October 2004

Personalia

Daniel H. Bays, professor of history and director of the Asian Studies Program at Calvin College, Grand Rapids, Michigan, has been named as a contributing editor of the INTERNATIONAL BULLETIN OF MISSIONARY RESEARCH. He is coeditor of The Foreign Missionary Enterprise at Home: Explorations in North American Cultural History (2003), editor of Christianity in China: The Eighteenth Century to the Present (1996), and author of China Enters the Twentieth Century: Chang Chih-tung and the Issues of a New Age, 1895–1909 (1978). Bays has held a National Endowment for the Humanities fellowship (1973), two Fulbright- Hays research grants to Taiwan (1977–78 and 1984–85), and a National Academy of Sciences grant for research in China (1986). 

Jack Graves, special assistant to the president, Overseas Council International, Indianapolis, Indiana, resigned in June 2004 to become executive director of the Theological Book Network, formerly called the International Book Charity. An American Theological Library Association affiliate, the network collects and redistributes theological resources around the globe cheaply and efficiently. For details, go to www.theologicalbooknetwork.org/.

Announcing

The general assembly of Verein zur Förderung der Missionswissenschaft (Association for the Promotion of Missiology), Immensee, Switzerland, has announced that in December 2004 it will discontinue publication of the quarterly mission journal Neue Zeitschrift für Missionswissenschaft. For more information, e-mail Fritz Frei, the editor and administrator, or Fritz Kollbrunner, the association’s president, at bethlehem-libri@bluewin.ch. 

Roger E. Hedlund is project director and chief editor for the Dictionary of South Asian Christianity, an ecumenical, international resource that documents the role and cultural contributions of Christianity in South Asian history. Publication of the dictionary is projected for 2006. For details, visit www.dharmadeepika.org/dictionary/dictionhome.html. 

At the August 9–13, 2004, assembly of the Latin American Theological Fraternity (Fraternidad Teológica Latinoamericana, FTL) in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, Omar Cortés Gaibur was named general secretary. He succeeds Tito Paredes, who held the position for twelve years. Gaibur is a Baptist minister and theologian teaching in the Baptist Seminary of Santiago, Chile. The new FTL executive includes President Ruth Padilla DeBorst (El Salvador), Vicepresident Ricardo Barbosa de Sousa (Brazil), Secretary Esteban Voth (Argentina), Treasurer H. Fernando Bullón Campos (Costa Rica), Flavio Florentin (Paraguay), Carlos Mondragón (México), and Víctor Rey (Chile). Ruth Padilla DeBorst, the second woman president of FTL, succeeded Lilia Góngora (Colombia). The FTL has over 300 members in 18 different countries. 

The life and legacy of Indian Christian social reformer, educator, Sanskrit scholar, and Bible translator Pandita Ramabai (1858–1922) will be the focus of a conference January 17–20, 2005, at Union Biblical Seminary, Pune, India. Coorganizers of the conference are the Centre for Mission Studies at Union Biblical Seminary, the Mylapore Institute for Indigenous Studies in Chennai, India, and the Christianity in Asia Project at the Faculty of Divinity, University of Cambridge, U.K. For more information, e-mail to cms@ubs.ac.in. 

The World Council of Churches will sponsor a Young Missiologist Consultation January 19–25, 2005, with a focus on pneumatology and mission. Organizers of the conference in Rome, which is by invitation only, welcome the nomination of young scholars under age thirty-five who have “academic theological training and show a specific interest in reflecting on Christian mission.” Contact Beate Fagerli at the WCC, Geneva, at cwme@wcc-coe.org. 

One hundred scholars from New Zealand and Australia spanning the disciplines of mission studies, biblical studies, systematic theology, and religious history met July 15–17, 2004, at Carey Baptist College, Auckland, for a conference on the theme “GodZone? Theological Scholarship in Aotearoa–New Zealand.” Stephen Bevans, S.V.D., professor of mission and culture, Catholic Theological Union, Chicago, was the keynote speaker. The conference also hosted the annual general meeting of the New Zealand Association of Theological Schools. 

