Christianity is becoming extinct. In order for it to continue on it must modernize its beliefs. The average Christian is white, middle class and is from Europe or America. The religion of Islam is expanding quickly and will soon dominate Christianity. These are all common claims made about Christianity that many people believe, yet Philip Jenkins claims and proves them untrue in his book, The Next Christendom: The Coming of Global Christianity. According to his book, Christianity is moving out of the global north and into the global south. In fact, Christianity is growing rapidly in countries such as Africa, Asia, and Latin America. He also writes about how Africa and Brazil will, within the next fifty years, replace Europe as the center of Christianity. Both of these countries have been heavily missionized within that past hundred years, and the number of Christians in each has raised millions. The expansion growth in these countries is due primarily to their high reproduction rates and their hunger for the Christian beliefs that the missionaries brought with them. Jenkins says in this book that the missionaries faced no problems trying to explain about a higher deity or other “bafflingly alien world views” to the Africans, because it followed closely with many of their own tribal beliefs. Many of the tribes worshiped one higher power already and also found that many of the Christian beliefs fell in sync with their own heritage and customs. They did though, encounter one problem: the beliefs fell so in sync with their tribal traditions, that eventually the African culture started to incorporate their customs such as exorcism, dream visions, prophesy, healing, and mysticism into their Christian churches, creating an entire sub group of Christianity. These sub groups are closely related to the more Pentecostal churches, but are far from the ritualistic practices of the Anglicans and Catholics that primarily missionized them. Pentecostal churches, because of the resurgence in countries such as Africa and Brazil will soon be the dominant Christian sects. They strongly emphasize views about personal relationships with God, biblical literism, speaking in tongues, visions and prophesy just as the African churches do. The Pentecostal church tends to mainly attract the poor or lower class of society, which also happens to be what Bra... ... middle of paper ... ...nto the thought that religious wars may occur, be he completely left out the ideas that the Islamic nation, being known for terrorism and other such acts of violence, could potentially eliminate Christianity from any form of mainstream. This is a serious topic to think about considering what they have done to other religions, and to Christian sects residing in the Middle East. I think Jenkins should have presented this as more of an issue and an actual threat then claiming that it might cause slight conflict. The book unquestionably had some strengths and some weaknesses. I believe the information that Jenkins provided was extremely well established and proven. This is exactly the type of information that people need to know, because the truth is being denied. I think for the book to be effective, it needs to be laid out better. I wouldn’t recommend this book to anyone besides a theological scholar due to the manner that it flows, even though it has very good reviews and is on best seller lists for Christian books. I commend Jenkins for going against the flow and writing against the average beliefs, but admonish him for writing the information in such an incomprehensible manner.
Protestantism and Pentecostalism has risen to 15% of the population. Their members are mostly poor or part of the working class. Their ministers are from the same social class as its members, unlike catholicism where most priests come from the elites of the neighborhood. The rise of evangelicals has surprised the region and has grown exponentially.
Throughout the Western culture, Christianity has played a crucial role in the spiritual life of many people. In fact, it is a one of the largest religion in the world with an estimating range from 2 to 3 billion Christians (Religions of the World: Numbers of Adherents; Growth Rates). Spreading with this worldwide religion, the idea that God is at the centre of daily life has a high importance to many people. In the early 20th Century, one of the significant developments of Christianity was the Pentecostal Movement (A Brief History of Christianity). More specifically, Pentecostalism is “the principles and practices of Pentecostal religious groups, characterized by religious excitement and talking in tongues”; its most remarkable detail is its emphasis of the Holy Spirit and the value of prayer (wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn). It has outspread around the world by the people who believed that they had experienced the marvelous moves of God.
In chapter four of Global Church Planting, the authors talk about the expansion of Kingdom communities as learned from the New Testament. They talk about the importance of church reproduction and how to do it in a healthy way. Indigeneity and church planting movements are critical parts to church multiplication. This chapter describes the importance of local churches training local leaders to again reproduce and train those churches as well to reproduce. “The missionary effort to establish indigenous churches is an effort to plant churches that fit naturally into their environment and to avoid planting churches that replicate western patterns.” – John Mark Terry
After reading The Next Christendom by Philip Jenkins I found that this book reminded me of a memorable passage from the movie Apollo Thirteen: a military man in the tense Houston control shares with a political figure his forewarning that the tragedy before will be the catastrophic moment for the space program Mission control flight chief Gene Kranz overhears their conversation and addresses it: 'With all due respect, gentleman, I believe this will be our finest hour.' This summarizes the book quiet well as the apparent demise of the western church (when the day comes) is forecasting on its fate over against the perceived adversaries of secularism and post-modernism. Jenkins reminds us that when view through a wide-screen lens so to speak, the inherent threat often yields to a broad outlook of opportunity, painting a clear picture of the future of Christianity in colors unaccustomed to American thinking, outlining the characteristics of the fast growing Christian churches that are outside of Western Europe and US. Jenkins also shows the possibility of conflicts between Christianity and other major religions (such as Islam or Hinduism). Speculating what affects this will have on established churches of having a Christian majority outside the west. The basic premise of this book I think is simply: the heart of Christendom has moved from the northern hemisphere to the southern hemisphere, what is surprising about this premise is that the northern hemisphere did not see the move, and still deny that it is moving.
