Today's post is by Rev. Dr. Jacob Dharmaraj. Rev. Dharmaraj is President of the Retired Clergy and Spouse Association of the New York Annual Conference. It is the first of a two-part series.
Part 1: The Impact of COVID-19 Upon Churches
The shopping malls are shuttered, church services suspended, places of recreation closed. COVID-19 has upended the laissez-faire in unprecedented ways. It has robbed many families of their dear ones and upended everyday life with death, fear, and anxiety.
Millions have lost their jobs, some permanently. Stock and commodity markets around the world gyrate unpredictably. Governments worldwide have reduced their benchmark interest rate which have resulted in lower fixed income for seniors who often rely on safe-haven income.
After re-evaluating the economic activities and health concerns of their citizens, leaders of many nations are in the thrall of unabashedly nationalist principles curbing multinational trade, international travel, and global migration. The doors may not open fully, even after an antibody vaccine is discovered.
The current pandemic environment is an unpleasant, alarming, and displeasing place where we do not want to be, but it is neither dystopian nor apocalyptic. COVID-19 is nonetheless a game-changer. It has already sown the seed for the evolution of new forms of worship gathering, church ministry, and mission outreach. It has spawned a three-axis disrupter to the church: its worship-style, its real estate, and its worldwide participation or partnership in mission.
The scars of this crisis will linger for years, if not decades, which will color views on using public places and congregating in large numbers. Seniors make up a significant percentage of our Sunday worship attendance. It will take a long time before they return with their generous giving.
Many parishioners may demand “virtual” services and ecclesial programs on-line, in addition to on-site services. A small group composing a dynamic worship team can garner a larger group of worshipers online than an on-site church gathering. Conversely, cross-cultural and cross-racial ministers will face an uphill battle. Several congregations, including small-town churches and service agencies, will be on a survival mode.
Since many established and start-up churches will offer worship services in cyberspace, there will be intense competition for membership, and there will be less demand for the church’s physical gathering space. Some will easily migrate from one worship setting to another.
The current crisis will reset our view of real estate, and our expectations from it. Will a massive church building be good stewardship of dwindling resources? Churches have already experienced a precipitous decline in demand for services held at their buildings, such as funerals and weddings, as more and more of them are being held in one-stop settings such as funeral homes or hotels or open-air settings.
COVID-19 is also impacting the funding of our mission partnerships. Social distancing has already disrupted fundraising efforts of churches, VIM, and mission events that are normally scheduled during spring and summer. Revenue generating programs such as daycare, summer camps, and various group activities will be adversely affected. Mega-donors and corporations may step in to fill the gap – but only to help multi-religious or Inter-faith organizations. They will promote their own agenda.
As a result, churches will have less cash revenue along with a reduction in the number of volunteers to run thrift shops, soup kitchens and engage in mid-week activities, which will weaken services to their local communities. Mission agencies and boards will have tough times keeping their doors open and programs afloat. With the cash flow much reduced, ecumenical and outreach programs will wane as well, while virtual connections remain.
Organizations that provide essential support services to groups on the front lines of issues such as human rights, social justice, poverty, environment, etc., will be heavily hit since they often run on a shoestring budget with no buffer, no cushion, and no room for error. Even if they have a sizeable endowment, they will be hit hard as their cash flow would be sub-par as the major stock index has lost a sizeable value and cut short the revenue stream. Even if the economy recovers, as recent history has proved, the recovery will only be partial for all industries.
COVID-19 will also remake academic institutions, especially seminaries and bible colleges that have already been adversely affected by dwindling resources and student enrollment. MacMurray College, a 174-year-old United Methodist-affiliated school near Springfield, Ill., announced last month that it will close in May 2020. The Chair of the board of trustees says that although the pandemic “complicated MacMurray’s financial condition,” it wasn’t the main reason for the closure.
The value of stock portfolios that several academic and church-related institutions hold has been seriously hurt. Loss of dividend income and the persistently low income from fixed securities will further crimp students’ scholarship, endowed chairs, and new faculty hiring. Fewer international students and racial-ethnic minorities would be able to attend theological schools full time as a good number of them are sponsored by church and mission agencies. Habitation rate of campus dormitories, usage of dining halls, and occupation of the classrooms will contract.