The eleventh international conference of the International Association for Mission Studies was held at the Regency Hotel in Port Dickson, Malaysia, from July 31 through August 7, 2004. Of the 207 persons from 43 countries who gathered to consider the theme “Integrity of Mission in the Light of the Gospel: Bearing the Witness of the Spirit,” 71 were from Asia, 56 from Europe, 46 from North America, 13 from Africa, 13 from Oceania, and 8 from Latin America. The 2004–8 Executive includes Darrell Whiteman (USA, president), Philomena Mwaura (Kenya, vice-president), Allan Anderson (UK/SA, treasurer), Lalsangkima Pachuau (India, editor of Mission Studies, the journal of IAMS), Anne-Marie Kool (Hungary/ Netherlands), Hwa Yung (Malaysia), Susan Smith, R.N.D.M. (New Zealand), Tito Parades (Peru), and Jonathan Bonk (Canada/USA). Outgoing general secretary Birger Nygaard will be succeeded by a European (Roman Catholic), to be formally announced in September. The next IAMS conference will be hosted by the Protestant Institute for Mission Studies, Budapest, Hungary. The assembly responded positively to an invitation from the Church of Scotland and the Centre for the Study of Christianity in the Non-Western World to participate in the preparation and implementation of a major 2010 event to commemorate the centennial of the Edinburgh World Missionary Conference.

July 2004

Personalia 

Died. David C. Pollock, 64, global advocate for third-culture kids (TCKs), April 11, 2004, in Vienna, Austria. A graduate of Moody Bible Institute and Houghton College, he and his family went to Kenya in 1975, where they served as boardinghome parents at Rift Valley Academy, and he taught at Moffat College of the Bible. Returning from Africa in 1980, he became the executive director of Interaction International, which he had cofounded in the 1960s, and now focused its work on providing a “flow of care” for TCKs, expatriate families, and the personnel who work with them. He was also on the faculty of Houghton College as an adjunct professor and as director of intercultural programs since 1992. Codirector of three International Conferences for Missionary Kids, held in the Philippines (1984), Ecuador (1987), and Kenya (1989), Pollock was a member of the Mission Commission of the World Evangelical Alliance and was codirector of WEA’s Global Member Care Task Force. He was named Houghton College’s Alumnus of the Year in 1993 and received an honorary doctorate from Houghton in 2000. In 1999 he coauthored the book The Third Culture Kid: Growing Up Among Worlds. 

The Keston Institute, Oxford, England, appointed Davorin Peterlin, a New Testament scholar from Croatia, as director. Keston publishes Religion and State: The Keston Journal, which studies church, state, and social issues in the former Communist countries. For details, visit www.keston.org. 

The Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate named Mary E. Bendyna, R.S.M., former senior research associate, as executive director, the first woman appointed to that post. Information on CARA, based at Georgetown University, Washington, D.C., may be found at http://cara.georgetown.edu.

The Evangelical Fellowship of Mission Agencies has announced that president and CEO Paul McKaughan will step down from his leadership position on December 31, 2005, after fourteen years with EFMA, which represents some 100 agencies and 20,000 missionaries worldwide.

Announcing 

“Depending on Uncompromising Leadership in a Syncretistic World” is the theme for the conference of the Interdenominational Foreign Mission Association, the Evangelical Fellowship of Mission Agencies, and the Evangelical Missiological Society, September 23–25, 2004, in St. Louis, Missouri. For details, visit www.ifmamissions.org or call (630) 682-9270. 

Sustainable Resources, an advocacy group based in Boulder, Colorado, will hold its “international forum connecting people with hands-on solutions to world poverty” September 30 to October 2, 2004, at the University of Colorado, Boulder. Representatives of non-profit agencies, humanitarian organizations, and educational institutions are invited. For details, visit www.sustainableresources.org or call (303) 998-1323. 

The Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, Pacific and Asian History Division, of Australian National University, Canberra, will host the first Biennial TransTasman Conference on Australians and New Zealanders in Christian Missions, at Home and Abroad, October 8–10, 2004. Presentations will be made on New Zealand and Australian contributions to Christian missions, according to http://rspas.anu.edu.au/pah/TransTasman. For details, e-mail Ian Welch, ianwelch@coombs.anu.edu.au.

The Eastern Fellowship of the American Society of Missiology will meet November 5–6, 2004, at Maryknoll, New York, to discuss Whose Religion is Christianity? The Gospel Beyond the West (2003), by Lamin Sanneh of Yale Divinity School. Speakers will include Sanneh, Todd Johnson, and Patrick Johnstone. For details, e-mail Jonathan Bonk at bonk@omsc.org. 

