conclusion The ‘New-generation Churches’ and their impact on the youth and others in the Church that the author points out , are real, but the extent and scope of such impact needs to be closely scrutinized. In his study of Christian fundamentalism and Communication in India, Pradip Thomas too had argued that such Christian groups are creating genuine challenges for the aspirations of pluralist societies, particularly in the South.

6

7

8

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6 Jesudas Athyal & John Thatamanil (ed.). Metropolitan

The decentralization of power in MTC in North America has a significant impact on the programs and policies of the Church as well with regard to the allocation of funds. The Diocese of North America has identified a number of outreach programs where considerable amount of human and material resources are being invested. The mission work in Mexico, among the Native Americans and ‘India Mission’ are central to the

Chrysostom on Mission in the Marketplace (Tiruvalla: CSS, 2002. p.

119.

7 Quoted in, Jesudas Athyal: “Beyond the Diaspora: Challenges and Concerns before the Mar Thoma Church” in, Mar Thoma Church: Identity and Mission in the Context of Multiplicity edited

by Rev. K. E. Geevarghese and Dr. Mathew T. Thomas (New York: Diocese of North America and Europe, 2014). pp. 92‐93.

8 P. 123.

9 Pradip Thomas. Strong Religion, Zealous Media: Christian Fundamentalism and Communication in India. Los Angeles, London, New Delhi, Singapore: SAGE Publications, 2008.

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While disillusionment with the established structures is a global phenomenon, it can, perhaps, be stated that in comparison to the traditional American churches, the Indian immigrant faith communities continue to be rich in membership and dynamism. Soong-Chan Rah cites one example: “In 1970, the city of Boston was home to about 200 churches. Thirty years later, there were 412 churches. The net gain in the number of churches was in the growth of the number of churches in the ethnic and immigrant communities.

While only a handful of churches in 1970 held services in a language other than English, thirty years later, more than half of those churches held services in a language other than English.”. Even as traditional religious groups, such as the Mar Thoma Church, move to the American context, the very dynamism of mobility coupled with the fresh and unconventional presence of young people who form the mainstay of most migrant groups could be contributing to warding off some of the lethargy and boredom that has crept into many traditional American churches. In any case, the author is right that this is an area where the Church should particularly be concerned about.

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In the ultimate analysis, Prema Kurien’s difficulty, as a social scientist, seems to be to penetrate through the obstacles in the transition of a young migratory community in order to realize what the group can offer, at a deeply spiritual and social level, at the global level. Financial links to any “home” communities are bound to ease with the passage of time and as the largely one-way mobility of a small group reaches optimum levels.

And, revolutionary technological advancements in communication skills have proved that translation from one language to another will not remain a major obstacle for long, especially for the techno-savvy younger generation. If, despite the best financial resources, communication skills and cultural parity with the surrounding community that the mainline American churches enjoy, the younger generation seems to be deserting them at a faster pace than those people who find the young immigrant churches to be irrelevant, the problem obviously, lies elsewhere. What is important for us is whether non-Western forms of religion have any resources to offer in the midst of the rapid changes happening around us. If there is a renewed interest today among Western scholars on Eastern forms of Christianity, it is due to the challenges an alternative vision has to offer in such a context. And, for us, the paramount question is whether the Mar Thoma Church, as a Reformed Eastern Christian group and a bridge community – between Western and Eastern forms of Christianity – has any spiritual or social resources to offer at the global level. That is an important discussion and we are grateful to Prema Kurien for making a significant theoretical contribution to this process.

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10 Soong‐Chan Rah. 2013. ‘The End of Christianity in America?’ http://www.patheos.com/Resources/Additional‐ Resources/End‐of‐Christianity‐in‐America.html (Cited, September 25, 2014)

11 For a recent discussion on the relevance of Eastern forms of Christianity, see, “He Has Made the Dry Bones Live”: Orientalism’s Attempted Resuscitation of Eastern Christianity” by Christopher D. L. Johnson in Journal of the American Academy of Religion (Vol. 82, Number 3, September 2014) pp. 811‐840.

