18 August 2007

Code on proselytism

It looks like a WEA spokesbeing hasindicated the WEAwould be ready to sign up to a code on mission, evangelismand proselytism.
such a code should, "establish the borderline between acceptable forms of mission protected by religious freedom, and undue forms of trying to convert people". The WEA leader recognised, however, the difficulty in nailing down "unethical means" to a concrete code of conduct, given different historical, religious, cultural and political contexts.

Though I suspect that the evangelicals and Pentecostals are not going to accept it if it ends up endorsing this opinion
"Religious preachers need to be told that no religion has monopoly to the truth, that there are many ways to find salvation," said Shastri.

From experience in local Christian groups working on the interfaith interface, I still find it strange that a lot of more liberal Christians don't seem to get how deep seated are the exclusivist trendswithin the evangelical constituencyand that you cannot speak for the Christian community without being considerably more careful about the voicing of pluralist-seeming perspectives.
What can be 'sold' to this constiturency, without trying to impose a suspected-of-heresy bunch of theologies is this
the code of conduct must be built around the concept of "dialogical evangelism" instead of "aggressive evangelism". Such an evangelism, Richie believes, can still be energetic and enthusiastic but not coercive or manipulative. He also explains that an appropriate evangelism needs to be ecumenical in attitude and concerned with operating ethically.
and that's pretty much at the extreme leading edge as I read things at the moment. But it's at least a step forward to read this:
The envisioned code of conduct, "will only make sense if it is not directed against Evangelicals and Pentecostals but written together with them". The WEA's "involvement and blessing is crucial in order to win the 'black sheep' amongst Evangelicals and Pentecostals over for a respectful kind of evangelism," Schirrmacher said.

I cation the reader new to my writing not to be too quick, either, to draw conclusions about my position from the above.

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