Graduate School of Theology, Hanshin University

Kipleting Eliud Seurei

Reimaging World Christianity; A Model to Mitigate Refugee

Suffering

Abstract

Colonial legacy has created divisions which result in violence and exclusion. Christendom was

based on the idea of exclusion, homogenisation and conquering the other. Nationalism, as an

ideology creates refugees and generates a monological ‘unity’ among the people in the country of

arrival against refugees, thus, Religion combined with nationalism poses a danger to humanity. This

article argues that Christendom, nationalism, and enlightenment/modernism results into order and

produces refugees, and causes pain and suffering. This provokes the reflection of World Christianity

to address the refugee problems created by Christendom, enlightenment and monologic nationalism.

It holds that WC is best alternative to counter exclusion and hogenization. Furthermore, World

Christianity is dialogic, inclusive, pluralistic, multi-centered and de-colonial, and these elements

can be used to counter the problem. Since humanity cannot proceed neglecting the global refugee

crises, the concept of a nation needs to be urgently reimagined in the light of World Christianity.

The illustration is done through the description case of ‘The Greek Coast Guard Shipwreck Tragedy,’

which occurred on June 14, full of Migrants and refugees. It claims that World Christianity which

is dialogic, inclusive, polycentric, pluralistic and de-colonial in its manifestations can offer better

directions to address the problem of Global refugee phenomenal.

Keywords
Christendom, World Christianity, Monologism, Nationalism, Refugees, Modernism

1
Introduction

The current refugee crisis is a global phenomenon that is shifting the global landscape. The

movement of people is as old as humanity itself, and it is not a new phenomenon to humanity.

However, this century is witnessing what has been termed as a ‘large scale migration in an

unprecedented level. This article addresses the Global refugee phenomena by employing World

Christianity lenses to offer a solution to the ongoing Christendom, nationalism, and modernization

that has created refugees and enhance the space of suffering and pain. The question that bonders in

the article is; How World Christianity can be the direction to address the global refugee phenomenon

and build an inclusive nation in the future that will not only accept refugees by going beyond

religious, cultural, ethnic, national, and economic boundaries but also foster an interdependent

environment which will not create further refugees? Stephen Castles and Mark J. Miller argue,

“while movements of people across borders have shaped states and societies since time immemorial,

what is distinctive in recent years is their global scope, their centrality to domestic and international

politics and their enormous economic and social consequences.”1

This paper is using the framework of World Christianity scholars to retrieve useful elements from

World Christianity against monologic nationalism; that causes the global refugee crisis and apply

them to address the global refugee phenomenon and reimagine nation based on them. It will argue

that refugee is the context of the emerging mission of this century and the global refugee

phenomenon is the reality of the present century, hence mission needs to address this reality to

liberate people and continue the on-going transformation. Thus, World Christianity is taken as an

alternative to monologic colonial Christendom. What characterizes is a large part of such migration

1
Stephen Castles&Mark J. Miller, The Age of Migration: International Population Movement in the Modern World
(London: Macmillan Press, 1998), 1.

2
is forced migration which has created millions of refugees. The global refugee phenomenon has

emerged as a painful moral wound of our times. The suffering and death of refugees call for urgent

action and the current refugee crisis is a global problem affecting all countries irrespective of

continents. In this regard, the paper upholds that there is need to reimagine the nation that is

inclusive, pluralistic and polycentric in nature to salvage and mitigate the situation of pain and

suffering that is caused to humanity. The case of the Capsized migrant boat will be highlighted in

the article, nationalism and Christendom discussed and the World Christianity proposed as the

solution to the phenomena.

Case: Migrant Boat Capsized, 22/06/2023: The Greek Coast Guard Shipwreck Tragedy

On June 15, 2023, the shocking news of; The Greek Coast Guard Shipwreck Tragedy hit every

headline News across the globe as the news anchors and rapporteurs, point their camera lenses to

the situation at hand. The boat full of migrants seeking a better life in Europe sank in Greek waters,

with hundreds missing and dozens confirmed dead, Greek and European authorities faced criticism.