The church hierarchy’s hiring requirements will shift along with its current established boundaries: those ministerial candidates who know how to manage technology, with pleasant personalities and excellent communication skills, will succeed. More and more Schools for License for Local Pastors and Course of Study programs will be demanded by cabinets. Since those programs are totally geared towards practical aspects of church ministry, many pastoral candidates will seek that route. Resource-rich church and non-denominational groups will offer Bible Study and training programs online. Study materials will be digitized and translated into multiple languages.
Thus, the impact of the present crisis on the church will be pervasive, affecting all parts of the church and its ministry.
Dedicated to fostering conversations about the global nature of The United Methodist Church
Monday, May 4, 2020
Friday, May 1, 2020
Recommended Readings: More from Robert Hunt on the Future of Theological Education
For those readers who found interesting Robert Hunt's two-part piece earlier this week on the future of theological education ("The Future of Theological Education - Fly or Die: The Problem and Some Responses"), there's good news: Dr. Hunt has written additional pieces on the future of theological education on his personal blog, Christianity and Intercultural Encounters. He published three more thought-provoking pieces back in January:
Wednesday, April 29, 2020
Robert A. Hunt: The Future of Theological Education – Fly or Die: Some Responses
Today's post is written by Dr. Robert Hunt,
Director of Global Theological Education, Professor of Christian
Mission and Interreligious Relations, and Director of the Center for
Evangelism at Perkins School of Theology. It is the second of a two-part series. The first part can be found here.
The future of theological education will depend on it becoming truly accessible, culturally and situationally contextual, financially sustainable, and engaged in continuous partnership and dialogue with local churches and the global church. Of these, the last is first in importance because all the others can be realized only in the context of partnership and dialogue. But as the COVID 19 crisis has clarified, our structures for engaging in partnership and dialogue with the global church are deeply dependent on the convening power that US-based institutions have because of their overwhelming financial resources. Absent the ability to gather significant numbers of persons in a single place, we quickly see how fragile the infrastructure of partnership really becomes. And this is particularly true of the UMC, where almost all the power to convene was vested in General Boards and Agencies or Episcopal offices that are rapidly being defunded.
I would suggest that the conditions described above require the following:
First theological schools, and indeed all schools, will need to shift away from a campus paradigm to a systems paradigm of self-understanding. In particular, both administrators and faculty must understand that a school is essentially a learning management system, LMS, in which facilities, faculty, courses, library resources, and so on are coordinated for the benefit of the student.
COVID 19 has effectively demonstrated the truth of this statement as every function of most schools has moved into an “online” environment. The potential to exist entirely in a virtual space is one of the key characteristics of an LMS as opposed to a campus-based school. Whether it is an LMS focused on course management, such as Canvas or Blackboard, or one based on administration such a People-Soft, a focus on the LMS allows schools to re-think what [was] is essential to education rather than maintaining legacy assets. This doesn’t mean that the classic campus isn’t a valuable resource for learning, but rather that it can and must be treated as a valuable as opposed to essential resource.
Given a change in paradigm away from the campus to the LMS, theological schools must rapidly develop their competence and resourcefulness in existing and emerging forms of education through digitally mediated relationships, or DMR. “Online education” isn’t sufficiently comprehensive and is too focused on technological rather than relational competence. Seminaries can hire technicians to get them online. What they really need is to engage experts in emerging pedagogies for DMR to become competent and effective. We will need to learn the emerging psychology and sociology of the DMR environment and develop new aspects of emotional and cultural intelligence.
The capacity to engage fruitfully and to cultivate competence in DMR will serve three critical needs.
First, it will become the basis for more sustained partnerships with geographically distant theological schools and churches. Beyond the current crisis, capacity in DMR will allow us to more fully and consistently engage our partners and both learn from them and appropriately share resources with them.
