German Protestants in the Moslavina and Bilogora Regions - Part II

The article researches the migrations of German Protestants in the area of Moslavina and Bilogora after the issuing of the Protestant Patent and religious liberalization in the second half of the 19th century. First, we research the regional background of the settlers (colonists), and we go on to follow the development of their church communities and parishes. After this, we describe the specific settlements with an absolute or relative German Protestant majority, as well as the historical circumstances of their church organization. Finally, we use sources, literature, and oral history (i.e., interviews) as we research the processes of migration and evacuation of German settlers and Protestants from those parts, as well as the destinies of their pastors and preachers during and after WWII. Due to the scope of the research, the article was divided into two parts. In part 1, the emphasis was on migrations, the settlers’ confessional background, and the founding of the first two large parishes in the region. In part 2, we will describe other parishes and their branches, their development, and stages of abandonment, as well as the description of their final spiritual workers’ activities.

Medieval/Christian Nubia

“Christian Nubia” is a term that describes the cultures that developed south of Egypt roughly between the 5th and 15th centuries ce. Although it is often also called “medieval Nubia,” its major characteristic is Christianity, practiced by Nubian-speaking peoples living in at least three kingdoms, namely, Nobadia, Makuria, and Alwa. Very little is known about Alwa, both because of limited archaeological research in the region and due to the focus of written sources on Nobadia and Makuria, which were closer to Egypt. What is known about the Christian Nubian kingdoms suggests that they were heavily influenced by their northern neighbor. In the first centuries of the medieval era, Nubia received the Christian faith and church organization of Byzantine Egypt, and its church was subsequently subordinated to the Coptic Patriarchate of Alexandria. After the Arab conquest of Egypt, the relations between the Caliphate and Makuria were defined by an agreement called the Baqt, which was signed after a failed siege of the Makuritan capital in 651–652. The Fatimid period of Egypt coincided with the apogee of Christian Nubian civilization, while the arrival of the Ayyubids in the 12th century broke with a long-standing tradition of relatively peaceful coexistence. Interventions from the north increased under the Mamluks, particularly due to internal strife and dynastic conflicts in Nubia itself. After two tumultuous centuries, Muslim rulers took over the throne of Old Dongola, the capital of Makuria. Bedouins then pushed the centers of Christian authority to the peripheries of Makuria and to centers in northern Nubia, such as Qasr Ibrim and Gebel Adda, where the last Christian Nubian king is attested in an inscription in Old Nubian dating from 1483. Soba, the capital of Alwa and perhaps the largest city of Nubia, was also in ruins by the early 16th century, as witnessed by European travelers to the region.

Epistle of Pope Zosimus to Hesychius, Bishop of Salona

Настоящая работа включает в себя перевод с латинского языка послания римского папы Зосима епископу Салоны (Далмация) Исихию (418 г.), а также вступительную статью и историко-филологический комментарий. Текст написан в ответ на обращение Исихия к Римской кафедре. Салонский епископ стремится заручиться поддержкой апостольского престола в борьбе против практики поставления в епископы и пресвитеры мирян и монахов, не прошедших все ступени церковно- и священнослужения. Папа одобряет позицию Исихия и описывает cursus honorumклирика. Послание содержит сведения о развитии церковного строя в Западном Иллирике и идеи римского первенства в позднеантичный период. This work includes a translation from Latin of the epistle of Pope Zosimus to Bishop of Salona Hesychius (418), as well as an introductory article and historical and philological commentaries. The text was written in response to the appeal of Hesychius to the Roman see. The Bishop of Salona seeks to receive the support of the Apostolic See in his struggle against the practice of ordination of laymen and monks (who have not passed all levels of ecclesiastical ministry) as bishops and presbyters. The Pope approves the position of Hesychius and describes step by step the cleric's cursus honorum. The epistle also contains information about the development of the church organization in Western Illyricum and of the idea of ​​Roman primacy in the period of Late Antiquity.