“Off the coast of Greece, more than 80 bodies have now been recovered after one of the deadliest

migrant shipwrecks in the Mediterranean in years. Up to 750 people are believed to have been

aboard a fishing vessel that set sail from Libya, headed towards Italy and then capsized off Greece

last week. Well, today, questions are mounting over whether Greek and European authorities could

have done more to prevent the tragedy.”2 As reported by Europe news.

The Fishing boat capsized June14 to be exact, about 45 miles southwest of Pylos, Greece’s in the

country’s southern Peloponnese peninsula. Members of Greece’s coast guard, navy and air force

2
Lydia Emmanouilidou, “Migrant boat disaster has Greece and Europe authorities facing criticism,” Europe ( June
22, 20230, https://www.npr.org/2023/06/22/1183842802/migrant-boat-disaster-has-greece-and-european-authorities-
facing-criticism [accessed July 03, 2023]

3
were deployed to search the waters of passengers, using helicopters, navy frigates and boats. Greek

and United Nations authorities were first alerted about the boat, which was heading for Italy, on

June 13. They then surveyed the area and repeatedly tried to call and contact the ship, but all requests

for help were declined as passengers repeatedly expressed that they wanted to continue their journey.

Later in the day on June 13, a merchant ship supplied the fishing boat with food and supplies.

However, later attempts to try and supply help were declined by passengers. A coast guard patrol

boat moved alongside the ship before it ultimately capsized in the early hours of June 143. With

hundreds of people still missing after the overloaded vessel capsized in the Mediterranean on June

14, the testimonies of those who were onboard paint a picture of chaos and desperation. They also

call into question the Greek coast guard’s version of events, suggesting more lives could have been

saved, and may even point to fault on the part of Greek authorities. Rights groups allege the tragedy

is both further evidence and a result of a new pattern in illegal pushbacks of migrant boats to other

nations’ waters, with deadly consequences. This boat was carrying up to 750 Pakistani, Syrian,

Egyptian and Palestinian refugees and migrants. Only 104 people have been rescued alive while

more than 500 people perished as they struggle to save their life across the sea. 4 This concept of

drawn boarders and boundaries has resulted to nationalism and Christendom which continue to

pause danger to humanity as a whole.

3
Kate Perez & Isabelle Butera, “Migrant boat death toll rises to 82 as Greece is criticized for response to capsized
boat,” USA Today ( Jube 21, 2023), https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2023/06/21/greek-boat-capsize-
fallout-focus-greece-government/70342879007/ [accessed July 03, 2023]
4
Florence Davey-Attlee, et al. “If They Had Left us be, we wouldn’t have drowned: CNN Investigation Raises
questions about Greek coast guard’s account of shipwreck tragedy,” CNN Update (June 23, 2023),
https://edition.cnn.com/2023/06/23/europe/greece-migrant-boat-disaster-investigation-intl-cmd/index.html [accessed
July 03, 2023]

4
Christendom and Nationalism

The French Huguenots, who were first called refugees, 5 were, in fact, the victims of the union

between religion and nationalism that was done to form a homogenous group; hence Christendom

was based on the idea of conquest and eliminating differences. The attempt was to form one

homogenized community that failed in the long run but created division and exclusion. Simply

because the idea of a nation-state is based on the assumption of one common language, culture,

tradition, history, and religion, which is known as Christendom. Though this might seem natural

and historical, a nation-state is a construct, where Anderson calls it an ‘imagined community’6

because it is not a real community where people know each other personally. The common

consciousness is a construct of the elite and the powerful, which uses it to control the masses. It is

obvious that Christendom, which was colonial by its nature, was a manifestation of the monologic

idea of conquest. Therefore, it excluded the 'other', hence, global refugee phenomenon which is a

product of exclusion. The church cannot exist for itself, but the church must exist for, by and of

mission that embraces the other. The ultimate goal of the mission is not a church, but the goal of the

church has to be a mission, and this is simply because the church is a product of mission and not

vice versa. When the church becomes an end in itself, it becomes narcissistic, and it works against

the reign of God.

Colonialism and Christendom have a monologic ideology that does not have the ability to dialogue

because monologism does not recognize plurality and differences. The assumption that everything

needs to be and can be forced to be harmonized, results in serialization, ordering, and exclusion.

5
Caroline Shaw, Britannia’s Embrace: Modern Humanitarianism and the Imperial Origins of Refugee Relief
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019), 3.
6
Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Relations on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism, (London: New Left
Books, 1983), 6.

