Miller, Donald E. and Tetsunao Yamamori. Global Pentecostalism: The New Face of Christian Social Engagement. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2007. x+ 262 pages.
By Mu-tien Chiou
Donald E. Miller and Tetsunao Yamamori spent four years in 20 different countries interviewing 400 mission experts and local church leaders. Their initial intent is to do research on fast growing, indigenous, and self-supporting churches with substantial involvement in social ministries in the developing world. When they discover that about 85 percent of the churches nominated were Pentecostal or Charismatic, they decided to give this type of ministry the coinage of ‘progressive Pentecostalism’ , which, they consider, reflects a significant trend in global Christianity. The end result becomes this book.
Its thesis is that Pentecostal churches worldwide are increasingly engaged in community-based social ministries that embodies a holistic understanding of the Christian faith (211).
II. Chapter Summary
In the earliest chapters, the authors spend much time delineating key concepts to be used throughout the book, including how they measure and theorize social engagement, and a working definition of ‘progressive Pentecostalism’ that distinguishes itself from 1) traditional Pentecostalism, 2) social gospel, and 3) liberation theology.
Throughout chapter 3 to 4, Miller and Yamamori take readers into the churches, homes, and communities of the world’s needy populations in places such as Uganda, Cairo, Calcutta, Caracas, Johannesburg, Buenos Aires, Nairobi, Hong Kong, Singapore, and Bangkok. The types of ministries they investigated are listed earlier in chapter 2: (1) mercy ministries (providing food, clothing, and shelter); (2) emergency services (responding to floods, famine, and earthquakes); (3) education (providing day care, schools, and tuition assistance); (4) counseling services (helping with addiction, divorce, and depression); (5) medical assistance (establishing health clinics, dental clinics, and psychological services); (6) economic development (providing microenterprise loans, job training, and affordable housing); (7) the arts (training in music, dance, and drama); and (8) policy change (opposing corruption, monitoring elections, and advocating a living wage).
It is noteworthy that the majority of these leaders initiated their ministries without any articulated blueprint or orchestrated plan except for a vision from their God. Many of these workers, on a similar vein, feel motivated by this divine calling or vision to penetrate into the extremely poverty-stricken areas for the sort drudgery that no one else would care to spend time on. Much to the authors’ credit, some of the interviews are actually testimonies from people who had their lives dramatically transformed by this type of embodied Christian faith.
In Chapter 5, which according to the authors’ argument ‘could be the lead chapter of the book’ (132), more scholarly efforts seem to be poured in to investigate the supernatural phenomena surrounding Pentecostal prayer and worship. The aim is to offer a balanced account in light of naturalistic understanding. Since what characterizes Pentecostals and singles their ministries out from voluntary social group are primarily their distinctive spiritual activities, to offer at least one secular explanation of these activities seems pertinent for the non-participating readership.
The relationship among Pentecostal theology, democracy and upward social mobility is the topic of chapter 6. It draws upon 20th century sociologists Max Weber and Karl Marx for the argument that Pentecostalism, in spite that a great number of its adherents are enjoying upward social mobility, has NOT come to the full appreciation of the biblical emphasis on social justice. Liberation theology therefore is expected to provide duly input to Pentecostals by focusing on structural evil and devising long-term strategy to fight against it (183). Chapter 7 covers many of organizational dynamics that occur in the developing process of Progressive Pentecostalism, including 1) their power structure and the transition of it, 2) the role of modern media, foreign missionaries, and female members, as well as 3) the influence of political/religious oppression, inter-denominational competition, and globalization. The closing chapter (ch.8) is a summary. It gives little things new but specifically reintroduces the issue concerning the future possibilities of Progressive Pentecostalism, should this movement keep developing and pass its axis unto the next generation. The prospect looks especially promising when the Christian social conscience awakened by liberation theology is aptly tuned by Pentecostalism and takes the form of peaceful reformation and education.
III. Personal Response
First of all, this book is very accessibly written. Writing as social scientists, Miller and Yamamori nonetheless takes a religious approach which assumes that human beings are to a large extent defined by those moral convictions or narratives of how their life ought to act and be. As president of Food for the Hungry, an international NGO which presence can be seen in dozens of countries around the world, Yamamori contributed valuable insights with his analysis on the working model that local churches and faith-based NGOs build together. Taking World Vision in Tanzania as example, he furnishes us with a convincing illustration on how and why NGO is often the catalyst for inter-denominational (and even inter-faith) cooperation on a given community development project (142).
For those of us interested in exploring what kind of roles religion can play in attend to the needs of individuals and help to ameliorate the global society, Global Pentecostalism is an exceptional introductory-level source.
IV. Reflection Based upon Other Reading Materials
The phenomenal rise of Pentecostalism around the world, particularly within the Southern Hemisphere has bewildered theologians and sociologists of religion together with a question mark about its possible ramification on the social aspects. This is the question posed by The Next Christendom with demographic statistics, and the answer is now attempted by Global Pentecostalism with journalistic-style interviews and reports. These two books should be regarded as mutual complementary.
The big issues with the latter, however, is that when the authors set out their research object as being ‘Pentecostal churches that were fast-growing, located in the developing world, had active social ministries in their communities, and were indigenous to their communities’, the 15 percent non-Charismatic churches among the investigated are eliminated from the researchers’ scope. In addition, neither are the unknown percentages of the more traditional Pentecostal churches that do not share the ‘progressive’ attributes being included in the discussion nor have the authors made their footprints plastered over the entire world map to make the outcome of survey persuasively global.
The consequence is that this book weakens its case as being a comprehensive account on either ‘global Pentecostalism’ or ‘holistic mission’. As for the first issue, the indigenous CEB of Catholic church detailed in Christianity in Latin America yet completely left out by this book serves as a lucid objection. As for the second issue, one would certainly expect to see the position of China’s house church renewal (c.f. Jesus in Beijing) in this progressive Pentecostal movement, rather than having Singapore with its Willow-Creek-like City Harvest church sneaking in the list of ‘developing countries’ for mere convenience’s sake.
林德貝克的贈言 Patrimoine de Lindbeck 