VERSE
Fandel, John
the individual (in a Western Christian setting) is suggested here for each and every separate cultural group. Thus, a Christian missionary is to enter into the new culture, read, listen and...
...its objective is to allow the Kingdom of God to be realized on earth with all the beauty of the diversity of the human family...
...The Christian missionary, as we have seen from the documents of Vatican II, does not come on primarily as an exorcist driving out the Devil in a pagan culture...
...For example, what role does sin play in the imagination, the literature, the rites, the realities of this particular culture...
...Its rationale is being developed...
...But let the discovery of the sense of sin proceed without prejudice or prejudgment...
...The fourth task is the positive building up of the Kingdom within the cultural group...
...Among the Aymara in southern Peru there is a long tradition of community reconciliation...
...First is the task of discovery...
...This tradition, then, may become the setting for the Sacrament of Reconciliation...
...Is it unjust economic and social structures (as Liberation Theology is wont to say...
...There is only Greek Christianity, Western European Christianity, Italian Catholicism, Irish Catholicism, the Catholicism of Latin America...
...This, then, leads to the third task: that of critique and refinement...
...Bad syncretism occurs when Christian teachers (either consciously or unconsciously) try to pretend it does not exist...
...The Word became incarnate thoroughly in Christ and thoroughly in the Semitic-Hebraic culture of the time...
...To build up a genuine local living Christian community one must do more than construct theoretically a local theology...
...Christ is not one avatar among innumerable many as in the Hindu pantheon...
...That is to say, the mere introduction of African drums and dance in the Roman liturgy may be nothing more than a form of accommodation...
...To paraphrase Geertz, we should not look for Christ "behind," "under," or "beyond" his culture, but Christ is to be discovered "in" his culture...
...In Japan, perhaps, the ceremonial tea service could well serve as the setting for the Eucharist...
...Berger's extreme example is that of cannibalism...
...Along with the discovery of some sense of God, sin, grace, Christ, redemption and kingdom in a particular culture, there is the second task of support and encouragement...
...There is bad and good syncretism...
...only then will the sense of grace, redemption and the need of a Savior make sense to the people in that culture...
...But the task of critique and refinement must be done with great prudence and skill ~to bring this local Christian community in line with the larger Christian tradition and within the larger "catholic" Christian community...
...In the authentic setting of the people's own traditional mode of realizing reconciliation among themselves, they will become aware that the very Son of God is present among them in word and action forgiving them their sins and effecting healing and grace within their community...
...Syncretism has always been a dirty word in missiology, but in this context the best theory and strategy (adopted by Robert Schreiter in his course at Catholic Theological Union in Chicago) is to admit openly that some form of syncretism has always happened and is always necessary...
...Commonweal: 719...
...Surely many societies do not find evil in polygamy, concubinage and in many other practices Western Christendom has traditionally classified as immoral...
...Thus, a Christian missionary is to enter into the new culture, read, listen and study its "messages"mits in~er meaningmand discover within the culture how God, sin, grace, Christ, redemption and kingdom are already present (in germ) within that culture...
...It is here that we see that historically, existentially, there is no pure abstract Christianity...
...This would be an example of how Christ must be discovered and built up among an indigenous cultural group...
...That is to say, how do these people perceive evil (along the lines of Paul Ricoeur's study The Symbolism ol Evil...
...The task is fourfold...
...To believe in the Incarnation in the sense of Blondel and Baum is to believe that the Word of God is incarnate (and redeeming) within all the cultures of the world...
...The constructing of a local Christian theology from within the actu.al living meaningful word of an indigenous culture will have many positive, constructive elements to work with if the first two steps (discovery and approval) have been done well...
...Nor can all moral judgments be set aside in some kind of crass relativism...
...In Christian doctrine the Incarnation of Christ and His Redemption is universal in effect, but absolutely unique and singular in cause...
...He is to look for and approve what is good and true in that culture...
...The movement deserves a hearing, careful support, and, above all, sharp criticism...
...The constructing of local theologies is not a tried and tested experiment yet...
...To avoid shallow accommodation, public rites and liturgies may take on rather radical different forms...
...0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 000 JOHN FANDEL POWDERED SKY on the path, robin's crushed eggshell, flecks diminutive as forgetme-nots a little further back...
...Is it primarily an external ritual uncleanness...
Vol. 104 • November 1977 • No. 23