Secondly, it will be the foundation of a theological education that is fully accessible not only in terms of those with disabilities but also those whose disability comes from lack of proximity. This requires more, however, than merely thinking about online teaching. 1. Students in theological schools now need personal computers and internet access as much as they telephones and library access. For this reason, theological schools have a moral obligation to ensure that as part of the aid they offer students they include personal computers and home internet access. 2. Theological schools must rapidly move beyond video-conferencing technology to the cutting edges of DMR such as VR classrooms, 360 engagement with places of pedagogical interest, and Enhanced Reality tools for learning. This technology is available now, and the failure to use it to make theological education more compelling and effective is negligence.
Third, and most importantly, competence in DMR is essential for preparing future pastors to minister in the context of DMR so that they can competently form and lead digitally mediated ministries (DMM). The theological school should and must become a laboratory for emerging ministries in which students can experiment. Courses in DMM incorporating DMR are as critical to the future of theological education as those teaching worship, preaching, evangelism, and pastoral care.
For theological education to endure through both the current crisis and the broader shifts taking place in our culture, in short, to be sustainable, it must fundamentally change its understanding of its goals and its financing.
First, it must recognize that the goal of all professional education is NOT a degree or certification, but involvement in lifelong learning in a community committed to scholarship and professional skill. Theological schools need to move students who graduate into immediate, year-round opportunities for continued engagement in learning. This will only be possible if theological schools work in partnership with the larger church to provide the types of continuing education, and certifications, critical to pastoral leadership of many types.
Closely related to this, theological schools must become intimately involved in pre-professional programs of discernment, working with college student ministries, local churches, and boards of ordained ministry to give potential pastors an opportunity to fully understand the commitments of ministry across many types of calling. Ultimately the MDiv and DMin will simply be intensifications of a process that begins in young adulthood and continues to retirement.
With this groundwork, theological schools will be able to develop more sustainable financial models. In our emerging economy, the days of paying fixed-fees for non-concrete products in need of constant upgrades are rapidly passing. We don’t buy software. We don’t even buy textbooks, we rent them. The reason for this is simple: subscriptions for services provide more reliable cash flow to those who provide such services. Theological schools must move toward a subscription model for their product, something that has already happened with most courses offered through online learning platforms.
What was formerly tuition will become a subscription for a high-level and deeply personalized teaching service. Other subscription levels might provide access to the classroom but not the teacher’s time or course credit. Another level might provide for certification in a specific skill or field of knowledge rather than a degree. Most importantly subscribers to theological education would be encouraged to maintain their subscription at an appropriate level for CEU credits after graduation. Instead of hounding alumnae for donations, theological schools should be encouraging their churches to pay for their continuing education.
Finally, theological schools will need to recognize that forming pastor-teachers, pastor-administrators, and pastor-entrepreneurs is as important as forming pastor-theologians. Teachers must know how to think, but every theological school faculty offers proof that there are thinkers who do not know how to teach. Only the embrace of the universe of pedagogies associated with engaged learning will keep theological education relevant in the emerging church and its social context. A blog post, podcast, PowerPoint deck, sermon, screenplay, video, or even board game can as easily demonstrate the capacity for critical thinking and knowledge as the standard academic essay or exam. But unlike the essay or exam, it also creates the capacity to do the work of pastoral ministry. And that is what the church needs.
The changes I’m proposing are sweeping and will be difficult to implement. They will take time. But the meteor has already struck, and we will either learn to fly or die.
The future of theological education will depend on it becoming truly accessible, culturally and situationally contextual, financially sustainable, and engaged in continuous partnership and dialogue with local churches and the global church. Of these, the last is first in importance because all the others can be realized only in the context of partnership and dialogue. But as the COVID 19 crisis has clarified, our structures for engaging in partnership and dialogue with the global church are deeply dependent on the convening power that US-based institutions have because of their overwhelming financial resources. Absent the ability to gather significant numbers of persons in a single place, we quickly see how fragile the infrastructure of partnership really becomes. And this is particularly true of the UMC, where almost all the power to convene was vested in General Boards and Agencies or Episcopal offices that are rapidly being defunded.
