Book Reviews

In the Way: A Study of Christian Missionary Endeavours.

By Kenelm Burridge. Vancouver, B.C.: Univ. of British Columbia Press, 1991. Pp. xoi, 307. $39.95.

As anthropologist, as observer of two by both their critics and their support­ Paradoxically, the abstractness with. generations of Christian mission, and ers. He shows that this missionary faith which the anthropologist lays out the now as interpreter of Christian life and . is a dialectical process: metaculturally structures of missionary life reveals history, Kenelm Burridge has no peer transcendent in its "devotional" patterns that recur concretely in mis­ in discussing the interaction of mis­ pole, and inculturationist in its "af­ sion. To grasp Burridge's point is to sions and culture. In the Way is a book firmative" pole. The dialectic, though, develop tolerance of those with whom no student of mission can afford not rises not in a conflict of ideas but in the one disagrees theologically without to read. While remaining an anthro­ concrete experience of God's love in giving up the need to debate the issues pologist, Burridge gives us a magister­ Christ as the source of mission's dis­ that divide, for In the Way reveals a ial work on the history and theology parate labors. process through which God writes of mission. To those who know his work In the Way gives insights into the straight with the crooked lines of mis­ on millenarianism ("cargo cults") in pluralistic nature of Christianity, into sionary efforts. Papua New Guinea and his other writ­ the relationship of social sciences and -William R. Burrows ings, In the Way will be another feast. missiology, and into the structures of To those who have never encountered Christian community and missionary his work, this is a wonderful book to endeavors. Professor Burridge's book begin with. is essential reading for both missiology William R. Burrows, Managing Editor of Orbis Burridge sees Christianity as an and missionary anthropology courses, Books, spent five years in Papua New Guinea intrinsically missionary faith and mis­ a book that is intellectually demanding and is at work on a book on mission and its sionaries as people understood poorly but that also repays careful attention. conceptual dilemmas in a postmodern age.

Black Christians and White Some may find the collection of Missionaries. essays less connected than anticipated; others may wish for a stronger con­ By Richard Gray. New Haven: YaleUniv. demnation of that most unsalvageable Press, 1991. Pp. viii, 134. $20. term "syncretism." But in this re­ viewer's opinion, the size, price, ac­ This book is a collection of essays that the kingdom of Kongo, where Chris­ cessibility and scope endear this book are the fruits of both recent research tianity was far from being a "fragile both as a textbook and as a general and long-term reflections of the author, exotic plant" (p. 9). work, providing local and historical who is emeritus professor of the his­ Following his reassessment of depth to African appropriations, trans­ tory of Africa at the University of Lon­ Kongo Christianity-its advances, set­ formations, and interpretations of don. The overriding theme of the book backs, misunderstandings, and fruitful Christianity. It is hoped that Professor is the transformations of Christianity exchanges-Professor Gray moves to Gray will continue to bring his vast by Africans. It is a welcome contribu­ wider reflections in the second part of knowledge to bear on these complex tion to the growing number of works the book concerning the varied rela­ developments-past, current, and fu­ that seriously address African agency tionship of the missionary movement ture--and that his work will be made rather than "Western initiatives" with colonial rule. He once again em­ available to those most actively in­ alone. Particularly valuable is the first phasizes the contributions of African volved in such processes. section of the book, which deals with cosmologies to nineteenth- and twen­ -Rosalind I. J. Hackett the relationship between the papacy tieth-century Christianity (particularly and central Africa in the seventeenth in the overlooked area of eschatology), century, highlighting cosmological despite the disillusions and disparities similarities for both black and white of power. In the last chapter, we are Rosalind I. J. Hackett, from Britain, hasbeen in Christians, the significant role of the confronted with insights that are often the United States since 1984; she teaches at the African confraternities in the local re­ valuable, yet sometimes debatable (how University of Tennessee, Knoxville. She has spent more thaneightyears doing research and teach­ sponse to the Capuchin mission in IIradically new" is the concept of Kongo and Angola, the interventions satanic forces for Pentecostalists com­ ing in Nigeria, with shorter visits to Ghana, of Lourenco da Silva in Rome on behalf pared to witchcraft in the precolonial Cameroon, and Kenya. of oppressed slaves, Fra Girolamo's context?) concerning the restructuring close rapport with Soyo Christians in of concepts and symbols of evil.