The Third International Conference on Missionary Linguistics, with presentations on early-modern descriptions of non-Indo-European languages prior to 1850, will be held March 12–15, 2005. Special attention will be given to research on missionary linguistic work in Asia and the Pacific, according to organizers Gregory James (lcgjames@ust.hk) of Hong Kong University of Science and Technology and Otto Zwartjes (zwartjes@kri.uio.no), University of Oslo. The conference will open at Hong Kong University of Science and Technology and conclude at the Inter-University Institute of Macau. Details may be found at www.hf.uio.no/kri/ospromil. 

The Fourth International Lausanne Researchers Conference, held under the auspices of the Lausanne Committee for World Evangelization, is slated for April 10–14, 2005, in Limassol, Cyprus, with “Uncovering Truth: The Impact of Research on Mission and Ministry” as its theme. Participants interested in presenting papers are invited to contact Peter Brierley, admin@christian-research.org.uk. Conference details may be found at www.Christian-research.org.uk. 

With the theme “Come Holy Spirit, Heal and Reconcile,” the World Council of Churches will hold its 2005 Conference on World Mission and Evangelism in Athens, May 9–16, the sixth such gathering since integration of the International Missionary Council and the WCC in 1961. This will be the first ecumenical mission conference held in a predominantly Orthodox context, according to www.mission2005.org. 

The Henry Martyn Centre, Cambridge, U.K., announces a CD-ROM containing the collected papers of the North Atlantic Missiology Project and the Currents in World Christianity Project. The two projects, which ran from 1996 to 2001, were based in the Centre for Advanced Religious and Theological Studies in the Faculty of Divinity, University of Cambridge. Contact: Polly Keen, administrator, Henry Martyn Centre, pk262@cam.ac.uk, or visit www.martynmission.cam.ac.uk. 

The School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London announces the creation of a new master’s degree in Christianities of Africa and Asia. The one-year course of study has been planned especially for clergy, church workers, and missionaries. Students may major in either Eastern and Orthodox Christianity or Christianity and Social Change in Sub-Saharan Africa. For details, visit www.soas.ac.uk or e-mail Paul Gifford at pg@soas.ac.uk. 

April 2004

Personalia 

The International Association for Mission Studies has appointed Lalsangkima Pachuau, professor of missiology at United Theological College, Bangalore, India, as editor-elect of its journal Mission Studies, effective with the first issue of 2005. The incoming associate editors are Johann Jayakiran Sebastian, also of United Theological College, Cathy Rae Ross of the Bible College of New Zealand, Auckland, and Paulo Suess of the Catholic University of São Paulo, Brazil. The current editor of Mission Studies is Stephen B. Bevans, S.V.D., professor of mission and culture, Catholic Theological Union, Chicago, Illinois. Visit www.missionstudies.org.

Daniel Jeyaraj, Judson-DeFrietas Associate Professor of World Christianity at Andover Newton Theological School, Newton, Massachusetts, has been named as an IBMR contributing editor. An Indian theologian, Jeyaraj is a leading authority on the Tranquebar Mission and the emergence of eighteenth- century Protestant churches in India. As a contribution to the Indian churches’ 300th anniversary celebrations in 2006, he recently translated two major monographs of the first Protestant missionary to India, Bartholomäus Ziegenbalg (1682–1719), from German into English. Editor of Dharma Deepika: A South Asian Journal of Missiological Research and an ordained presbyter of the Diocese of Tirunelveli, Church of South India, Jeyaraj previously taught at Union Biblical Seminary and Gurukul Lutheran Theological College and Research Institute in Pune and Madras, India, respectively, and most recently as John A. Mackay Professor of World Christianity at Princeton Theological Seminary, Princeton, New Jersey. 

Died. G. Linwood Barney, 79, missionary anthropologist and seminary administrator, October 29, 2003, in Fort Myers, Florida. He and his family served in Laos and Vietnam as missionaries of the Christian and Missionary Alliance from 1951 to 1954, where he worked with William Smalley and Yves Bertrais on developing the romanized written form of the Hmong language. After returning to the United States, he taught at St. Paul Bible College, now Crown College, St. Paul, Minnesota, and earned an M.A. and Ph.D. in anthropology at the University of Minnesota. In 1960 he and Jack Shepherd founded the Jaffray School of Missions, now the Alliance Theological Seminary, Nyack, New York. In addition to being professor of anthropology for twenty-five years, he served for various periods as dean of students, dean of faculty, and director of studies. For twenty-five summers he also taught at the Toronto Institute of Linguistics, and for twenty-four years he served on the board of the Overseas Ministries Study Center. His article “The Challenge of Anthropology to Current Missiology” appeared in the IBMR in October 1981. 