I would suggest that the conditions described above require the following:
First theological schools, and indeed all schools, will need to shift away from a campus paradigm to a systems paradigm of self-understanding. In particular, both administrators and faculty must understand that a school is essentially a learning management system, LMS, in which facilities, faculty, courses, library resources, and so on are coordinated for the benefit of the student.
COVID 19 has effectively demonstrated the truth of this statement as every function of most schools has moved into an “online” environment. The potential to exist entirely in a virtual space is one of the key characteristics of an LMS as opposed to a campus-based school. Whether it is an LMS focused on course management, such as Canvas or Blackboard, or one based on administration such a People-Soft, a focus on the LMS allows schools to re-think what [was] is essential to education rather than maintaining legacy assets. This doesn’t mean that the classic campus isn’t a valuable resource for learning, but rather that it can and must be treated as a valuable as opposed to essential resource.
Given a change in paradigm away from the campus to the LMS, theological schools must rapidly develop their competence and resourcefulness in existing and emerging forms of education through digitally mediated relationships, or DMR. “Online education” isn’t sufficiently comprehensive and is too focused on technological rather than relational competence. Seminaries can hire technicians to get them online. What they really need is to engage experts in emerging pedagogies for DMR to become competent and effective. We will need to learn the emerging psychology and sociology of the DMR environment and develop new aspects of emotional and cultural intelligence.
The capacity to engage fruitfully and to cultivate competence in DMR will serve three critical needs.
First, it will become the basis for more sustained partnerships with geographically distant theological schools and churches. Beyond the current crisis, capacity in DMR will allow us to more fully and consistently engage our partners and both learn from them and appropriately share resources with them.
Secondly, it will be the foundation of a theological education that is fully accessible not only in terms of those with disabilities but also those whose disability comes from lack of proximity. This requires more, however, than merely thinking about online teaching. 1. Students in theological schools now need personal computers and internet access as much as they telephones and library access. For this reason, theological schools have a moral obligation to ensure that as part of the aid they offer students they include personal computers and home internet access. 2. Theological schools must rapidly move beyond video-conferencing technology to the cutting edges of DMR such as VR classrooms, 360 engagement with places of pedagogical interest, and Enhanced Reality tools for learning. This technology is available now, and the failure to use it to make theological education more compelling and effective is negligence.
Third, and most importantly, competence in DMR is essential for preparing future pastors to minister in the context of DMR so that they can competently form and lead digitally mediated ministries (DMM). The theological school should and must become a laboratory for emerging ministries in which students can experiment. Courses in DMM incorporating DMR are as critical to the future of theological education as those teaching worship, preaching, evangelism, and pastoral care.
For theological education to endure through both the current crisis and the broader shifts taking place in our culture, in short, to be sustainable, it must fundamentally change its understanding of its goals and its financing.
First, it must recognize that the goal of all professional education is NOT a degree or certification, but involvement in lifelong learning in a community committed to scholarship and professional skill. Theological schools need to move students who graduate into immediate, year-round opportunities for continued engagement in learning. This will only be possible if theological schools work in partnership with the larger church to provide the types of continuing education, and certifications, critical to pastoral leadership of many types.
Closely related to this, theological schools must become intimately involved in pre-professional programs of discernment, working with college student ministries, local churches, and boards of ordained ministry to give potential pastors an opportunity to fully understand the commitments of ministry across many types of calling. Ultimately the MDiv and DMin will simply be intensifications of a process that begins in young adulthood and continues to retirement.
With this groundwork, theological schools will be able to develop more sustainable financial models. In our emerging economy, the days of paying fixed-fees for non-concrete products in need of constant upgrades are rapidly passing. We don’t buy software. We don’t even buy textbooks, we rent them. The reason for this is simple: subscriptions for services provide more reliable cash flow to those who provide such services. Theological schools must move toward a subscription model for their product, something that has already happened with most courses offered through online learning platforms.
What was formerly tuition will become a subscription for a high-level and deeply personalized teaching service. Other subscription levels might provide access to the classroom but not the teacher’s time or course credit. Another level might provide for certification in a specific skill or field of knowledge rather than a degree. Most importantly subscribers to theological education would be encouraged to maintain their subscription at an appropriate level for CEU credits after graduation. Instead of hounding alumnae for donations, theological schools should be encouraging their churches to pay for their continuing education.