Analisis Eksistensi 100 Tahun Gereja Pantekosta Di Indonesia (GPdI)

Currently, a church that wants to develop effectively needs to have an organizational structure that can accommodate the church’s missions and dynamically able to keep up with changing situations. The problem is, the Bible does not clearly record the organization of the church, so the church is often seen as an organism and tends to ignore organizational aspects. On the other hand, placing church as an organization alone will cause a declinein its divine nature as the body of Christ. This article aims to analyze the Pentecostal Church in Indonesia (GPdI), which in 2021 commemorate 100 years in Indonesia since their early start. The research was conducted qualitatively by anayzing content literatureof the GPdI's Memorandum of Association/Articles of Association (AD/ART), finding the biblical basis as well as theconceptual review of Organizational Development Theory. This article tries to present the relevance of church development and the concept of Organizational Development theory. The results of this study can be used as a parameter to map the condition of the church organization and an evaluation indicator to anticipate sustainable development efforts. Abstrak Indonesia Saat ini gereja yang ingin berkembang secara efektif perlu memiliki tatanan organisasi yang dapat mengakomodasi misi gereja dan secara dinamis mampu mengikuti perubahan situasi. Masalahnya, Alkitab tidak mencatat secara jelas hal pengorganisasian gereja, sehingga gereja sering dipandang sebagai organisme dan cenderung mengabaikan aspek organisasi. Di sisi lain, menempatkan gereja sebagai organisasi saja dapat menyebabkan kemerosotan kodrat ilahinya sebagai tubuh Kristus. Artikel ini bertujuan untuk menganalisis Gereja Pantekosta di Indonesia (GPdI) yang pada tahun 2021 memperingati 100 tahun di Indonesia sejak awal dirintis. Penelitian dilakukan secara kualitatif dengan analisis konten literatur yang mengkaji isi Anggaran Dasar dan Anggaran Rumah Tangga GPdI, menemukan landasan biblikalnya serta tinjauan konseptual Teori Pengembangan Organisasi. Artikel ini mencoba menyajikan relevansi perkembangan gereja dan konsep teori Pengembangan Organisasi.Hasil penelitian ini dapat dijadikan parameter untuk memetakan kondisi organisasi gereja dan menjadi indikator evaluasi mengantisipasi upaya pengembangan yang berkelanjutan.

The Church, Food Culture, and Ecotheology: An Ongoing Church Effort to Reduce Bushmeat Eating in Minahasa, Indonesia

Minahasa is a Christian-majority region in the Muslim-majority country of Indonesia. Most of the Minahasan people are meat consumers, with an increased consumption rate during festive seasons. Unfortunately, during these seasons, the consumption of non-cattle animals such as wild animals also increases. This eating style was reported to be related to the high prevalence of metabolic diseases in this area. In this paper, we report the effort of the largest church organization in Minahasa to promote healthy eating habits among its congregation, which comprises the majority of the society of the region. More recently, the church has also been incorporating the values of wild animal conservation in its programs in collaboration with a local non-government organization. This ongoing unique phenomenon might serve as a unique example of how a church organization can be involved in public and planetary health as a part of its mission to preach the gospel to every creature.

Africanization of Christianity: Henry Venn’s indigenization of Christianity

The history of Christianity has always been a two-way process of transformation in any given culture. Christianity and paganism are reciprocal; Christianity is necessary for revelation to be fulfilled, but the actual quality of this fulfillment depends upon the quality of the religious man transformed by revelation. Christianity, as a result of this, needs a natural religion, the same way it needs all human realities as the sole mission is to save what has first been created. The link between Gospel and culture is that Gospel whenever its introduced and established in a new culture, is “transposed” in a particular way a sweet melody into a new key. Moreover, the Gospel, when transposed from its biblical world to other cultural worlds, undergoes change itself as well as causing these other worlds to change. Crowther created an astonishing impact and contribution after his consecration in 1864; as he strived to indigenize or Africanize Christianity to make it possible for the Christian faith to be accepted by Africans without having to give up or disown their cultural values. This work seeks to find what part Henry Venn, the dynamic and accomplished secretary of the Church Missionary Society, played to see how Christian faith can go well together or combine with African beliefs and practices to produce Christianity which may become a religion for Africans. This work has shown that Henry Venn's ideas on native Church organization include: the native Church needs the ablest native pastors for its fuller development and that it should be under a native bishop and that a native Church is organized as a national institution. This work adopted a qualitative method that used historical and content analysis. This work concluded that for the Africanization of Christianity to be actualized, African Church must have its liturgy or incorporate what was good of the native religions to develop an authentically African Christianity. And that reducing the various African vernaculars into writing and developing native literature was a first step in the reforming movement toward Africanization of Christianity; just as Venn urged Crowther to undertake the translation of the Bible into Yoruba and to preach in Yoruba even while still at Freetown.