5
Though there are various factors like economic, social, political, and cultural that might give rise to

refugees, monologism is one of the main causes. Monologic nationalism was seen as a positive

force mainly by independence freedom fighters to unite different ethnic and religious communities

to fight against the common enemy, the colonizer. However, this same nationalism has another

dimension of excluding people as it is based on the idea of an enemy. After independence, the

nation-state that is formed following the European ideology of nation-state tends to establish a

central government replacing the colonizer, for which homogenization of language, culture, and

religion is essential, which only turns out to be a violent process. Since the nation-state created by

colonizers is not a harmonized group, there is always a struggle for power and control over the other

groups in the nation. As a result, nationalism and nation-state not only contributes towards

generating refugees, but it has also united the country of asylum against refugees.

The global refugee phenomenon, which is a product of monologic ideology of nationalism, has

destroyed the lives of millions of people, and still continues to destroy the lives of people even

today. Refugee deaths in the seas while attempting to get to a safe place, call for immediate action

not only to meet the needs of the refugees but also to address the main reason that causes refugees.

In the twenty-first century, the movement of people has increased along with globalization. In

globalization, while on one hand, the movement of capital is free-flowing, on the other hand, the

movement of people is highly restricted. Despite restriction through border patrol and visa control,

people haven’t stopped attempting dangerous journeys. This has resulted in an alarming increase in

the deaths of refugees attempting to flee conflict prone zones to a safer context. The borders of the

modern nation-states have precipitated the suffering of refugees.

6
At the end of the fifteenth century Europe’s colonisation of Asia, Africa, and the Americas began

and the justification was based on the just war theory of the medieval period. 7 Back then

colonisation became the new form of crusades. Though there was colonisation of non-Christian

people in Europe even before the fifteenth century, the colonised people were assimilated into the

‘dominant culture’ but later because of physical, linguistic and cultural differences slavery was

imposed on the colonised non-western people.8 During that time only the European religion and

culture was considered as the culture and the religion, but all other belief systems and cultures were

considered to be ‘corrupt’, and Europe took a higher moral stand to exploit and impose slavery, thus

trying to create a monologic religion all over the world.

As David Bosch says Jesus did not have any intention to found a new religion and his followers

were not given any separate identity, doctrine or there was no centre. The disciples were to go

around the whole world. As time passed Christianity became a new religion. Bosch says:

We perceive something of this difference between an institution and a

movement if we compare the Christian community in Jerusalem with that
of Antioch in the forties of the first century AD. The Antioch church's
pioneering spirit precipitated an inspection by Jerusalem. It was clear that
the Jerusalem party's concern was not mission, but consolidation; not grace,
but law; not crossing frontiers, but fixing them; not life, but doctrine; not
movement, but institution.9

The Jerusalem community was into institution, laws, and fixedness and not mission, movement and

grace. The focus was on consolidation and the same appeared later as the church was

institutionalised with strong structure. Consolidation is one of the aspects of Christendom where

7
David J. Bosch, Transforming Missions, Paradigm Shifts in Theology of Mission (New York: Orbis Books, 2014),
226.
8
Bosch J., Transforming Missions, 227.
9
Bosch J., Transforming Missions, 51.

7
everything is brought together as one. From the time of Constantine in the middle age, the

relationship between the Pope and the Holy Roman Empire was interdependent. The reformation

brought a big change to this while the Holy Roman Empire turned into several nation-states. The

idea of Christendom continues in the churches. Bosch says:

in each European country the church was “established” as state church—

Anglican in England, Presbyterian in Scotland, Reformed in the
Netherlands, Lutheran in Scandinavia and some of the German territories,
Roman Catholic in most of Southern Europe, etc. It was difficult to
differentiate between political, cultural, and religious elements and
activities, since they all merged into one. This made it completely natural
for the first European colonizing powers, Portugal and Spain, to assume that
they, as Christian monarchs, had the divine right to subdue pagan peoples
and that therefore colonization and Christianization not only went hand in
hand but were two sides of the same coin.10

The reformation resulted in religion, politics, and nation-state to merge into one while there was

constant tension maintained between the church and the state. Though the authorities struggled for

power over each other it was not merged into one unit. Thus state and religious identity became one.