Finally, theological schools will need to recognize that forming pastor-teachers, pastor-administrators, and pastor-entrepreneurs is as important as forming pastor-theologians. Teachers must know how to think, but every theological school faculty offers proof that there are thinkers who do not know how to teach. Only the embrace of the universe of pedagogies associated with engaged learning will keep theological education relevant in the emerging church and its social context. A blog post, podcast, PowerPoint deck, sermon, screenplay, video, or even board game can as easily demonstrate the capacity for critical thinking and knowledge as the standard academic essay or exam. But unlike the essay or exam, it also creates the capacity to do the work of pastoral ministry. And that is what the church needs.
The changes I’m proposing are sweeping and will be difficult to implement. They will take time. But the meteor has already struck, and we will either learn to fly or die.
Monday, April 27, 2020
Robert A. Hunt: The Future of Theological Education – Fly or Die: The Problem
Today's post is written by Dr. Robert Hunt,
Director of Global Theological Education, Professor of Christian
Mission and Interreligious Relations, and Director of the Center for
Evangelism at Perkins School of Theology. It is the first of a two-part series.
It hasn’t been a secret for nearly a decade that Christian theological education faces some very difficult challenges. Some of these are well documented. Over the last 30 years or so, the number of accredited theological schools has more than doubled. Independent evangelical churches have sought to reassess and, in some cases, expand the educational qualifications of their pastors by creating their own theological schools and remaining independent from established denominational seminaries and older non-denominational schools.
Yet over the last 20 years, there has been both a decline in applications for graduate-level theological education and a shift away from the Master of Divinity to shorter and more focused degree and certificate programs. These changes are driven by shifts in the understanding of Christian vocation, membership declines in mainline denominations, and the leveling of growth among independent evangelical churches.
Beneath these readily observable changes are tectonic changes in the understanding of how Christian communities are formed and live out their ministries and the growing demand for creative and innovative leadership. The artifacts of 20th century Christianity are readily observable in the form of buildings dedicated to the church, both large and small. And they still provide a model of visible Christian presence in a community. However, what these buildings house may not look like the church of their founders and obscures the existence of countless new Christian communities with no ties to either the physical or the political structures of earlier forms of Christianity.
Finally, the social and cultural setting in which churches and their leaders carry out their mission is also rapidly changing. Secularization and the rise of the “nones” are only fragments of these changes. Less noticed is that the cultural complexity of US society is both more visible and growing. The result is that diversity in social settings and organizations has become normal rather than exceptional even as Christian churches obstinately regard multi-cultural ministries as exceptional rather than normal. As importantly the shift into what is being generally called the 2nd Machine Age and the rise of “gig economy” promises to disrupt long-standing economic structures, increase unemployment, decrease wages, and turn on its head the long-standing association of human value with productivity and efficiency in American culture.
COVID 19 is only exacerbating the already developing fault lines in our culture. Humans isolated from work become vastly more dependent on Artificial Intelligences that manage both our online commerce and our communication networks. That same isolation is already accelerating development of AI technologies that replace humans in jobs that would otherwise pose a health risk to worker or customer. Robots are already replacing orderlies and cleaners in hospitals.
Our understanding of what it means to be human is changing. Yet neither theological schools nor churches have given significant attention to these changes and thus neither has an intelligible witness to the gospel in this context.
Yet just when research and reflection are most needed [just], these changes, coupled with declining financial resources and increasing desperation to create growing churches, undermine the traditional role of theological schools as centers of research in theology, Biblical interpretation, church history, and Christian ministry. Even if such research weren’t still focused on Enlightenment-era problems, as it often is, it has come to be seen as a luxury churches cannot afford as they seek pastors trained for immediately effective ministry rather than long term reflection. The concept of the pastor-theologian, which research seminaries were formed to foster, is giving way to the demand for pastor-entrepreneurs and pastor-managers that traditional seminaries are ill-equipped to meet.