168 INTERNATIONAL BULLETIN OF MISSIONARY RESEARCH Mission and Meaninglessness: chapters to the theme of the book at The Good News in a World of times seems forced, yet detracts rela­ Suffering and Disorder. tively little from a stimulating and, in some ways, ground-breaking volume. By Peter Cotterell. London: SPCK, 1990. -Kenneth B. Mulholland Pp. xii, 332. Paperback £12.95.

In this unique book, Peter Cotterell, a develop a holistic view of mission con­ former missionary to Ethiopia who stitutes a major contributioin to evan­ Kenneth B. Mulholland is Dean and Professor currently serves as Principal of London gelical missiology. Cotterell's work of Missions at Columbia Biblical Seminary and Bible College, as well as Senior Lec­ encompasses a broad range of topics Graduate School of Missions, Columbia, South turer in Missiology and Linguistics, in a scholarly fashion, yet is seasoned Carolina. Previously, heserved fornearly fifteen emphasizes that the task of Christian with the practicality of a veteran mis­ years asa missionary to Central America under mission is to make sense of life in a sionary. His attempt to relate all of the the United Church Board for World Ministries. world where the general unsatisfac­ toriness of ordinary empirical exist­ ence is of such magnitude that life appears meaningless. The book's thirteen chapters are divided into four parts. Part One, "Religion, Religions, and the Ap­ parent Meaningless of Life," consists PROPOSALS INVITED FOR of six chapters in which Cotterell ana­ lyzes the apparent meaningless of life, PROJECTS IN MISSION RESEARCH surveys seven ways in which Chris­ tians have approached the other reli­ gions of the world, sets forth a Christian The Overseas Ministries Study Center, New Haven, worldview, struggles with the prob­ Connecticut, announces a research enablement lems occasioned by the classic Chris­ program for the advancement of scholarship in tian insistence on the finality of Christ and the claim that salvation is to be studies ofmission andChristianity, particularly in found exclusively in him. The back the non-Western world. Grants will be awarded on cover states the significance of his con­ a competitive basis in the following categories: clusions: "It is the first book by a leading British Evangelical to recog­ nize God's saving activity among those Field research for doctoral dissertations who live without the church and with­ Post-doctoral book research and writing projects out an overt knowledge of the Gos­ pel." This fact alone guarantees that Missiological consultations (small scale) the book will be controversial. Translation ofmajor works ofmission The second part of the book con­ sists of eight chapters which appear to scholarship into English be a collection of independent essays Oral history projects (non- Western world) on a variety of topics the author has grouped together under the rubric Planning grants for major inter-disciplinary "Mission as Response to the Ap­ research projects parent Meaningless of Life." Cotterell emphasizes ecclesiology and includes Projects that are international and cross-cultural, a perceptive critique of the Church Growth Movement. Other chapters of collaborative and interdisciplinary are preferred. particular merit include an incisive sur­ Initial letters ofinquiry(no more than three pages) vey of the church in Europe, an at­ outlining the purpose, components, and budget of tempt to construct a theology of the poor, a thoughtful discussion of the the project, should be sent to: relationship of Christianity to Judaism, and a brilliant exposition of the mission Geoffrey A. Little, Coordinator theology contained in the Gospel ac­ cording to Matthew. Research Enablement Program Part Three surveys three move­ Overseas Ministries Study Center ments that Cotterell regards as alter­ 490 Prospect Street native responses to meaningless: Islam, New Haven, CT 06511 Marxism, and Liberation Theology. The fourth and final part consists of a single chapter summary of the relationship This program is supported by a grant between mission and meaningless and from The Pew Charitable Trusts. a concluding postscript. Extensive notes, a select bibliography, and three indices add to the usefulness of this volume. This comprehensive attempt to

OcroBER1992 169 An African Theology of Mission. the growing number of studies on the subject. By Gwinyai Henry Muzorewa. Lewiston, The book is rather repetitive; with N. Y.: EdwinMellen Press, 1990. Pp. xvi, chapter after chapter repeating the same 204. $89.95. criticism of missions. Furthermore, in connection with religious pluralism the In this book the author investigates the nel a n d resources and that the author makes statements that can only concept of mission , having in mind the traditional religiocultural system has be described as misleading, such as: church in Africa, which has played host nothing to contribute to the formation "Evangelism among the Africans to a vast number of mission aries from of Christian life and thought in Africa. therefore does not entail introducing a Europe and America over the centu­ This stu dy thus represents a concern new faith" (p. 53); and, "Select as­ ries. In the author's jud gment certain that a number of students of Christi­ pects of the Christian faith unite with misconceptions have trad itionally sur­ anity in Africa have articulated, partic­ 'corresponding' aspects of the indig­ rounded mission; in particular, it seems ularl y in recent decades; the author's enous religion for the sake of religious to have been ass umed that mission in­ own earlier book The Origin and Devel­ continuity" (p. 58). What procedure is volves a unidirectional flow of person­ opment of African Theology belongs to being recommended with respect to the latter is unclear. The author stresses that mission is not the work of humans or of a mission board but is God's work, and that conversion is the work of the Spirit. One wishes, however, that such views had been worked out more meaningfully. -Kwesi A. Dickson

