Recommended Viewing: Global Discipleship Webinars

Earlier this year, Discipleship Ministries hosted a series of six Global Discipleship Webinars featuring United Methodist leaders from around the world talking about ministry in their contexts. Videos from several of those webinars are available on Discipleship Ministries' website. In particular, videos from the following webinars are available:

Discipleship and Community Engagement in a Post-Christian Society with Rev. Barry Sloan

This webinar talks about Rev. Sloan's work in Germany

Discipleship Among Immigrant and Diaspora Communities with Rev. Jonavern Lungub

This webinar talks about Rev. Lungub's work with Filipino and African immigrant communities in the Gulf States of the Middle East.

Discipleship and Evangelism in a Christian-Minority Country with Rev. Lun Sophy and Rev. Andrew Lee

This webinar talks about Methodism in Cambodia, which is a fruit of joint ministry by The United Methodist Church, the Korean Methodist Church, the Methodist Church of Singapore, and the World Federation of Chinese Methodist Churches.

It is hoped that Discipleship Ministries will post the other webinar videos as well.

I found the conversation about immigrant groups in the Middle East particularly interesting, since it represents a growing area of United Methodism, but one that is beyond the experience and outside the information streams of most United Methodists in the United States.

Recommended Reading: United Methodist Church-Planting in the Middle East

The Institute on Religion & Development's (IRD's) John Lomperis recently published an article on IRD's blog about Filipino United Methodist migrants planting churches in the Middle East, where they live as laborers. While Lomperis begins the article with polemical remarks about American ecclesio-political fights, most of the article is a description of the context and work of these Filipino United Methodists, including observations from a trip Lomperis took to visit some of them.

I found Lomperis' article interesting as another example of the ways in which mission, especially when combined with migration, bypasses and even at times subverts formal church structures. (This blog has shared other such examples, including this recent article.) Lomperis notes that the mission work that these Filipino United Methodists are engaged in is not supported by any formal structure of the denomination and is not part of the standard geographic units of the denomination.

Bill Mefford: A Litany for Persecuted Christians in the Middle East

Today's post is contributed by Dr. Bill Mefford. Dr. Mefford is Faith Outreach Specialist for Americans United for the Separation of Church and State. Prior to that position, he was Director of Civil and Human Rights at the General Board of Church and Society (GBCS). His post takes the form of a litany calling for justice for persecuted Christians in the Middle East.

With great concern and sadness we recognize the persecution of our brothers and sisters in Christ happening throughout the world, particularly in the Middle East, the birthplace of Christianity. Like many religious groups in the region, Christians have been forced to endure civil wars and unrest as groups vie for control. In addition, Christians have been targeted for persecution from Islamic extremist groups that have arisen in the chaos across the Middle East.

The percentage of Christians living in the Middle East has declined precipitously in recent years due to regional unrest, the collapse of national governments and ensuing economic turmoil, and targeted persecution from violent Islamic extremists. The factors creating unrest in this area of the world are complex. We doubt there is a single solution that will bring peace.

We are especially aggrieved by the persecution our sisters and brothers in Christ are facing. The United Methodist Church has long stood against religious persecution and urges “policies and practices that ensure the right of every religious group to exercise its faith free from legal, political, or economic restrictions.” (2012 Book of Discipline 162-C)

We call for an end to blasphemy laws that curtail the full expressions of faith for all people including Christians. We call for all nations to abide by article 18 of The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which states, “Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.”

We recognize that in many nations, unrest or even civil war have made protection of religious minorities difficult. Without governmental protections, fair and effective law enforcement does not exist. Thus, religious minorities have become targets of extremist violence. Civil society, including religious and faith-based bodies, thrive under conditions of democratic transparency and inclusion.

We call for all people to promote religious freedom wherever they reside, and to abstain from religious discrimination of any kind. All religions must be wary that their interpretations of their sacred texts and teachings do not allow discrimination and violence.

We urge United Methodists to pray for our persecuted brothers and sisters in Christ for “when one member of the Body suffers, all suffer.” (1 Corinthians 12:26)

We urge President Obama, as we do all world leaders, to make religious freedom a prominent part of their diplomacy with all nations, particularly with nations in the Middle East.

We call on all nations to protect religious minorities and to allow for the full expression of religious beliefs for all of their citizens.

Kale Yu: Speaking for the Persecuted

Today's post is written by Dr. K. Kale Yu. Dr. Yu is a Lecturer in the Religion Department at High Point University, a United Methodist-affiliated institution.

On June 30, 2016, The New York Times reported that ISIS claimed responsibility for the killing of a Coptic Christian priest in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula. The Rev. Rafael Moussa, 46, had earlier left a church in the area where he attended a church service before being gunned down on the streets. He died instantly after being shot in the head. In a message distributed on social media, the Islamic State called Moussa as a “disbelieving combatant.” The killing of Moussa represents the latest in a long line of violence against Christians in the Global South. Reports indicate that such violence has intensified in recent years.

In predominantly Muslim Egypt, Christians, who make up about 10 percent of the population, live as a minority and endure social prejudice and workplace discrimination. The experience of Coptic Christians in Egypt is not unusual for many Christian communities in the Global South as living as a minority and marginalized faith remains a constant. This means that such Christian communities have to embrace the stark reality that simply professing oneself a Christian courts social and legal discrimination, incarceration, and even death. As the discourse on missiology shifts to non-Western regions, many Christian communities in the Global South are linked by tenuous, existential bonds of Christian affiliation and devotion while enduring at the same time hostility not unlike the conditions facing early Christian communities that were perceived as threats to the governmental and religious authorities. For many parts of the Global South today, declaring oneself a Christian often entails a conscious commitment to a faith that threatens not only their personal security but also the livelihood of their family and relatives.

The recent shooting of Rev. Rafael Moussa exposes the challenges of developing a hermeneutical understanding in the theology of missions. Many Christians in the Global South must learn to navigate the perilous water of being a Christian in a hostile environment where enduring potential persecution remains a crucial element in one’s self-understanding of his or her Christian faith. Often relying on a hermeneutical process tied to human reasoning, Western missiological perspectives, however, generate little discussion on the unwanted yet undeniable offensive reaction the Gospel produces in many communities in the Global South. For Christians living in hostile environments, abiding in Christ comes at a cost. As militants in the Global South marshal their forces—military and ideological—into a combat position against Christian communities, vigilance against attacks has become the benchmark of their Christian experience.

In the shift of focus to the Global South, our missiological understanding of the Christian witness and the missionary nature of the church must explain not only the simple reality of the pitfalls that come with Christian faith but also equip believers with methodologies to navigate through societies that labels them as “disbelieving combatants.” The absence in speaking, clarifying, or guiding believers in what is becoming heightened antagonism toward Christians in the Global South underscores the incomprehensibility of evil, and it also points to the inadequacy of missiological approaches to convey the realities and magnitude of developing events in the Global South. The silence on this topic is not confined to Western missiologists, but extend to Christian leaders in the West who feel discomfort in broaching the issue altogether, as if it undermines the edifice of Christian conceptualization. Perhaps the baggage of colonialism continues to weigh on Western missiologists and engaging the subject does not fit within intellectual framework, but we are reminded that many Christians in the Global South live in a fraught existential nature that demands our attention at a most crucial time.