Enrichment of Women in Church Activities of the Diocese (Contd. page 17) Ecumenical Net working in a Global Context: Our women throughout the Diocese are celebrating World Day of Prayer (WDP) along with women of other denominations on an ecumenical basis as well as at the parish level. These celebrations have helped our church members to be aware of global issues facing women and children and to help fund projects to support their needs. On a local level, Mar Thoma women are providing strong leadership and technical assistance to celebrate WDP with their ecumenical sisters from the Orthodox, CSI, Jacobite, Knanaya and Catholic churches. These collaborative WDP celebrations and efforts have empowered women as well as helped create intergenerational fellowships.

Women have served as Volunteers in Traditional Roles Enriching the Church through the Years: Mar Thoma women also provide leadership roles for the Sevika Sanghom activities, Church Committees, Sunday Schools, Diocesan Councils, Mission Boards, and Editorial Board and Managing Committee of the Mar Thoma Messenger, Diocesan Sub Committees, Sabha Council and Diocesan Assembly. Their perspectives and voices have enriched our church, Diocese and parishes. Many of our women are accomplished writers, artists and musicians and have enriched the church with their skills. Many have theological background and are well known speakers in our Church and Community.

Diocesan Level and Missions in India: Women have served in key leadership roles within the Mission Board of our Diocese since its inception. Our younger women have consistently given their time and talent in volunteering for the mission trips. Women also have financially supported mission projects in India and within the Diocese. Educational Attainments: Our second-generation women are high achievers and are excelling in professional education and careers. These women are an asset to our church and a great role model for the younger generation. However, serious questions remain as to how our Church can meet the needs of this millennial generation who are leaving the church in large numbers.

We have three generations of women in our church today: the first generation immigrants, their children who were mostly born and brought up in the diocese, and the third generation (grand children). Even though the sensibilities of these generations are vastly different, we do have a common thread that connects us through our culture, faith, practices, and family values of our forefathers. I have vivid memories of my mother, Elizabeth George, as an active member of the Sevika Sanghom and the church committee of the Philadelphia Mar Thoma Church. Her enthusiasm and love of the church has been contagious. May the experiences of yesterday, the activities of today and the vision for tomorrow help the Mar Thoma women to enrich our church and help its growth: Let it be the legacy that we pass on to the future generations. Standing at the momentous milestone of the 25 years faith journey of our Diocese, I am filled with the spirit of celebration and gratitude to all the stops and pauses that have developed us and assisted us to write this history both individually and collectively. May we grow in grace as we grow older and may the wisdom of our mothers, the courage of our sisters and the hopes of our daughters keep us whole and strong!

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Christ and Culture Lal Varghese, Esq. Dallas According to an article titled ‘Ministry in Multicultural and National / Ethnic Parishes’ by National Association of for Lay Ministry of Catholic Churches in U. S. A, the term ‘Culture’ is defined as ‘as system which creates a shared identity and establishes the boundaries of a human group by defining behavior patterns that allow individuals to feel confident when relating to other members of the group.

Culture is both learned and in a constant process of being created as it is passed from generation to generation.’

God created man in his own image to be as companion to God and created a culture where man and God can interact each other and live forever. God created certain rules and norms for man to obey and to live as friend with God in an environment created by God for man to live for generations. Thus God created a culture, which can be titled as ‘Culture of Garden of Eden’. Adam and Eve were not alone in the Garden of Eden. They were with God. God not only visited them on a regular basis, but he walked with them in the Garden of Eden. Genesis 3:8 says, “And they heard the voice of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day: and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God amongst the trees of the garden.” This passage gives us the distinct impression that God regularly walked in the garden. He just did not visit the Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden to issue commands and edicts, but the Garden of Eden was where he fellowshipped with Adam and Eve. This fellowship was mutually enjoyable, but this changed the day Adam and Eve sinned and ate of the forbidden fruit. They were now ashamed before God and God banished them from the Garden of Eden and his presence.

But man disobeyed God’s plans and norms of the culture created by Him and set his own culture in this world. Thus God repented even creating man in the world. ‘Then the LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And the LORD was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart. So the LORD said, “I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth, both man and beast, creeping thing and birds of the air, for I am sorry that I have made them.” But Noah found grace in the eyes of the LORD. ………..Noah was a just man, perfect in his generations. Noah walked with God.’ (Genesis 6: 5-9) Second Chronicles 16:9 says, “The eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth to show himself strong to those whose heart is loyal to him.” And He spotted him. He took notice. It was Noah, because he was not conforming to the culture of the world.