And that is just in the US. In the global south where Christianity is growing rapidly, churches barely have the resources to adequately train pastors. At the same time, neither the content nor the pedagogy of Western theological training is particularly relevant or helpful. Merely exporting expertise from over-served to under-served schools is of little value and may, in fact, be toxic. In short, the rise of the global south has revealed how contextual, and limited in relevance, Western theological education really is.
Given these challenges, theological educators will need to reexamine the foundational values and purposes of their work. I would suggest that the critical values for the future will be: accessibility, cultural and situational contextualization, sustainability, and continuous partnership and dialogue.
It hasn’t been a secret for nearly a decade that Christian theological education faces some very difficult challenges. Some of these are well documented. Over the last 30 years or so, the number of accredited theological schools has more than doubled. Independent evangelical churches have sought to reassess and, in some cases, expand the educational qualifications of their pastors by creating their own theological schools and remaining independent from established denominational seminaries and older non-denominational schools.
Yet over the last 20 years, there has been both a decline in applications for graduate-level theological education and a shift away from the Master of Divinity to shorter and more focused degree and certificate programs. These changes are driven by shifts in the understanding of Christian vocation, membership declines in mainline denominations, and the leveling of growth among independent evangelical churches.
Beneath these readily observable changes are tectonic changes in the understanding of how Christian communities are formed and live out their ministries and the growing demand for creative and innovative leadership. The artifacts of 20th century Christianity are readily observable in the form of buildings dedicated to the church, both large and small. And they still provide a model of visible Christian presence in a community. However, what these buildings house may not look like the church of their founders and obscures the existence of countless new Christian communities with no ties to either the physical or the political structures of earlier forms of Christianity.
Finally, the social and cultural setting in which churches and their leaders carry out their mission is also rapidly changing. Secularization and the rise of the “nones” are only fragments of these changes. Less noticed is that the cultural complexity of US society is both more visible and growing. The result is that diversity in social settings and organizations has become normal rather than exceptional even as Christian churches obstinately regard multi-cultural ministries as exceptional rather than normal. As importantly the shift into what is being generally called the 2nd Machine Age and the rise of “gig economy” promises to disrupt long-standing economic structures, increase unemployment, decrease wages, and turn on its head the long-standing association of human value with productivity and efficiency in American culture.
COVID 19 is only exacerbating the already developing fault lines in our culture. Humans isolated from work become vastly more dependent on Artificial Intelligences that manage both our online commerce and our communication networks. That same isolation is already accelerating development of AI technologies that replace humans in jobs that would otherwise pose a health risk to worker or customer. Robots are already replacing orderlies and cleaners in hospitals.
Our understanding of what it means to be human is changing. Yet neither theological schools nor churches have given significant attention to these changes and thus neither has an intelligible witness to the gospel in this context.
Yet just when research and reflection are most needed [just], these changes, coupled with declining financial resources and increasing desperation to create growing churches, undermine the traditional role of theological schools as centers of research in theology, Biblical interpretation, church history, and Christian ministry. Even if such research weren’t still focused on Enlightenment-era problems, as it often is, it has come to be seen as a luxury churches cannot afford as they seek pastors trained for immediately effective ministry rather than long term reflection. The concept of the pastor-theologian, which research seminaries were formed to foster, is giving way to the demand for pastor-entrepreneurs and pastor-managers that traditional seminaries are ill-equipped to meet.
And that is just in the US. In the global south where Christianity is growing rapidly, churches barely have the resources to adequately train pastors. At the same time, neither the content nor the pedagogy of Western theological training is particularly relevant or helpful. Merely exporting expertise from over-served to under-served schools is of little value and may, in fact, be toxic. In short, the rise of the global south has revealed how contextual, and limited in relevance, Western theological education really is.
Given these challenges, theological educators will need to reexamine the foundational values and purposes of their work. I would suggest that the critical values for the future will be: accessibility, cultural and situational contextualization, sustainability, and continuous partnership and dialogue.