Kwesi A. Dickson, formerly head of the De­ partment for the Study of Religions, University of Ghana, Legan, Accra, is now President of the 340 CONTRIBUTORS ANNUAL SOOlST1CAL Conference, Methodist Church, Ghana. -AViRTUAl 'WHO'S STATUS OF GLOBAL WHO" OF CONTEM­ MISSION, BY DAVID PORARY MISSIOLOOY BARRm 242 BOOK REVIEWS EDITOR'SSELECTION OF FIFTEEN OUT­ 392 OOCTORAL OiS­ STANDING BOOKS SERTATION NOTICES EACH YEAR Mission to Rural America: The Story of W. Howard Bishop, CUMULATIVE INDEX Founder of Glenmary. The Third Bound Volume of ByChristopherJ. Knuffman. Mahwah, N.J.: MISSIONARY GOLD PaulistPress, 1991. Pp. x, 298. Paperback INTERNATIONAL BULLETIN OF MISSIONARY RESEARCH, 1985·88 $16.95. The story of Catholic evangelization in Here is more gold for every theological library and exploring scholar of the United States has yet to be told, mission studies-with all16 issues of 1985-1988-bound in red buckram, but Christopher Kauffman's Mission to with vellum finish and embossed in gold lettering. Itmatches the earlier RuralAmerica represents one giant step bound volumes of the Occasional Bulletin of MissionaryResearch, toward remedying the situation. 1977-1980 (sorry, completely sold out), and the InternationalBulletinof Kauffman, who has written histories MissionaryResearch, 1981-1984 (also sold out). of the Alexian Brothers, the Knights of Lim itededition, International Bulletinof Missionary Research, 1985-1988. Columbus, and the American Suipi­ :K Only~boundvolumes available. Each volume is individually cian Fathers, here provides a scholarly, readable account of the life and times numbered and signed personally by the ed itorand associate editor. of W. Howard Bishop, the Catholic Special Price: $56.95 missionary and rural-life activist who founded the Glenmary Home Mission­ ers. This biography will certainly res­ cue Bishop from undeserved semi­ Send me __ bound Yolume(s) of the International Bulletin of Missionary obscurity and earn him a secure niche Research , 1985-1988 at $56.95. in subsequent surveys of American

Enclosed is my check in the amount ::N::.m:,::.:..... _ Catholic history. Kauffman pays fas­ of $ made out to "Jntar­ tidious attention to the detail s of Bish­ ~~t~~~~~~.~I~~~ne~ ~~::ii~~~~ :Ad~d::.r .::.:.:. _ op's career, especially to his extensive, U.S.A. add $4.00 for postage and ever-expanding network of friends, handl ing . Payment must accom ­ pany all orders. Allow 5 weeks for confreres, and fellow travelers, from delivery with in the U.S.A. brief encounters with Catholic Worker Mall to : Publ ications Off ice, Overseas Ministries Study Center, 490 Prospect SI.. New Haven , cr 06511·2196 Peter Maurin and the Catholic pub­ lishers Frank Sheed and Maisie Ward to more sustained collaboration with

