The Unshakable Kingdom: The Life and Ministry of Paul Berron (1887–1970)

Paul Berron was a singular missionary, a missionary ‘in between’ cultures and nations. He lived and worked not only between his European roots and the field of mission he organised in Syria and Lebanon, but also between two European countries, France and Germany, then involved in a harsh conflict. His experience as an Alsatian and his Christian commitment enabled him to sympathise with the fate of the Armenian survivors of the genocide of 1915. He maintained close links with Christians in the Netherlands, Switzerland, and other nations, involving them in the work of the emerging Action Chrétienne en Orient. To him, mission was not only a work in distant countries, but began at home, especially among newcomers to Europe. In his writings he reflected on nationalism, culture, providence and the church, developing a unique and early expression of ecumenical missiology.

AKTUALISASI PENDIDIKAN AGAMA KRISTEN DALAM GEREJA SEBAGAI DASAR PELAKSANAAN MISI

Christian Religious Education is a strong, firm, and fundamental Christian commitment in church ministry. If the church ignores teaching, then the church becomes static, lives in ignorance of faith, and means nothing. The task of the church is to equip and teach the members of the congregation to remain faithful to God and carry out his commands. This task remains relevant and must be continuously updated according to the demands of needs, developments, challenges, and contexts. With education, the church helps believers so that they can live as disciples of Christ, be able to apply their faith in daily life, and make Christian Religious Education the basis for carrying out missions. A person's spiritual growth does not occur because of his status as a Christian, or because of his faithfulness to follow church services. Therefore, the entire existence of the church in its ministry must be centered on planned and continuous teaching.

Do Christian Counselors Show More Empathy Toward Christian Clients Than Secular Clients? An Examination of the Relations Between Counselors’ Empathy and Counselor–Client Similarity in Christian Commitment

This study investigated the association between counselors’ Christian beliefs and their counseling. One hundred fifty-eight participants, including 13 counselors and 145 counselors-in-training who were assessed for levels of Christian commitment, were randomly assigned to view one of two versions of a videotape (i.e., a client with or without Christian commitment) and respond in writing to the client’s problem. Two trained raters (i.e., a licensed counselor and an advanced counseling intern) evaluated counselors’ levels of empathy. Counselors with low and high levels of Christian commitment showed similar levels of empathy for non-Christian and Christian clients, while counselors with moderate levels of Christian commitment showed more empathy for Christian clients. The implications of these findings and directions for future research are discussed.

Dimensi Sosial Ekaristi Yohanes Paulus II dan Benediktus XVI

Concerns that arise currently are the development of a culture of hatred, the fading of a culture of love, secularism and social injustice. In the midst of that situation, the Church stands as a concrete manifestation of the face of God's love in the middle of the world. In the Ecclesia de Eucharistia encyclical, John Paul II asserted that the eschatological character emphasize the Christian commitment to the world, especially establish the social life order (cf. EE 20). The Eucharistic dimension of the Eucharist implies that the world order must be transformed as a form of participation towards fulfillment at the end of time. Whereas in the Apostolic Exhortation Sacramentum Caritatis, Benedict XVI, asserted that the Eucharist celebration brings our whole lives into spiritual worship that pleases to God (cf SCar 70). From this research, it is known that the Eucharistic social dimension becomes a spirit of love culture according to the writer. This love culture finds its source and power in the Eucharist. Through the celebration of the Eucharist, people are mystically united with Christ. In the light of the theology of the Eucharistic social dimension of John Paul II and Benedict XVI, mystical union with Christ refers to the oneness of God's thankfulness to the fulfillment of the last days (cf. John 15:13).

Can I Believe?

Maybe Christianity is actually true. Maybe it is what believers say it is. But at least two problems make the thoughtful person hesitate. First, there are so many other options. How could one possibly make one’s way through them to anything like a rational and confident conclusion? Second, why do so many people choose to be Christian in the face of so many reasons not to be Christian? Yes, many people grow up in Christian homes and in societies, but many more do not. Yet Christianity has become the most popular religion in the world. Why? This book begins by taking on the initial challenge as it outlines a process: how to think about religion in a responsible way, rather than settling for such soft vagaries as “faith” and “feeling.” It then clears away a number of misunderstandings from the basic story of the Christian religion, misunderstandings that combine to domesticate this startling narrative and thus to repel reasonable people who might otherwise be intrigued. The second half of the book looks at Christian commitment positively and negatively. Why do two billion people find this religion to be persuasive, thus making it the most popular “explanation of everything” in human history? At the same time, how does Christianity respond to the fact that so many people find it utterly implausible, especially because of its narrow insistence on “just one way to God,” and because of the problem of evil that seems to undercut everything it asserts? Grounded in scholarship but never ponderous, Can I Believe? takes on the hard questions as it welcomes the intelligent inquirer to give Christianity at least one good look.

Integrating Theology and Social Science to Uncover How Childhood Experiences Contribute to Christian Commitment in Young Adulthood

Christian educators seek to understand how each life stage influences the next. Social science has found that the childhood years are filled with experiences that contribute to spirituality in young adulthood. This article seeks to understand these possible experiences by examining the biblical and theological aspects of childhood religious education and then integrating them with social science. Conclusions reveal three findings in regards to the connection between childhood experiences and young adult spiritualty: (1) understanding God’s larger narrative, (2) enhancing Christian identity, and (3) developing godly character.

Childhood Significant Experiences that Contribute to Christian Commitment in Young Adulthood

Childhood experiences are significant to adult spirituality. Understanding these influential experiences can assist professors of Christian education as they seek to empower future children’s ministry workers. This article seeks to understand how childhood experiences influence adult spirituality. In-depth interviews and grounded theory were utilized on 21 participants between 22 and 30 years old. Results from this study created seven themes revealing the childhood experiences that contribute to Christian commitment in young adulthood.

‘Woman Seems to Be Given Her Proper Place’: Western Women’s Encounter with Sikh Women 1809–2012

Over a period of two centuries, western women—travellers, army wives, administrators’ wives, missionaries, teachers, artists and novelists—have been portraying their Sikh counterparts. Commentary by over eighty European and north American ‘lay’ women on Sikh religion and society complements—and in most cases predates—publications on Sikhs by twentieth and twenty-first century academics, but this literature has not been discussed in the field of Sikh studies. This article looks at the women’s ‘wide spectrum of gazes’ encompassing Sikh women’s appearance, their status and, in a few cases, their character, and including their reactions to the ‘social evils’ of suttee and female infanticide. Key questions are, firstly, whether race outweighs gender in the western women’s account of their Sikh counterparts and, secondly, whether 1947 is a pivotal date in their changing attitudes. The women’s words illustrate their curious gaze as well as their varying judgements on the status of Sikh women and some women’s exercise of sympathetic imagination. They characterise Sikh women as, variously, helpless, deferential, courageous, resourceful and adaptive, as well as (in one case) ‘ambitious’ and ‘unprincipled’. Their commentary entails both implicit and explicit comparisons. In their range of social relationships with Sikh women, it appears that social class, Christian commitment, political stance and national origin tend to outweigh gender. At the same time, however, it is women’s gender that allows access to Sikh women and makes befriending—and ultimately friendship—possible.

Total Commitment

This chapter explores the strategies used in finance-dominated capitalism to ensure worker compliance with company demands, using mechanisms of fear, hope of external reward, self-evacuation, and the convergence of employee desires with that of the company. It will contrast these strategies, point by point, with the way in which commitment to God is related to more mundane commitments. Attention is drawn to the way Christian commitment imitates at a critical remove the enterprise self of contemporary capitalism.