Multicultural Ministry Matters

There has been a lot of discussion about the recent 'vibe shift' away from radical atheism back towards an openness to the supernatural. I don't think this new spirituality is necessarily an openness to the unique claims of Christ. It will more probably replace one set of commonly-accepted misunderstandings about Jesus with another.  Under radical atheism, people dismissed the Biblical claims about Jesus' resurrection because they 'knew' that it was impossible. Jesus hadn't really died. He just passed out (after being beaten and whipped and crucified) and then woke up in the tomb (and rolled away the stone himself and overcame several guards). Or the disciples hallucinated that they saw him (even though Jewish beliefs of the time didn't expect one person to rise possessing eternal life himself; they expected a general resurrection at the end of time - see John 11:24 ). Or something else.  The so-called 'explanations' of Jesus' non-resurrectio...

The Nones Project is an ongoing study into the belief systems of people who call themselves non-religious. A few weeks ago one of the project leaders,  Ryan Burge  of Washington University,  posted some really interesting preliminary results  on his Substack.  1. We've probably heard of people who are spiritual but not religious (SBNRs). SBNRs were "the largest group of nones" in the sample. They believe in the supernatural realm but not necessarily in "a God." They are "deeply skeptical of religion but highly interested in spirituality," therefore individualistic and anti-institutional.  2. But this study differentiated SBNRs from people they called Nones In Name Only, NiNos. They different to SBNRs by being religious about their spiritual. They believe not just in the supernatural but in "God." And they tend to engage in traditional communal religious practices while SBNRs practice individualised eclectic bespoke spiritual practices. The s...

What is education for? A recent post at the Ethics Center gives the following options:  Instrumentality : education is a means, an instrument, to self-improvement. The logic is that:  Education enhances your employability,  Which in improves your potential to generate wealth,  And that wealth maximises your independence and autonomy Which serves the ultimate goal of maximising your ability to choose your preferred lifestyle, to create your private heaven on earth. Democracy : education forms good citizens who are able to engage in the kind of reasoned debate which forms wholesome societies. The logic here is:  Societies are formed by individual people, and by sub-communities like families, ethnic groups, religious groups, and social clubs,  Where those individuals and sub-communities have their own perspectives and values,  Which usually conflict to some degree but are not entirely irreconcilable,  But who need to take the time and energy require...

My ministry colleague Ying Yee of Chinese Christian Church Milson's Point recently posted some thoughts on bicultural, bilingual ministry . Below is my response.  Our 'ethnic' heritage is an aspect of our identity which God gives us for our good and with which we're supposed to honour him. If the new Jerusalem is full of people from every tribe and nation, the Chinese will be there. And English-speaking Chinese-background Australians will be there. And people of mixed race will be there. And we'll all be delighting in God's goodness to us, as he has expressed it to us in our particular circumstances. Part of those circumstances will be the formation of our particular churches. Not the buildings - the communities.  If my understanding of Australian church history is correct, Chinese churches in Australia came about in one of two ways. Australian people evangelised Chinese migrants, especially during the 1800s gold rush. I think denominational churches like Chine...

I spoke last weekend at a church camp on "the opportunities and challenges of reaching post-Christian Australia." The main theme of my talks was the need to have a sufficiently basic, therefore flexible, understanding of the gospel and the Christian faith in general – an adequately simple yet rich ‘theology’ – to engage with the diverse, often contradictory, alternate systems of belief and behaviour which people believe in, and therefore live by, today.  I analysed three broad forms of belief and their associated ways of life: atheism, non-religious ‘spirituality,’ and organised ‘religion.’ The overarching message of the three talks was that ‘religion’ is the only stable option of the three, and that we therefore need to prepare to engage with the coming religious resurgence.  Because God really exists, atheism is radically wrong – it is wrong about the fundamental, foundational realities of the universe, therefore wrong about everything else – and is therefore unsurprisingly...

We live in a globalised world. The internet and social media has made it possible to communicate with people across the whole world at the speed of light. Relatively cheap air transport has made international travel more accessible more than ever before. Contemporary globalisation is the result of this international accessibility. People and ideas from across the world – especially from areas which used to be far away, therefore 'foreign' and different, 'exotic' – are now nearby and accessible. The 'other' has become our 'neighbour' – physically, electronically, or both. We may even speak of the situation of 'globality' – the mindset and expectation, brought on by the processes of globalisation, of having access to the apparently limitless options offered by the whole world.  This barrage of information can be exciting, exhausting, or frightening. It can be exciting because we can learn from different sources, and get different perspectives on ev...