This gave the reason to colonize other people as they were not believers and hence were denied

their rights and faced exclusion. The Enlightenment narrowed down the work of the church in

society from its broad spectrum.11

The relationship between religion and nationalism is not only found in the Medieval age but is

rising again in 20th and 21st century, and Juergensmeyer warns that it can be very dangerous.

Juergensmeyer says “for the radical accommodation of religion to the ideologies of nationalism and

transnationalism may not be good for either religion or political order.”12 After Britain took over

France slowly protestant missionaries became agents of the empire as “evangelicals became a

10
Bosch J., Transforming Missions, 281.
11
Bosch J., Transforming Missions, 288.
12
Mark Juergensmeyer, “The Global Rise of Religious Nationalism”, Australian Journal of International Affairs,
64:3, (2010): 262-273.

8
respected power in the state, and missionaries, whether they intended to or not, became promoters

of Western imperial expansion.” 13

The western missionary enterprise worked under the conviction that God has chosen western

nations by his grace.14 The concept of the chosen nation played an important role in the mission

during this period. According to Bosch “manifest destiny” is a product of nationalism.15

virtually every white nation regarded itself as being chosen for a particular
destiny and as having a unique charisma; the Germans, the French, the
Russians, the British, the Americans, the Afrikaners, the Dutch. It was only
to be expected that the nationalistic spirit would, in due time, be absorbed
into missionary ideology, and Christians of a specific nation would develop
the conviction that they had an exceptional role to play in the advancement
of the kingdom of God through the missionary enterprise.16

Bosch surveys the “Manifest destiny” in North America and says that the missionary passion was

ignited by both national and religious as they cannot be separated. 17 The zeal to do become a

missionary was aroused not only by religious passion but equally by national interest also. During

the Victorian era, missionaries’ work for empire was felt strongly as missionaries were pushing the

empires agenda thus in the name of God’s agenda of preaching the Gospel the empire’s interest was

served. ‘missionaries became the pioneers of western imperialistic expansion.’18 In South Africa

during the second half of the 19th century mission was not only God’s work but was also important

because it was an opportunity to serve the fatherland, the welfare of the nation. 19 Though

missionaries were nationalistic the colonial power was also against them because in

13
Juergensmeyer M., “The Global Rise of Religious Nationalism,” 288.
14
Bosch J., Transforming Mission, 305-308.
15
Bosch J., Transforming Mission, 305.
16
Bosch J., Transforming Mission, 306.
17
Bosch J., Transforming Mission, 309.
18
I Bosch J., Transforming Mission, 310.
19
Bosch J., Transforming Mission, 311.

9
Juergensmeyer’s words “the missionaries were the liberal colonizers.’ 20 Colonial legacy is

monologic by its nature, it has a truth claim and cannot listen to any other voices.

Enlightenment/Modernism

The will to do mission and to serve one’s country merged as mission became an opportunity to

serves ones country. The mission became so much race centred and nation-centred that the German

mission organizations had the popular slogan “only German missionaries for German colonies” as

quoted by Bosch. 21 Before the enlightenment, it was religious division but the enlightenment

brought a new division that separated people is the notion of ethnicity or race where the civilized

claimed they had the responsibility to the uncivilized.22 One can see how the missionary enterprise

became nation-centred and the empires were promoting young people to do mission as it served the

nation’s interest.23 The twentieth century American mission became more foreign than domestic as

the foreign mission idea server the purpose of the mood of the nation.24

James Bryce a Scottish missionary was of the opinion that instead of proving that Hinduism is

illogical it is better to make people believe that Hinduism has a glorious past “a golden age” through

their own literature, this will help the relationship between the conquered and the conqueror.25 This

resulted in the idea that there was a glorious past and later it legitimizes the claim that India was

country with one religion and it had a glorious past, resulting in creating hatred towards minorities

20
Mark Juergensmeyer, “ The Global Rise of Religious Nationalism.”
21
Bosch, Transforming Mission, 316.
22
Bosch J., Transforming Mission, 319.
23
Bosch J., Transforming Mission, 319.
24
Bosch J., Transforming Mission, 308.
25
James Bryce, A Sketch of Native Education in India, (Edinburgh: William Blackwood and Sons, 1839), 121-124.