Friday, April 24, 2020
Recommended Readings: Coronavirus and social justice in the Philippines
The coronavirus pandemic has become a political and social justice issue, as well as a public health issue, in some places around the world. Among those places is the Philippines. Analysts have expressed concerns about the authoritarian approach to combatting the virus taken by Philippines President Duterte (see Article 1, Article 2, and Article 3). As in most places, restrictions on movements have had disproportionate impacts on the financial state and food security of those who rely on daily wages to buy their daily bread. Moreover, there have been instances of the government disrupting aid to the poor and even jailing those distributing the aid. The National Council of Churches in the Philippines has condemned these moves by the government.
Amid this situation, Filipino United Methodists have been expressing concern for the impacts of the virus and the government's response on the most vulnerable in Filipino society.
Deaconness Norma Dollaga has written several pieces on this theme. She has lifted up the need for food for the poor amidst the crisis and the necessity of incorporating social justice into the government's response to the pandemic.
Dollaga has also reported on an Easter Sunday visit by her organization, DAMBANA (Damayahan Simbahan sa Panahon ng Disaster), and the Promotion of Church People’s Response to an impoverished area of Manila impacted by the pandemic. Relatedly, Prof. Lizette Galima Tapia-Raquel highlighted the plight of the poor and oppressed in her Easter message for the Promotion of Church People's Response.
Deaconness Darlene Marquez-Caramanzana has pointed out the intersection of social distancing restrictions and privilege.
Gladys Mangiduyos, writing for UMNS, has shared a story about United Methodist pastors facing increased government harassment while in quarantine for their social justice work.
Amid this situation, Filipino United Methodists have been expressing concern for the impacts of the virus and the government's response on the most vulnerable in Filipino society.
Deaconness Norma Dollaga has written several pieces on this theme. She has lifted up the need for food for the poor amidst the crisis and the necessity of incorporating social justice into the government's response to the pandemic.
Dollaga has also reported on an Easter Sunday visit by her organization, DAMBANA (Damayahan Simbahan sa Panahon ng Disaster), and the Promotion of Church People’s Response to an impoverished area of Manila impacted by the pandemic. Relatedly, Prof. Lizette Galima Tapia-Raquel highlighted the plight of the poor and oppressed in her Easter message for the Promotion of Church People's Response.
Deaconness Darlene Marquez-Caramanzana has pointed out the intersection of social distancing restrictions and privilege.
Gladys Mangiduyos, writing for UMNS, has shared a story about United Methodist pastors facing increased government harassment while in quarantine for their social justice work.
Wednesday, April 22, 2020
UMVIM: We Are Still in Mission!
Today’s post is by Rev. Dr. Tammy Kuntz. Rev. Dr. Kuntz is Coordinator of United Methodist Volunteers in Mission (UMVIM), North Central Jurisdiction. It is a response to David W. Scott's post, "COVID-19, Travel, Zoom, and the Future of United Methodist Mission."
Yes, World, We are still in mission!
While the COVID-19 pandemic has forced us into stay-at-home and self-quarantine, we know that United Methodists continue to serve their neighbors. Masks and gloves have replaced hammers and saws as people shift their skills to provide food and necessary daily-living supplies to their communities. Those with sewing machines are moving beyond school bags and Days for Girls kits to making masks. Volunteers in Mission (VIM) work with the United Methodist Committee on Relief (UMCOR) to respond quickly to the needs of their neighbors following tornadoes in alternative ways as directed by each annual conference. We are still in mission. It just looks different.
Yes, the number of short-term teams has dropped off. Project sites have suspended operations, international borders are closed, and airlines have cancelled flights. However, there are still stories to tell. Previous mission engagements are shared through web sites and social media connections with team members. We are still telling the story. It just looks different.
Some project site directors are offering a virtual mission journey. We can still share in the good work happening at Give Ye Them to Eat and Bahamas Methodist Habitat. More of these missions will be available in the coming weeks. We are still serving. It just looks different.
Teams, districts, and conferences partnering with mission sites in the US and around the world are connecting and gaining an understanding of the concerns for the future. The cancellation of teams means a reduction of income as well as an inability to meet the needs of the community. This is evidenced in the Michigan-Haiti Partnership previously referenced. We are still partnering. It just looks different.