Heaton, Allan. An Introduction to Pentecostalism: Global Charismatic Christianity. United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press, 2013. Print.
The process of syncretization among the African religions helps to explain why those cults found it relatively easy to accept and integrate parts of Christian religious belief and practice into the local cult activity. Initially this integration was purely functional, providing a cover of legitimacy for religions that were severely proscribed. But after a few generations a real syncretism became part of the duality of beliefs of the slaves themselves, who soon found it possible to accommodate both religious systems.
Christianity's expansion and adaptation is a result of these various methods and results in plethora of ways to practicing Christianity. While some convert to Christianity because of the power it gives, others, including many of the lower classes, convert based on logic or the acceptable nature of slow assimilation offered by the missionaries dispersed among the area. Although Christianity adapts and adjusts to different cultures, it never strays from the fundamentals of belief. Power is not the only reason to serve God, logic does not take priority over Christian belief, and pagan practices are not left unchanged. With its diversity, Christianity proves itself relevant and able to exist in any culture and any place.
In conclusion, it is important to realize that it was not one single factor which was responsible for the spread of Christianity, all these figures came together to give the perfect platform for a new religion to develop, " Never before in the history of the race had conditions been so ready for the adoption of a new faith by the majority of the peoples of so large an area" (K.S Latourette).
To know the history of the Pentecostal movement, one needs to know what they believe. Pentecostalism is a movement within Christianity that places special emphasis on a direct personal experience of God through the baptism in the Holy Spirit. During Pentecost, the Holy Spirit fell upon those in the upper room. Acts 2:1-4 says, “When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. 2 Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. 3 They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. 4 All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues[ as the Spirit enabled them.” (1,3)
When mentioned to the general public, the word “Pentecostalism” generates three diverse responses: confusion, mockery, and tolerance; some people never heard of the word, some people view it as being infamous, and the rest accept it. According to the Oxford dictionary, Pentecostalism “relates to any number of Christian sects emphasizing baptism in the Holy Spirit.” Misconceptions originated from the misunderstanding of the history of Pentecostalism, along with the notion that Pentecostalism is one sect when, in fact, there are many divisions. The largest of these is the teachings of Charismatic’s, which make up the most prevalent part of the denomination and have been the driving force for the assumptions and reputation that Pentecostalism has garnered. To truly understand Pentecostalism, one needs to learn the religions history, the standard beliefs of the various sects, and the contemporary changes that some followers have made in the recent years that have fueled the current fallacy about the belief system.
was the end of the world when this had happened to him. He thought that
John: 8:32 “You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” (NRSV)
The above statement can perhaps best sum up the relationship between Christianity and Europe throughout the ages. Christianity has been the strongest single influence in the history of Europe. Regardless of the century, no discussion would be complete without reference being made, at least in small part, to the Church. It is true that in recent centuries this influence has declined significantly, but nevertheless one could argue that it still plays an important part in the lives of many people. Throughout history Christianity has been both a unifying force and also a force for disunity. During the Dark Ages it was the only unifying force. By the Middle Ages people defined themselves by their religion and in Europe this religion had become Christianity. Through it's missionary work, it's monasteries, it's education, it pilgrimages, it's crusades, it's influence on art and architecture and it's Papacy it had united the peoples of Europe. By the thirteenth century all of Europe was Christian. It's ideas penetrated every aspect of life and every political and economic arrangement. It's churches could be seen in the major cities as well as the mountainside villages of rural Europe. It's bishop's were part of the politics of countries at the highest level and for many centuries it's clergy played the role of civil servants to the European rulers. It helped form the foundations of modern human rights and law across Christendom. By the end of the reformation Christianity had passed it's peak of influence on European society, and so in evaluating it's influence, it is perhaps best to end t...
Worlds together worlds apart focuses is about the connections between societies from conquests and the gradual, but accelerating ways where connections became ties of inter-dependence. The relations between societies are what will concern us. The forces pulling the world together vary from religious to economic, political to intellectual. These forces bring the world together, but they also create new divisions.
However, it should be brought in to notice that this term arose as a consequence of the resentment among African theologians towards the European culture with which Christianity is clothed. They argue that one finds western form of Christianity in Africa and that is not indigenous to Africa. Christianity brought to Africa through some missionaries who considered western culture superior than African culture and they simply transplanted western Christianity in the African soil, having no respect for African culture and tradition. Thus at that time some theologians and Bishops felt the need to de-westernize the Christianity by taking...