170 I NTERNATION AL B ULLETIN OF M ISSIONARY REsEARCH clerical activists such as Luigi Ligutti free from strong positive or negative schools contributed much to the vital­ and John LaFarge, S.J., and the Mary­ convictions. Her goal is primarily to ity of evangelicalism in our century. knoll leaderJames Anthony Walsh. This understand what was happening on a They also have played a significant role book is more than a biography or a descriptive level. The book lays a foun­ in the story of American education. career study. It is a sensitive portrait dation for future analysis and evalua­ They emphasized integration of theory of a significant, neglected movement tion of this movement's educational and practice; pioneered innovative within the American Catholic com­ goals and programs. concepts and techniques; combined munity, a movement that united priests, The author has produced an in­ classroom instruction with practical ex­ seminarians, brothers, sisters, and lay­ depth view of the origin and devel­ perience. The schools accepted stu­ people in a common, if occasionally opment of these schools where Prot­ dents of varying ages and educational conflict-ridden, effort to make America estant fundamentalists trained as and economic backgrounds. They of­ Catholic. evangelists, pastors, teachers, and fered correspondence, extension, eve­ MissiontoRuralAmerica recaptures missionaries. She shows how the Bible ning and summer classes; they also the spirit of a critical, almost forgotten segment of the convert crusade of the forties and fifties, and provides im­ ~NEW portant historical background for those DIRECTIONS I.N--­ who seek to understand the roots of today's Catholic evangelization effort MISSIO,N READINGS--' among the American unchurched. This book illuminates two aspects of the early RECONCILIATION NEW DIRECTIONS INMISSION twentieth-century American Catholic Mission & Ministry in a & EVANGELIZATION 1 Church that were neglected by con­ Changing Social Order Basic Documents 1974-91 temporaries and remain neglected by ROBERT J. SCHREITER JAMES A. SCHERER and historians: rural life and home mis­ Paper $10.95 STEPHEN B. BEVANS, EDITORS sions. In so doing, it casts new light Paper S16.95 upon other, more frequently examined NEW EVANGELIZATION aspects of the Catholic experience and Good Newsto the Poor HISTORY OF THE CHURCH IN raises intriguing questions about the LEONARDO BOFF LATIN AMERICA 1492-1992 changing priorities of American Cath­ Paper $13.95 ENRIQUE DUSSEL, EDITOR olics in this century. ­ Cloth $49.95 -Debra Campbell ASIAN CHRISTIAN SPIRITUALITY MISSION & MINISTRY IN Reclaiming Traditions THE GLOBAL CHURCH Debra Campbell is Associate Professor of ~li­ VIRGINIA FABELLA, PETER K.H. LEE and ANTHONY BELLAGAMBA gious Studies atColby College, Waterville, Maine. DAVID KWANG-SUN SUH, EDITORS Paper $18.95 Sheis currently writinga historyof theCatholic Paper $16.95 Evidence Guild. THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN MODERN CHINA THE WILL TO ARISE Perspectives Women, Tradition, and the Church in Africa EDMOND TANG andJEAN-PAUL WIEST, EDITORS MERCY AMBA ODUYOYE and Paper $18.95 Training God's Army: The MUSIMBI B.A. KANYORO, EDITORS FOR ALL mE PEOPLES American Bible School, 1880­ Paper $16.95 1940. OF ASIA Federation of Asian Faith Meets Faith Series: _ By Virginia Lieson Brereton. Bloomington, Bishops' Conferences Ind.: Indiana Univ. Press, 1990. Pp. xix, UNIQUENESS Documents from 1970 to 1991 212. $27.50. Problem or Paradox in Jewish CATALINO G. AREVALO, EDITOR and Christian Traditions Cloth S39.95 GABRIEL MORAN Over the years American Bible schools Faith and Culture Series: _ have been largely ignored or ridiculed Cloth $39.95 Paper $16.95 by the scholarly and educational es­ MODELS OF tablishment. When Brereton under­ LEAVE THE TEMPLE CONTEXTUAL THEOLOGY took her research a decade ago, she Indian Paths to Human Liberation STEPHEN B. BEVANS discovered that almost nothing had FELIX WILFRED, EDITOR Paper S16.95 been written on the Bible school for a Cloth $39.95 Paper $19.95 general audience. She dug in with a Ecology and justice Series: _ resolve to bring empathy and appre­ WORLD RELIGIONS AND SUSTAINABILITY ciation for the purposes and view­ HUMAN LIBERATION Economics, Ecology, and Justice points of these educators. DAN COHN-SHERBOK, EDITOR JOHN B. COBB, JR. Virginia Brereton teaches history Cloth $39.95 Paper $16.95 Cloth $39.95 Paper S16.95 and writing at Harvard University. She has published widely in women's re­ ligious history and conservative Prot­ estant evangelicalism. This is the first published history of American Bible Q Maryknoll, NY 10545 1-800-258-5838 .In NY Collect 914-941-7687 schools by an outsider. As such, she ORBIS BOOKS writes from a vantage point relatively