Yes, our international partners may realize that they have been relying too heavily on US short-term mission teams. People are coming together for their own communities, meeting the need of neighbors, and offering skills they may not have realized they had. After all, when we share in God’s mission, we know that we are there to meet the needs of the community, not serve our own expectations of what need to be done. (I John 3:16-18) remembering that the most important task is the one we have just been given. We are still serving God in the world. It just looks different.
There is no doubt that the mission field will look different when the world emerges from this pandemic. We will still be in mission. It will just look different.
Rev. Dr. Tammy Kuntz, Volunteers in Mission North Central Jurisdiction
Rev. Tom Lank, Volunteers in Mission Northeastern Jurisdiction
Karen Distefano, Volunteers in Mission South Central Jurisdiction
Ronda Cordill, Volunteers in Mission Western Jurisdiction
Rev. Matt Lacey, Volunteers in Mission Southeastern Jurisdiction
Gray Gambrell, Volunteers in Mission Southeastern Jurisdiction
Yes, World, We are still in mission!
While the COVID-19 pandemic has forced us into stay-at-home and self-quarantine, we know that United Methodists continue to serve their neighbors. Masks and gloves have replaced hammers and saws as people shift their skills to provide food and necessary daily-living supplies to their communities. Those with sewing machines are moving beyond school bags and Days for Girls kits to making masks. Volunteers in Mission (VIM) work with the United Methodist Committee on Relief (UMCOR) to respond quickly to the needs of their neighbors following tornadoes in alternative ways as directed by each annual conference. We are still in mission. It just looks different.
Yes, the number of short-term teams has dropped off. Project sites have suspended operations, international borders are closed, and airlines have cancelled flights. However, there are still stories to tell. Previous mission engagements are shared through web sites and social media connections with team members. We are still telling the story. It just looks different.
Some project site directors are offering a virtual mission journey. We can still share in the good work happening at Give Ye Them to Eat and Bahamas Methodist Habitat. More of these missions will be available in the coming weeks. We are still serving. It just looks different.
Teams, districts, and conferences partnering with mission sites in the US and around the world are connecting and gaining an understanding of the concerns for the future. The cancellation of teams means a reduction of income as well as an inability to meet the needs of the community. This is evidenced in the Michigan-Haiti Partnership previously referenced. We are still partnering. It just looks different.
Yes, our international partners may realize that they have been relying too heavily on US short-term mission teams. People are coming together for their own communities, meeting the need of neighbors, and offering skills they may not have realized they had. After all, when we share in God’s mission, we know that we are there to meet the needs of the community, not serve our own expectations of what need to be done. (I John 3:16-18) remembering that the most important task is the one we have just been given. We are still serving God in the world. It just looks different.
There is no doubt that the mission field will look different when the world emerges from this pandemic. We will still be in mission. It will just look different.
Rev. Dr. Tammy Kuntz, Volunteers in Mission North Central Jurisdiction
Rev. Tom Lank, Volunteers in Mission Northeastern Jurisdiction
Karen Distefano, Volunteers in Mission South Central Jurisdiction
Ronda Cordill, Volunteers in Mission Western Jurisdiction
Rev. Matt Lacey, Volunteers in Mission Southeastern Jurisdiction
Gray Gambrell, Volunteers in Mission Southeastern Jurisdiction
Monday, April 20, 2020
Recommended Reading on Differing Cultural Understandings of Disease
Rev. Esther Inuwa, an intern for Church and Society, has written a post on Church and Society's website entitled "A United Methodist Reflections on COVID-19 in Nigeria." While the post can be read for its connection to the current pandemic, it is most insightful as a window into the ways in which disease is understood differently and therefore produces different responses in a non-Western culture than in Western culture. Rev. Inuwa, a native of Nigeria currently studying in the US, is to be commended for her informed and accessible depiction of Nigerian cultural understandings of disease, understandings that differ significantly from those common in the United States. Last week, I recommended the work of Hofstede and Meyer on differing cultural values. Rev. Inuwa adds a significant element to that discussion of cultural differences. They are not just about values but about the mental schemas that people use to make sense of the world around them. Rev. Inuwa's piece therefore further shows the challenge of being an international, intercultural church.
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