| Missionary strategy
By JOHN L. ALLEN JR.
NCR Staff
Rome
Like any multinational corporation concerned with market share,
the Roman Catholic church occasionally calls its sales force back to
headquarters for a strategy session. What emerged at the latest such meeting in
mid-October was, in effect, a vigorous debate over how to market the
church’s product line.
The International Missiological Congress, held at Rome’s
Urbaniana University, where seminarians from missionary countries come to
study, brought together more than 1,000 missionaries and scholars from five
continents. The Oct. 17-20 event took on special significance in light of the
Vatican’s controversial recent document Dominus Iesus.
Released Sept. 5, the document demanded that theologians reassert the
uniqueness of Jesus Christ and the superiority of the Catholic church.
What emerged at the congress was not a challenge to the doctrine
in Dominus Iesus. None of the speakers at this gathering advocated
radical new theological ideas. Rather, they offered widely differing reactions
to the document’s tone and style.
In effect, the divisions pivoted less on what the church’s
message should be and more on how to sell it.
Some argued that absolutist language, such as the claim that
followers of other religions suffer from “grave deficiencies” in
comparison to Catholics, creates enormous problems in presenting the Christian
message. Others, however, accused those seeking to downplay the hard language
in Dominus Iesus of soft-pedaling the truth.
A few participants suggested that the congress itself reflected
practices that don’t make the church very attractive. For example, Sr.
Teresa Okure of Nigeria, speaking from the floor, noted that not a single woman
was among the 22 speakers on the program. The omission was especially glaring
given that some 65 percent of participants were women.
When Dominus Iesus was issued, many observers felt it was
aimed at India where missionaries and scholars are searching for new ways to
present Jesus in a culture that prizes religious tolerance. It was no surprise
that at the congress many of the strongest criticisms of absolutist language
came from Indian speakers.
“The language of uniqueness is bound to be misunderstood,
because it appears to be exclusive, negative and intolerant,” said Fr.
George Karakunnel of the Pontifical Institute of Alwaye, India, referring to
insistence in Dominus Iesus on Christ as the lone savior. “The
Christian message has to be expressed in terms and expressions other than those
that sound like exclusive claims.”
Salesian Fr. Sebastian Karotemprel, an Indian who teaches at the
Urbaniana University, urged that local churches be consulted before doctrinal
statements such as Dominus Iesus are issued. “Otherwise we will be
setting fire to the context and expect others to put out the fires of
controversy and fundamentalism,” he said.
Karotemprel distanced himself from many of the new theologies
associated with India and criticized by the Vatican, such as the theologies
advanced by Fr. Raimundo Panikkar and Jesuit Fr. Jacques Dupuis, seeing in them
a “tendency to relativization of the Christian faith.” Dupuis is a
Belgian who spent more than 30 years teaching in India. Panikkar, a Spaniard
with a Hindu father, is best known for his argument that Christ is active in
all the religious traditions of the world.
Several Indian speakers advocated an approach that emphasizes love
and service rather than strong doctrinal statements. Such a “kenotic
Christology,” named after the Greek word that refers to the
“self-emptying Christ” in Paul’s letter to the Ephesians, is
better suited to spread the faith in Asia, they said.
“Jesus is our Lord and Master, not simply because of his
equality with God, but because he washed our feet,” said Fr. Anto
Karokaran, editor of a theological journal in Bhopal, India.
The “love and service” approach does not impress
everyone. Fr. John Egbulefu, a Nigerian who teaches at the Urbaniana
University, told NCR that he “pounced” on several of the
Indian speakers after their presentations.
“Divine revelation dwindled into oblivion” in these
presentations, Egbulefu said in an interview. He said the Indians emphasized
the suffering of Christ while forgetting the point of his suffering -- to save
all humanity, making him the lone savior of the entire world. “They have
forgotten half the theology they ever learned,” he said.
Egbolefu also challenged Bishop Walter Kasper, secretary of the
Vatican’s council for Christian unity, who recently gave an interview in
Germany in which he criticized both the timing and tone of Dominus
Iesus. During the congress Kasper seemed sympathetic to the concerns
expressed in Dominus Iesus, though he used more moderate language to
make the same points.
“He goes to Germany and he is against the pope, but here he
whitewashes the whole thing,” Egbloefu said. “This double tongue is
what I don’t like. It’s a symptom of a deep problem in the church. We
can’t build a mission on the basis of insincerity.”
In raising the problem of the lack of women on the program, Okure,
a member of the Society of the Holy Child Jesus, said, “We have to get to
the heart of Jesus’ message, a message of liberation.” She suggested
that if the church is having trouble reaching the people, it may be in part
because it marginalizes women, offering the all-male program as a case in
point.
Okure is chair of the department of Biblical Theology at the
Catholic Institute of West Africa in Nigeria.
The meeting was held in conjunction with the Oct. 22 Jubilee of
Missionaries, when Pope John Paul II planted a small olive tree in a pot
containing soil from each of the 112 nations represented at the event. The tree
is a symbol of the church’s hope for success in spreading its message.
The e-mail address for John L. Allen Jr. is
jallen@natcath.org
National Catholic Reporter, November 3,
2000
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