Creedal Monologism and Theological Articulation in the Mennonite Central Committee

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philip Fountain
Keyword(s):  
North American ◽  
Central Committee ◽  
Service Organizations ◽  
Christian Theology ◽  
Archival Research ◽  
Close Attention ◽  
Mennonite Central Committee

This chapter presents an ethnography of Christian theology. It does so by examining theological articulation in and through the creedal form. Creeds may be taken as an archetypal monologic mode of expression due to their monovocal presentation of standardized, non-debatable claims. Through close attention to how and why creeds are created it is possible to examination the contours and operations of the monological imagination. Drawing on fieldwork and archival research, this chapter explores the creedal articulation, as well as instances of disarticulation, within two North American Anabaptist service organizations, namely the Mennonite Central Committee and Christian Aid Ministries. Their differing strategies of theological articulation illuminate the uses and limits of monological discourse.

scholarly journals Creating a Space for Peace-making: Burundi and Beyond

Refuge ◽  
1997 ◽  
pp. 20-21
Author(s):  
Tim Wichert
Keyword(s):  
United Nations ◽  
Central Committee ◽  
Lessons Learned ◽  
International Volunteers ◽  
Mennonite Central Committee

Mennonites and Quakers have historically renounced the use of violence for resolving conflicts. From 1994 to 1997 the Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) ran a program of civilian peacemaking in Burundi at the request of local Quakers. Their goals were modest, hoping that international volunteers could assist in reducing the level of violence and creating space for positive things to happen. Lessons learned were discussed at a seminar hosted by the Quaker United Nations Office in Geneva in May 1997.

scholarly journals Fetishizing Dialogue and Commodifying Peacemaking

2009 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 136-152
Author(s):  
Mahdi Tourage
Keyword(s):  
Central Committee ◽  
Sign Systems ◽  
Student Exchange ◽  
Mennonite Central Committee ◽  
Ongoing Dialogue ◽  
Research Institute

This paper assesses the ongoing dialogue and student exchangebetween the Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) and one ofthe most violent institutions in Iran, the Imam Khomeini Educationand Research Institute (IKERI). I will use this relationshipbetween theMCC and IKERI to examine the broader question ofinterreligious transnational dialogue and peacemaking.After a brief background of this somewhat “secretive” dialogue/student exchange, I will evaluate its effects. Of particular interestwill be the following questions: How do we responsibly shapeMuslim–non-Muslim dialogue for peace and understanding in aglobal context that is inevitably shaped by an imbalance of powerand representation? How are the acts of resistance undertaken bythe disenfranchised local/diasporic Iranian communities and thesustained systematic violence against them impacted by a peacefulfaith community such as the Mennonites? How does the absolutizationof “dialogue” coupled with self-proclaimed theologicalmandates effectively strip away the archives of violence from livingmemories and histories?What can examining the decade-longdialogue between the MCC and IKERI reveal about the mechanismsof perpetuation and dissimulation of imperial dominationand control? How can transnational interreligious interventions bethe nexus for infusing sensitivity and expecting accountability?I argue that a fetishization of dialogue and a commodification ofpeacemaking took place between the MCC and IKERI, resultingin the patronage of the sign systems of existing normative ideologiesof violence ...

Kathy Acker

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Georgina Colby
Keyword(s):  
Women's Writing ◽  
Experimental Writing ◽  
Kathy Acker ◽  
Archival Research ◽  
Close Attention ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
Literary Cultures ◽  
Series Of Experiments ◽  
Unpublished Manuscripts ◽  
Compositional Method

Kathy Acker’s body of work is one of the most significant collections of experimental writing in English. In Kathy Acker: Writing the Impossible, Georgina Colby explores the compositional processes and intricate experimental practices Acker employed in her work, from early poetic exercises written in the 1970s to her final writings in 1997. Through original archival research, Colby traces the stages in Acker’s compositional processes and draws on her knowledge of Acker’s unpublished manuscripts, notebooks, essays, illustrations, and correspondence to produce new ways of reading Acker’s works. Rather than treating Acker as a postmodern writer this book argues that Acker continued a radical modernist engagement with the crisis of language, and carried out a series of experiments in composition and writing that are comparable in scope and rigor to her modernist predecessors Stein and Joyce. Each chapter focuses on a particular compositional method and insists on the importance of avant-garde experiment to the process of making new non-conventional modes of meaning. Combining close attention to the form of Acker’s experimental writings with a consideration of the literary cultures from which she emerged, Colby positions Acker as a key figure in the American avant-garde, and a pioneer of contemporary experimental women’s writing.

scholarly journals Assessing the Quality of a Local Authority Conference and Hospitality Venue Using the ServQual Model

2014 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 15-20 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mike Donnelly ◽  
Edward P White
Keyword(s):  
Service Quality ◽  
Public Service ◽  
Local Authority ◽  
Reliability And Validity ◽  
Service Organizations ◽  
Close Attention ◽  
Private Companies ◽  
Public Service Organizations ◽  
Hospitality Venue

Abstract The close attention paid to service quality by successful private companies has become part of the environment within which most public service organizations now operate. The ServQual model has been used with success to help companies quantify customers' expectations and perceptions of their service and to use this analysis as the basis for improvement. More recently, the ServQual approach has been applied in public service contexts with mixed reliability and validity. This paper reports on the application of the ServQual model to a conference and hospitality venue operated by a Scottish local authority. The study investigates five distinct customer segments: conferences, meetings, receptions, performances, and weddings. The expectations-perceptions gaps are assessed for each of these segments using the ServQual model and the size and antecedents of ServQual Gap 1 is also examined.

scholarly journals Bearing witness: Reframing Christian–Muslim encounter in light of the refugee crisis

2017 ◽  
Vol 74 (1) ◽  
pp. 22-35 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joshua Ralston
Keyword(s):  
North America ◽  
North American ◽  
Forced Migration ◽  
Interreligious Dialogue ◽  
Christian Theology ◽  
Refugee Crisis ◽  
Ethical Considerations ◽  
Bearing Witness ◽  
Constructive Engagement ◽  
The Church

The refugee crisis of 2015 and 2016 and the subsequent theopolitical responses in Europe, North America, and elsewhere have been marked throughout by concerns about Islam and Muslims. The long and often uneasy relationship between Christianity and Islam has shaped European and North American responses to forced migration and has been an often unchallenged source for anti-migrant policies and rhetoric. In order for Christian theology and the church communities to offer constructive engagement within the current migration context, they must find new avenues to address and engage with Islam. This essay borrows from Jürgen Moltmann’s theopolitical interpretation of interreligious dialogue and his innovative rethinking of Christian theology in conversation with Judaism to propose that an analogous posture toward Islam be developed. It concludes by outlining the contours of a theology of witness/ shahid that offers constructive possibilities for reframing Christian–Muslim debates to better attend to its theological, political, and ethical considerations.

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