By Matters India Reporter
Kottayam: The Christian Conference of Asia says for opening “closed doors” to strangers is not an option but “a theological mandate” for the followers of Christ.
“Our task is to open the closed doors to embrace the strangers, which is a liberative engagement. Contextually, the re-interpretation towards embracing the stranger is not an option, but a theological mandate to meet the needs,” affirmed the participants of a national follow-up consultation of the Asia Mission Conference (AMC)-2017 of the Christian Conference of Asia (CCA).
More than 70 participants from various parts of India attended the June 19-21 consultation at the Sophia Centre of the Orthodox Theological Seminary in Kottayam, Kerala, organized by CCA and the Vichara, an ecumenical think-tank based in the southern Indian state.
It focused on a sub theme of the AMC, ‘Embracing the Strangers and Prophetic Witnessing.’
The consultation sought to understand and embrace the vulnerable “strangers” who can be categorized as refugees, internally displaced people, victims of human trafficking, and migrant workers who are all deprived of their inherent rights and dignity.
“Missiologically, embracing a stranger has been taken as one of the mission hermeneutical paradigms in the 21st century. Our understanding of mission has been changing, widening its scope and making paradigm shifts in different contexts. If this shift is taken seriously as mission hermeneutical paradigm in the Asian Churches, it will become a transforming mission not only in Asia, but also all over the world,” the consultation observed.
Bishop P. C Singh, president of the National Council of Churches in India (NCCI) and the Moderator of the Church of North India, opened the consultation.
Bishop Singh, who is also a member of the Executive Committee of CCA, in his inaugural address stated that “enhance embracing the stranger” includes wielding a wider ecumenical instrument of interfaith communities tackling the issue together, and “this is a Christian missiological affirmation and mandate”.
Renowned Orthodox theologian the Rev. Dr. K. M. George, said that there are changes in perceptions of hospitality in ‘embracing the stranger’ and the hospitality of God was unconditional, open to the strangers, the weak, vulnerable, oppressed and outcast, while our human hospitality has been conditional and limited.
Reverend George further added that “the challenge is to reinterpret the idea of hospitality, and to rethink the implications of hospitality in the face of increasing geo-political changes today”.
The thematic address delivered by the Rev. Dr. Ngur Liana of CCA expounded various dimensions of ’embracing the stranger and prophetic witnessing in the Asian contexts.
Reverend Liana stressed the need for the theological vision to “engage in prophetic witnessing together for embracing the strangers” in the circumstances of escalating violence, terrorism and xenophobia. He explained God as a “migrant” God, Jesus Christ as a “migrant”, and a “refugee” who makes complete identification with the strangers. The Holy Spirit as a God who is with the strangers, co-suffering in their suffering and giving hope in times of hopelessness”
Addressing the concerns of the migrants and strangers Dr. Michael Tharakan, a well-known social scientist, described the history of migration and the conflict between the nomadic and sedentary people.
Tharakan analyzed migration as “a strategy or combination of strategies that enhance(s) access to resources; the rational approach to the issue would be to understand the dynamic relations that influence migration”.
He further added that “an inclusive approach would lead to the admission that the world’s resources are open to all and that ‘the whole world is for the whole world’ thus enabling a cooperation between the sedentary and nomadic people”.
Rev. Dr. Daniel Premkumar who led the Biblical, theological reflections emphasized the need to “incarnate/embody ourselves in the struggles of the stranger” especially as people shared the same web of salvation and obligation.
In a presentation on ‘Embracing the Strangers and Church’s Mission,’ the Rev. Dr. P. G. George, a professor of Old Testament gave a refreshing understanding on migration from the Old Testament and the New Testament perspectives. He narrated how the strategically placed divides in the Bible could be interpreted in the perspective of migrants.
Reverend George added that “immigrant theology must be constructed or articulated as an Asian contextual theology as well as one of the contextual theological trends and see it from the perspective of the strangers” .
“Migration is no longer an aberration but a norm now. If the church represents the kingdom community, it is the responsibility of the church today to serve the people of God irrespective of their identity. We need to come out of our existential pathos, and what we need is imaginations to do prophetic witness, ” said Dr. George, a former Research Director of the Senate of Serampore University.
In a session dealt on ‘Church and Prophetic Witness’, the Rev. Christopher Rajkumar, Executive Secretary of the NCCI, elucidated that the gospel affirming social justice should be preached to embrace everyone and “prophetic witness was not concerned with mere prosperity but of a holistic life and had social justice as its base”.
Rajkumar reiterated that “prophetic is to affirm God’s love through critical engagements to de-build and re-build communities, prophetic is to create equality and freedom but more importantly, it is holistic and multi-layered justice that leads towards absolute peace.”