OcrOBER1992 171 sponsored Bibleconferences and camps, sents an excellent treatment of this ensues-the "battle between Baby­ and pioneered religious broadcasting misunderstood term. lon and Jerusalem." and filmmaking. -Charles E. Hummel On this theological base the au­ While the study is based on infor­ thors build their textbook, replete with mation about a wide collection of Bible case studies of urban mission in the schools, it focuses on Moody Bible In­ New Testament, of "great models" stitute, Gordon College, Nyack Col­ Charles E. Hummel is a former president of from various continents today, practi­ lege, the Boston BibleSchool, and Biola Barrington College (Rhode Island) and director cal counsel, and a variety of hands-on College (formerly the Bible Institute of of InterVarsity faculty ministries. He is theau­ examples of successes and failures Los Angeles). The six-page appendix thor of Fire in the Fireplace, Tyranny of the from urban mission veterans. "Defining Fundamentalism" pre- Urgent, and The Galileo Connection. The hard questions of develop­ ment and relief work, church growth, ethnicity, church-state relationships, all of which impact today's urban mis­ Cities: Missions' New Frontier. sionary, are given extensive attention. Most moving for me were the three By Roger S. Greenway and Timothy M. chapters on mission to the urban poor Monsma. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker in the United States, to street people, Book House, 1989. Pp. xiii, 321. Paperback and to the international "industry" $18.95. of the world's red-light districts. Greenway and Monsma have "Beyond question," say the au­ Greenway and Monsma begin done all of us a service with this pi­ thors, "the new chapter in world with a biblical framework for under­ oneer text for urban missions. May and mission histories is entitled 'Cit­ standing the city. A reformed theolog­ voices from the other Christians tra­ ies.' " The population projections they ical model-no surprise-shapes their ditions-Catholic, Lutheran, Pentecos­ supply to support that claim leave no perspective interlaced with accents tal, Anabaptist, etc.-follow soon to fill doubt. For example, Africa's four larg­ from Augustine's "two cities." out the ecumenical chorus on strate­ est cities (Cairo, Lagos, Nairobi, Kin­ Thus God's "common grace" still gies for mission to the cities. shasa) just thirty years from now will operates in even the most pagan of cit­ -Edward H. Schroeder each have fifteen million-plus people. ies. God "created the inhabitants, Their book proposes to "pro­ stamped his image on them, and re­ vide students and practitioners of strains their worst intentions." Edward H. Schroeder, a Lutheran, directs the Christian missions with a basic intro­ When the Christian Gospel ar­ program of The Crossings Community, St. ductory textbook" for urban mission, rives, God's "special grace" also Louis, Missouri, an ecumenical school for laity not only to these supergiants, but to goes to work in the city, engaging the all cities whither the millions are forces of evil, building "a commu­ in.mission to today's secular society. streaming in the southern and eastern nity of a different kind." With the Gos­ hemispheres today. pel present in a city religious warfare

Unity of All Christians in Love and Mission: The Ecumenical ity is marked not by one church or one Method of Kenneth Scott creed, but by love, agape, God-given Latourette. and seen in Jesus Christ. "By this everyone will know that you are my By [uhani Lindgren. Helsinki: Suomalai­ disciples, if you have love for one an­ nen Tiedeakatemia, 1990. Pp. 401. Paper­ other" (Iohn 13:35). That unity for back. No price given. Annales Academiae which Jesus prayed (john 17:21) ena­ Scientiarum Fennicae: Dissertationes Hu­ bles convincing witness, "that the manarum Litterarum 54. Distributor: Ac­ world may believe." Unity and mission ademic Bookstore, 00100 Helsinki, are inextricably intertwined, and as the Finland. WCC's 1951 Rolle Statement declares, ", .. every attempt to separate [uhani Lindgren of the Finnish Lu­ framed largely in biblical language. those two tasks violates the wholeness theran Overseas Mission had prepared Systematic theological analysis applied of Christ's ministry to the world." well for his University of Helsinki doc­ to one not a systematic theologian but Yet, as Latourette noted, even in toral dissertation. His master's thesis a historian of Christianity creates its the Christian community's first days, on Latourette (1986) and his Licen­ own problems; yet Lindgren handles divisiveness and division existed. tiate's thesis in Systematic Theology on these creditably. He could have These continued to multiply. In the pe­ Latourette's ecumenicalmethod-unity strengthened his presentation with a riod of the four great ecumenical coun­ andmission(1988)--undergirdthis cur­ brief, focused examination of some key cils (325-451) each effort to state rent book. elements in the American Baptist her­ accurately the truths of the faith cre­ The doctrinally formed Lutheran itage, part of which Latourette's meth­ ated new fractures. Further splitting theologian finds difficulty occasionally odology reflected. occurred. Thus for Latourette the new with the Baptist historian who had no The following comments on surge toward unity (love), springing formal theological education and method must be limited. Lindgren ob­ from mission since the mid-nineteenth whose theological statements were serves that for Latourette Christian un­ century and amid today's global