Died. Jonathan Chao, 65, founder and president of China Ministries International and director of the Christianity and China Research Center, January 12, 2004, in West Covina, California. Born in northeastern China, he grew up in China, Hong Kong, and Japan, until he immigrated to the United States, where he graduated from Geneva College, Westminster Theological Seminary, and the University of Pennsylvania (Ph.D. in Sinology, 1986). From 1977 to 1987 he taught at the China Graduate School of Theology in Hong Kong, of which he was the founder, where he also established the Chinese Church Research Center in 1978. His most recent book (in Chinese) was A History of Christianity in Socialist China, 1949– 1997 (1998). 

Announcing 

The Pontifical Institute of Foreign Missions has an online edition of its AsiaNews service. The agency, which has been publishing social, cultural, and religious news on Asia since 1986, started the online edition November 2003. Directed by Bernardo Cervellera, an expert in Chinese affairs, the agency offers daily news on all of Asia in Italian, English, and Chinese. Visit www.asianews.it. 

The trustees of the United Board for Christian Higher Education in Asia voted in November 2003 to move their program personnel and program office from New York to Asia. “This is a significant change in the way the United Board operates and promises to transform its work, ensuring that it will remain relevant, timely, and evidence-based,” according to a press release. The trustees’ decision came in response to recommendations of a task force chaired by Willi Toisuta, president emeritus of Satya Wacana Christian University, Yogyakarta, Indonesia. The move will “enable more immediate and collaborative dialogue” between United Board program officers and their Asian scholar-partners. As a result, the Asian Christian Higher Education Institute, established in 2001 and currently located at Hong Kong Baptist University, will be the main focus of United Board program activity in Asia. David Kwang-Sun Suh, founding executive director of the institute, now serves also as the United Board’s vice president for programs. Richard J. Wood, president of the United Board and based in New York, will maintain oversight of the United Board as a whole, including the Asian Institute. 

The International Association of Catholic Missiologists will hold a workshop-encounter on the subject “Sharing Diversity in Missiological Research and Education: Issues of Theological Language and Intercultural Communication,” September 29–October 2, 2004, in Cochabamba, Bolivia. IACM plans to hold similar workshops in Africa (2005), Asia-Oceania (2006), Europe (2007), and Canada (2008). Contact John Gorski, M.M., IACM president, at gorski@ucbsun3.ucbcba.edu.bo or visit www.missionstudies.org/IACM. 

The Yale-Edinburgh Group on the History of the Missionary Movement and Non-Western Christianity will hold its annual meeting July 1–3, 2004, at the University of Edinburgh. Speakers will discuss the theme “Missions, Money, and Privilege.” The study group is cosponsored by the Centre for the Study of Christianity in the Non-Western World at the University of Edinburgh, Yale Divinity School, and the Overseas Ministries Study Center. Visit www.library.yale.edu/ div/yaleedin.htm for details. 

The Lausanne Committee for World Evangelization is calling church leaders from around the world to meet with mission strategists September 29–October 5, 2004, in Thailand for the 2004 Forum for World Evangelization. Participants will examine trends and develop plans to address thirty local and global issues that include globalization, transformation of cities, the “uniqueness of Christ in a postmodern world,” and “at-risk people.” Visit www.lausanne.org/2004 for details. 

January 2004

Personalia 

C. Douglas Lovejoy was named executive director of the United States Catholic China Bureau, effective January 1, 2004. He succeeds Janet Carroll, M.M., who served in that role since the bureau’s inception in 1989. Author of a 1987 doctoral dissertation on the Catholic Church’s reopening in China, Lovejoy was director of university development for Asia at Princeton University. See www.usccb.net. 

The Board of Directors of the Institute for Ecumenical and Cultural Research, Collegeville, Minnesota, named Donald B. Ottenhoff, senior editor of the Christian Century, as the institute’s executive director, beginning June 1, 2004. He will succeed Patrick Henry, who is retiring after twenty years. Ottenhoff, a minister in the Presbyterian Church (USA), joined the editorial staff of the Christian Century in 1991 and has been senior editor since 1998. For details, visit www.iecr.org. 

