Marginal Christianity

Posted on 16 September 2014 by Brian Stanley     In the first meeting of the postgraduate World Christianity course ‘Selected Themes in the Study of World Christianity’ held on 15 September 2014, Professor Brian Stanley presented what he perceives as the top ten historical myths about World Christianity. 1. Christianity is a western religion. It neither began in western Europe, nor has it ever been entirely confined to western Europe. The period in which it appeared to be indissolubly linked to western European identity was a relatively short one, lasting from the early sixteenth to the mid-twentieth centuries. The Church in China, India, Ethiopia, and Iraq is older than the Church in much of northern Europe. 2. Christian missions operated hand-in-glove with the colonial powers. Sometimes they did, but frequently they didn’t. Missions were usually critical of the way in which empires operated, mainly because they conceived of empire as a divinely-bestow...

https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=8024463059512837285#editor/target=post;postID=6116955329452016279 By christena on March 18, 2014  If you are preparing to do [ urban ministry ] and you’ve never had a non-white mentor, you are not an [urban minister], you are a colonialist. – adapted from Soong-chan Rah [i] Last week I had the honor of meeting with a group of urban pastors who’ve devoted their lives to serving Buffalo, NY. While discussing the challenges they encountered while doing urban ministry in a predominantly non-white, socio-economically oppressed [ii] city, the black, Hispanic and Asian pastors with whom I met raised a familiar issue, one that I’ve heard and witnessed all over the country.  Same story, different city. Buffalo, like many other urban centers, has faced a shrinking population and declining business interest for decades [iii] . urban decay, Buffalo, NY But things rapidly changed in December 2013, when NY Governor Andrew Cuomo an...