There is only one another person mentioned in the Bible who walked with God. “Enoch walked faithfully with God; then he was no more, because God took him away.”

Genesis 5:24. Both Noah and Enoch never allowed themselves to be influenced and overwhelmed by then prevalent worldly culture without the presence of God. God saved Noah and his family from the great flood. God wanted man to obey him and walk in the culture of the Garden of Eden, but man disobeyed God and fell in to the hands of the devil, in to the culture of the world, thus alienated himself from God and His Kingdom. But God was always faithful to his creation, even though man was not faithful to his creator. Man lost the culture of God and created his own culture and began worshipping other gods. Man thus became obligated to the world culture and not to the culture of God.

For generations man kept on disobeying the cultural context created by God. God sent prophets to warn people about their sins and turn to God. He even brought Israelites from Egypt to the promised land of Canaan.

There also they created their own culture by worshipping other gods and not the living God. Finally, God decided to send His own son to save the humankind from their sins crated by their own culture. God has chosen people of different culture to visit Jesus at the time of His birth including the shepherds and the wise men from the east.

God has even planned a safe haven in Egypt for the parents of Jesus to live until it is safe to return his native place. By being born as the child of a virgin, Jesus created His own culture known as a “Christ Culture.” He taught us to love each other, care for others, to share our time and talents and wealth with the less fortunate. He even warned that it would be impossible for a wealthy man to enter in Heaven, thus He warned people of His time about the culture of wealth. In the Law of Moses, it was commanded to love others as we love ourselves, but Jesus set a new standard: His love for us. In the hours before He went to the cross, He would both tell and show

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that love. “Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends” (John 15:13).

Jesus has developed the ‘Cultural Competence’, the ability to interact comfortably and confidently with the people of any culture. When Jesus decided to travel from Judea to Jerusalem, He opted to travel through Samaria, a region avoided by most of the Jews, since they believe that Samaritans are not to be a group of people to be interacted by Jews, because Jews considered Samaritans as low cast people. But, Jesus, not only preferred to travel through Samaria, but also interacted with the Samaritan woman at the well as described in John 4: 1-26. She was even surprised that Jesus being a Jew interacted with her and even asked for water to drink. Thus He not only told us to love each other but also showed us how to interact with others irrespective of their race, culture or sexuality.

Throughout the ministry of Jesus, He preached among people of all nations and culture in an around the places he lived and traveled. It is surprise to note that nowhere in the Bible, there is any mention where Jesus lived especially during the 3-½ years of His public ministry. He wanted to be with the people of all culture and regions and language. He even has disciples from different cultural background appointed by Him to complete His ministry in this world. He did not preach to only people of one culture or one nation. He traveled around interacted with prostitutes, tax collectors, who are considered as the ‘untouchables’ according to the Jewish religious culture.

He invited the fishermen, the ordinary men to become extraordinary people as His disciples. He was even criticized by the Pharisees for interacting with such people of low culture according to Jewish system. But Jesus did not pay any attention to such criticisms and even fought against the evils of the culture of the society in which He lived. One such example was His interactions in the Jerusalem temple by turning the tables of the people who made the temple a market place.

But the ‘Christ Culture’ created by Jesus was lost again and Christians developed their own culture based on the standards of the society in which they lived. The Christians in order to become the true witnesses of Jesus must rise to the level of the culture established by Jesus.

Christians should live like the lotus plant with its flowers above the muddy water with beautiful colors by nourishing those around it. Christians should be same like the lotus plants even though it lives in the muddy pond and depend for everything for its growth from the pond, but it rises above the water and creates its own culture not mixed with the culture of the pond in which it lives.

Thus when Christians rise above the cultural backgrounds of their society and adorn the culture of Christ, they are considered as true witnesses of Jesus Christ.

Richard Niebuhr has posited five different relationships that the Christian has with culture, namely: Opposition, Agreement, Christ above culture, Tension and Reformation. The first two choices are the extremes.