Died. Donal Lamont, 92, Roman Catholic bishop and Irish missionary, an outspoken opponent of racial discrimination in the white-ruled British colony of Rhodesia, in Dublin, August 14, 2003. Entering Rhodesia in 1946 to establish a Carmelite mission, Lamont was appointed bishop (1957) and president of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Rhodesia (1970). He helped found the Catholic Justice and Peace Commission of Rhodesia (1974). He was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1978, following his 1977 expulsion from Rhodesia for his outspoken protests against the policies of Rhodesia’s last white leader, Ian Smith. 

Announcing 

On October 9, 2003, the Center for the Study of Global Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, South Hamilton, Massachusetts, unveiled the World Christian Database, an online resource that serves faculty, students, religion scholars, church leaders, missiologists, and journalists seeking information and analysis on the global Christian movement. This initiative presents the core data supporting the World Christian Encyclopedia and World Christian Trends. The WCD, according to center director Todd M. Johnson, includes detailed information on 34,000 Christian denominations and on religions in every country of the world. In addition, extensive data is available on 238 countries and 13,000 ethnolinguistic people groups, as well as data on 7,000 cities and 3,000 provinces. Statistics in the WCD provide a significant update of the data published in WCE/WCT in 2001. For more information, visit www.globalchristianity.org. 

The premier issue in October 2003 of Global Missiology, an online-only journal that promises “exchanges between researchers, practitioners, and scholars who have an international scope and global concerns,” featured an unpublished lecture, “Missions According to Scripture,” by Dutch theologian and politician Abraham Kuyper. The editor is Enoch Wan, chair of the Division of Intercultural Studies and director of the doctor of missiology program at Western Seminary, Portland, Oregon. For more information, visit www.globalmissiology.net.

The Church of Jesus Christ in Madagascar will hold an international colloquium April 5–8, 2004, with “Rescuing the Memory of Our Churches” as its theme. Participants will discuss the role of church archives, organize their conservation and use, and exchange their archiving experiences. For more information, visit www.missionstudies.org/rescue/english.htm.

The American Society of Missiology will hold its annual meeting June 18–20, 2004, in Techny, Illinois, with “Collaboration: The Missing Link in the World Christian Mission” as the theme. The annual meeting of the Association of Professors of Mission will be held at the same location prior to the ASM gathering. William O’Brien is the ASM president. For details, visit www.asmweb.org.

Thomas Wang, Luis Bush, and Patrick Johnstone are among the speakers scheduled for the Korean World Mission Conference (KWMC 2004) to be held at Wheaton College, Wheaton, Illinois, July 26–30, 2004. To be conducted in Korean, this will be the fifth quadrennial international conference sponsored by the Korean World Mission Council for Christ, Valley Cottage, New York. An English-language conference especially for youth, collegians, and young professionals will be held simultaneously. For details, visit www.kwmc.com, email kwmc@kwmc.com, or call (845) 267-4159.

Mar Elias University will become the first Christian, Arab, and Israeli university in the Middle East, reports the Catholic charity Aid to the Church in Need. Dedicated to improving Arab-Israeli relations and hailed by Zenit News Agency as “a glimmer of hope in the troubled Middle East,” the university is an initiative of the Melkite Catholics. The new university received accreditation from the Council of Higher Education of the Israeli Ministry of Education. Courses will be offered primarily in English, with some in Arabic and Hebrew. The provisional campus is in Ibillin, Galilee, where the Melkites already have an educational complex. For details, visit www.me-c.org/home.html.

The Centre for Mission Studies at Union Biblical Seminary, Pune, India, announces plans to publish a semiannual journal featuring articles from faculty and alumni. UBS Journal’s first issue will have the theme “Educating the People of God.” Contact the Centre at cms@ubs.ac.in.

Creation of the Dictionary of Indian Christian Biography is underway. Members of the Contextual Theology Department of Union Biblical Seminary, Pune, India, coordinated by Jacob Thomas, will provide administrative and technical support for the online database of biographies of Indian “Christian servant-leaders who have impacted lives and have contributed to the society at large.” Patterned after the Dictionary of African Christian Biography sponsored by the Overseas Ministries Study Center, the broadly interconfessional, historically descriptive, and nonproprietary database will be published in English and eventually in other Indian languages. For details, e-mail biographies@dacb.org or visit www.dacb.org.