German Protestants in the Moslavina and Bilogora Regions

The article researches the migrations of German Protestants in the area of Moslavina and Bilogora after the issuing of the Protestant Patent and religious liberalization in the second half of the 19th century. First, we research the regional background of the settlers (colonists), and we go on to follow the development of their church communities and parishes. After this, we describe the specific settlements with an absolute or relative German Protestant majority, as well as the historical circumstances of their church organization. Finally, we use sources, literature, and oral history (i.e., interviews) as we research the processes of migration and evacuation of German settlers and Protestants from those parts, as well as the destinies of their pastors and preachers during and after WWII. Due to the scope of the research, the article was divided into two parts. In part 1, the emphasis is on migrations, the settlers’ confessional background, and the founding of the first two large parishes in the region, and after that, we describe other parishes and their branches, their development, and stages of abandonment, as well as the description of their final spiritual workers’ activities.

RUSSIAN CHURCH DIVISION AND RELIGIOUS INTOLERANCE

The article focuses on the origins and further evolution of the Church Schism in Russia as well as on the legal status of the representatives of the Old Believers in Russia. Church reforms initiated by patriarch Nikon and the local Church Council in 1666-1667 banned all elements of the old Russian church tradition and outlawed Old Believers. Russian legislation viewed Old Believers as church and state criminals. However, in spite of strong discrimination from state and official church, Old Believers remained mostly loyal to Russian state. Gradual improvement of the legal status of the Old Believers started in XVIII century. Decree on religious tolerance issued by the emperor Nikolas II on 17 April, 1905, proclaimed Old Believers as legally recognized church organization.

Development of School Education in South Ossetia in the XIX-early XX Centuries

After the annexation of Ossetia to the Russian Empire, the formation of national education begins. The decisive factor here was that the origins of the formation of the Ossetian school were national cadres – people’s educators and clergy. The process of formation of education was particularly difficult on the territory of South Ossetia. This was due to a number of reasons, the main of which was the geography of the region almost entirely consisting of mountainous terrain. Another negative factor was that the teaching was conducted in Georgian (unlike in North Ossetia), Russian was less accessible here. The development of school education in South Ossetia went along with the revival of the Church organization, since all the first schools were built at churches (parochial) and the first teachers were clergymen. The learning process was mainly limited to the study of the Georgian and Russian alphabets, as well as the Law of God with the study of prayers in the Georgian language. The development of national school education was initiated by the Ossetian spiritual Commission (The First (established in Tiflis in 1816), and then the Second), which is associated with the construction of the first schools in South Ossetia. The first school was Java, then Cheselt, Bekmar and Yedys, built in four different districts of the region in 1826. Large-scale school construction here begins only in the second half of the XIX century and is associated with the Society for the restoration of Orthodox Christianity in the Caucasus. This Society, which replaced the second Ossetian Spiritual Commission, abolished in 1867, existed until 1917. School affairs were also part of her department. It is noteworthy that in South Ossetia, women’s education appears almost simultaneously with men’s, but, unlike the latter, all open schools for girls, after a short time, ceased to function. Later, in addition to parochial schools, so-called Ministerial schools (i.e. secular schools of the Ministry of public education) appeared. The first (Ministerial) school was opened in Tskhinvali in 1881. The entire school network of South Ossetia before the revolution consisted of 28 parochial and Ministerial schools and one “higher primary school”, covering 1,896 students.