Opposition means that the Christian opposes all cultural artifacts as "worldly." Agreement takes the other extreme, where Christians finds their religion to be fundamentally compatible with the culture around them. The last three choices are somewhere between the extremes. In his final paragraph of his book, Niebuhr says, “To make our decisions in faith is to make them in view of the fact that no single man or group or historical time is the church; but that there is a church of faith in which we do our partial, relative work and on which we count. It is to make them [our decisions] in view of the fact that Christ is raised from the dead, and is not only the head of the church but also the redeemer of the world. It is to make them in view of the fact that the world of culture—man’s achievement—exists within the world of grace—God’s Kingdom” Richard Niebuhr’s book “Christ and Culture, 1951) Paul writes in Romans 12:2 “Do not be conformed to this present world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may test and approve what is the will of God – what is good and well-pleasing and perfect.”

The above-mentioned article titled ‘Ministry in Multicultural and National / Ethnic Parishes’ by National Association of for Lay Ministry of Catholic Churches in U. S. A, concludes with these words: “Called to announce the Good News about Jesus in every place and language on earth, the Church has recognized since the time of St. Paul (Acts 17:22-31) that the Holy Spirit has planted ‘seeds of the Word’ in every culture (cf. Evangelii Nuntiand)i. It is the task of missionaries and evangelizers everywhere to nurture those seeds and bring them to fruition in the light of the Christian teaching. As a church, our cultural diversity embodies the still-unfolding story of the Incarnation in every language and culture of the world for the last two thousand years.”

The Church in the world should join together to develop a ‘Christian Culture’, which should be above the culture of each society in which the Christians live wherever in the world. It is possible to create such a Christ like culture sine He taught us to love our neighbors as ourselves. All the Ten Commandments have been codified in this simple commandment given by Jesus Christ. Thus we as Christians will be able to rise above the cultures of the society in which we live and show the world by living in a culture created by Jesus Christ. By creating the culture of Christ, we will be creating the ‘Culture of Garden of Eden’ as envisioned by God when He created man in the beginning. Thus the creation will join its creator ultimately, thus fulfilling the mission of our Lord Christ in this world and in the eternal world.

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Christianity and Kerala Culture Dr. Titus Mathews, Calgary It is essential to start this article by defining the words, Christianity and Culture. Christianity is one of world’s major religions, which worship Jesus Christ as Son of God, one of the Trinity of Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

To define the word culture, let me use the words of the late Dr. M.M. Thomas: “Culture is what holds a community together, giving a common framework of meaning. It is preserved in language, thought patterns, way of life, attitudes, symbols and presuppositions and it is celebrated in art, music, drama, literature and the like. It constitutes the collective memory of the people and the collective heritage, which will be handed down to generations still to come. Culture denotes the community life based on moral and spiritual values; and the people’s celebration of these community values.

One may say that in a culture, creation of artistic beauty expresses the people’s way of life realizing truth and goodness. Truth, Goodness and Beauty are integrated in the pattern of community living. Aesthetics and morality go together.”

Christianity originated in what is today Israel and spread to other parts of the world over many centuries. It was during the time of the Roman Empire that it spread to the west, especially to the countries that we include in Europe. Once it became the state religion it had powerful influence on the history and culture of Europe.

European culture is largely Christian culture, though increasingly it is becoming secular. Christianity is not one united religion as it is split into different factions, Roman Catholic, Eastern and Oriental Orthodox and numerous Protestant denominations. There is no unique Christian culture as there are variations in language, thought patterns, way of life, attitudes and symbols among these different denominations. The rise of Islam in the 7th century CE curtailed the strength of

Christianity in the Levant. The rise of colonial powers in Europe beginning in the 15th century spread both Roman Catholic and Protestant Churches to the ends of the world.

The character of Christian culture has evolved over historical times and adjusted to those of the surrounding cultures where Christians are in a minority.

The foundations of Christian culture can be traced to Jewish culture out of which Christianity originated. For example, central to Jewish culture is Sabbath, a day set apart to worship in a communal setting in a Synagogue.

Six days in a week one goes about doing different work, whereas the seventh day is one for rest. For Christians, Sunday, the first day of the week is set apart for corporal worship in a church setting commemorating the day of resurrection of Christ after his crucifixion.

Jews follow the laws given to them by Moses, for example, the Ten Commandments, which can be summarized as: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your mind. This is first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: Love your neighbour as yourself.” Jesus said he has come to fulfil the law and not to abolish them. In fact he extended the commandments saying: Love your enemies.

The Jews are often referred to as the people of the book. The Old Testament of the Bible is the book of the Jews. It consists of the Torah, the Prophets and the Writings. Christians can also be called people of the book, the Bible, which contains the Old and New Testaments. The Sunday worship consists of praise giving, reading of Bible portions and sermons, which explain them. Celebrating the Mass or the Last Supper is also part of Sunday worship. During the course of a year, important events in Jesus’s earthly life such his birth (Christmas), crucifixion and resurrection (Easter) are commemorated. Periods of prayers and fasts called lent are observed prior to these important events in the Christian calendar.

The Bible extends a powerful influence on the thoughts and patters of life of Christians. Christian culture is strongly influenced by the Bible.

Of all the religions, Christianity is perhaps, the most highly organized. A denomination, if it is large, is organized into local groups (Parishes) with a local head (parish priest or vicar).

Many such groups are supervised and led by senior priests or bishops and

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several bishops are under the care leadership of an Archbishop or Metropolitan. Roman Catholic Church, which is the largest denomination, has the Pope as its head and Cardinals collectively and individually assisting and supporting the Pope. Organizing regular Sunday worship and celebrating special feasts or festival is not the only functions of church leadership.

Churches are involved in running schools, hospitals, orphanages, old age homes and many orders of priesthood. Because of such activities they have a profound influence on the culture.

The distinct nature of Christian culture can be seen when it is contrasted with the Hindu culture, which is predominant in India. It is easily done in the Kerala context, where Christianity has a significant presence.

Hindu’s also have temples for worship and priests to conduct puja ceremonies. But for Hindus, worship is personal and the presence of community is not required for pujas. Hindus also celebrate festivals and have pilgrimages to places such as Sabarimala and Guruvayur.

But, Hinduism is far less organized compared to Christianity. Kerala Christians, especially those who claim ancestry to the missionary work of Apostle Thomas during the first century have adopted certain aspects of Hindu culture and incorporated into their marriage ceremonies. Therefore it is not difficult for St. Thomas Christians to co-exist peacefully with Hindu majority population in Kerala.

It is possible to notice sub-cultures within Christianity as different denominations practice their religions differently. Orthodox Christians have adoration of saints and special festivals at parish levels. In recent years walking pilgrimages to Parumala, where a saintly bishop, Mar Gregarious, is buried. Roman Catholics have distinct features adopted from the universal church. Other denominations of Western origin have practices originating in Western countries. In contrast to all these, Mar Thoma Christians are more or less puritanical as they have neither crucifixes nor pictures of saints surrounding altars.

Kerala Christians, who have migrated to other lands primarily for employment reasons, have taken their Kerala Christian culture to where ever they have gone.

Their religious organizations are basically extension of their structures back in Kerala. Sunday worship is conducted mostly in Malayalam, though English is being used to accommodate the second and third generation who do not speak or understand Malayalam well.

Further changes and accommodation of Western culture is inevitable over the course of time. Only the process of continuing immigration of people is delaying this. In secular life most people have adopted to the culture of the lands to which they have moved.

When it comes to artistic expressions, Kerala Christians take a back seat to the Hindus. In dance and drama they contribute little to Kerala culture. Hindus dominate on literary contributions. While they do a lot of social work and run hospitals and schools, the efforts of Christians are directed towards success in business and finances. They are also active in political endeavours.

Kerala Christian culture is unique though it is not pure Christian culture as it is modified by its accommodation of the Hindu culture. Kerala Christians, who have migrated to other lands primarily for employment reasons, have taken their Kerala Christian culture to where ever they have gone.

When it comes to artistic expressions, Kerala Christians take a back seat to the Hindus. In dance and drama they contribute little to Kerala culture. Hindus dominate on literary contributions. While they do a lot of social work and run hospitals and schools, the efforts of Christians are directed towards success in business and finances. They are also active in political endeavours.

Kerala Christian culture is unique though it is not pure Christian culture as it is modified by its accommodation of the Hindu culture.

Dr. Titus Mathews is Professor Emeritus of Physics at the University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada.

Educated in U.C. College and Madras Christian College, he received his Ph.D. degree from University of London (Imperial College) in 1962. He joined the University of Calgary in 1966 and has served as Professor and Head of Physics Department and also as Associate Vice-President (Academic). He has been awarded the Good Servant Medal by Canadian Council of Christians and Jews, Out Standing Service Award by India-Canada Association and Alberta Government. He is also the recipient of Queen Elizabeth Golden Jubilee medal for service to the University of Calgary.

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