10
who did not fit into the one single tradition of glorious past. This idea served the purpose of

fundamental nationalism. Bryce wanted to preach the gospel to Hindus in way that they will accept

for which he says first Hindus need to accept ‘brahma’ as one God then missionaries can say that

the Hindu knowledge of one God is same as that of the Christian God which gives the space to say

that Jesus Christ is sent by God to save humanity.26 The idea of the glorious past is now a hindrance

to the refugees in India as the nation tends towards homogenisation.

Colonial legacy is monologic by its nature, it has a truth claim and cannot listen to any other voices.

Bakhtin personally lived and faced the hard realities of monologism during the Stalin regime in

Russia, when the state was authoritative and suppressing all other voices that differed from the state.

It is the loss of freedom that made Bakhtin take a stand against anything that is finalized to show

that nothing can be finalized. During the Stalin, regime order was central to state control. Ordering

and control are central to monologism on which the modern state is based. Zygmunt Bauman27 says:

Among the multitude of impossible tasks that modernity set itself and that
made modernity into what it is, the task of order (more precisely and most
importantly, of order as a task) stands out -- as the least possible among the
impossible and the least disposable among the indispensable; indeed, as the
archetype for all other tasks, one that renders all other tasks mere metaphors
of itself. 28

When the empires fell, the modern state rose, and along with the modern state, ordering became

crucial. Bauman says “Order is continuously engaged in the war of survival.” 29 In the war of

26
Bryce, A Sketch of Native Education in India, 94-95.
27
Zygmunt Bauman (1925-2017) was an eminent sociologist from Poland, he was the professor of sociology at the
university of Leeds. His major work was ‘Modernity and Liquid Modernity.’
28
Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and Ambivalence (Oxford: Blackwell publishers, 1998), 4.
29
Bauman Z., Modernity and Ambivalence, 7.

11
survival of order, anything that does not fit in was to be eliminated. Therefore, modernity wants to

design and order everything to fit human existence. Bauman says:

The raw existence, the existence free of intervention, the unordered

existence, or the fringe of ordered existence, become now nature: something
singularly unfit for human habitat -- something not to be trusted and not to
be left to its own devices, something to be mastered, subordinated, remade
so as to be readjusted to human needs. Something to be held in check,
restrained and contained, lifted from the state of shapelessness and given
form – by effort and by force.30

The idea that nature is not fit for human existence therefore it needs to be ordered, controlled,

subordinated according to human need justified using force to attain this goal. The states being a

product of modernity had this idea that urges towards homogenization creating violence. Modernity

has provided a strong desire to define and control, therefore:

the society that modernity wants to create is effected and sustained by

design, manipulation, management, engineering. The existence is modern
in as far as it is administered by resourceful (that is, possessing knowledge,
skill and technology), sovereign agencies.31

Ordering and control are central to modernity as Bauman says “the preoccupation with orderly,

manageable society, is a common denominator of other modern undertakings... to make human

affairs regular and amenable to planning and control was high up in the mind of the principal

advocates and actors of industrialism, democracy, and capitalism.”32 The imperialistic nature of

modernity is exposed as Bauman says: “Whoever traveled faster could claim more territory—and,

having done that, could control it, map it and supervise it keeping the competitors at arm’s length

30
Bauman Z., Modernity and Ambivalence, 7.
31
Bauman Z., Modernity and Ambivalence, 7.
32
Zygmunt Bauman & Keith Tester, Conversations with Zygmunt Bauman (Cambridge, Polity Press, 2001), 78.

12
and intruders out of bounds.”33 The same is true of nation-states that were products of modernity

which itself ‘was born under the stars of acceleration and land conquest.’34

Samuel Y. Pang exposes the relationship between ordering and the enlightenment rationality, he

says: “In fact, this social engineering, the quest for order and ambivalence free homogeneity was

reinforced by enlightenment rationality in which everything including nature is subordinated to

human will and reason.”35 Enlightenment rationality placed human reason above nature, the quest

for order did not end with nature, and the same principle was applied to human society. Furthermore,

Edward Said36 shows what enlightenment has done with ordering in history. Said articulates that:

So far as Orientalism in particular and European knowledge of other

societies, in general, have been concerned, historicism meant that the one
human history uniting humanity either culminated in or was observed from
the vantage point of Europe, or the West.37

Plurality was destroyed and one point of view became the only point of view and all other views

were not considered as different but as wrong. In monologism there is always a tendency to order

and homogenize and there is no space for plurality since everything needs to fit into one large

framework which is not dialogical. Modernism gave birth to nationalism and nationalism depends

on the idea of homogeneity that everything should be unified into one single idea. Western

rationalism permeated the political ideology of Nationalism which is exclusive and unified. In the

33
Bauman Z., Liquid Modernity (Cambridge: Mass, 2000), 11.
34
Bauman Z., Liquid Modernity, 110-112.
35
Samuel Y Pang, Ethical Responsibility Beyond Interpretation: A Dialogical Theology of Global Christianity
(Seoul: Handle Publishing House, 2002), 43&44.
36
Edward Said (1935-2003), was a Palestinian American political activist. He examined literatures in the light of
socio cultural politics. His master piece on Orientalism changed the way people thought about the word.
37
Edward Said, ‘Orientalism Reconsidered’ in Europe and Its Others, Vol. 1 ed. Francis Barker et al. (Colchester:
University of Essex, 1985), 22.

13
process of homogenization minorities who do not belong to the so called mainstream ideology are

excluded.

Pain and suffering

The enlightenment philosophy assumes that there is something common as Kedourie says, “The

philosophy of the Enlightenment prevalent in Europe in the eighteenth century held that the universe

was governed by a uniform, unvarying law of Nature.”38 This concept gave birth to the assumption

that though there are differences, there is much common to bring people together. Therefore, the

state tries to homogenise people in one way or the other leading to oppression and persecution of

those who do not fit in.

Arendt argues that the rise of the modern state gave birth to refugee and stateless people. “Since the

peace treaties39 of 1919 and 1920, the refugees and stateless have attached themselves like a curse

to all the newly established states on earth which were created in the image of the nation state.”40

Arendt also exposes the pain and suffering the nation-state has brought on refugees. “once they have

left their homeland they remained homeless, once they have left their state they became stateless;

once they were deprived of their human rights, they were rightless, the scum of the earth.” 41 After

the formation of the modern nation-state, once someone decides to leave the nation the person losses

not only national identity but the state system deprives the person of human personhood.

38
Elie Kedourie, Nationalism (London: Hutchinson and co, 1961), 10.
39
After the first world war.
40
Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 290.
41
Arendt H., The Origins of Totalitarianism, 267.

14
Refugees are not only homeless but they also do not belong to any state thereby not having any

political rights and having become stateless, no state has the responsibility towards them. Though

we have the charter of human rights, refugee crises show that humans are citizens and those who

do not have citizenship cannot have access to human rights. After the French revolution refugees

were not only deprived of life, liberty and pursuit of happiness, equality before law and freedom of

opinion, all the laws of rights were designed for people living in a given community the problem of

the refugee is that they do not belong to any community.42 They have left their homes and now are

not accepted in the country where they have reached and live in between.

The more organized the society has become resulting in expulsion of more people. “only with a

completely organized humanity could the loss of home and political status become identical with

expulsion from humanity altogether” 43 Arendt rightly argues that before the nation-states were

formed, people who lost their homes but were able to settle in a new territory but now with the

control of border there is no freedom of movement. So once people lose their citizenship identity,

they do not have a place in human society. Arendt speaks of the ‘right to have rights’, Arendt

expounds how organized communities act towards the other: Arendt says:

The reason why highly developed political communities, such as the ancient
city-states or modern nation-states, so far insist on ethnic homogeneity is
that they hope to eliminate as far as possible those natural and always
present differences and differentiations which by themselves arouse dumb
hatred, mistrust, and discrimination because they indicate all too clearly
those spheres where men cannot act and change at will i.e., the limitation of
the human artifice. The “alien” is a frightening symbol of the fact of
difference as such, of individuality as such, and indicates those realms in

42
Arendt H., The Origins of Totalitarianism, 295.
43
Arendt H., The Origins of Totalitarianism, 297.

15
 which man cannot change and cannot act and in which, therefore, he has a
distinct tendency to destroy.44

The alien who is the other becomes an object that has to be either conquered or destroyed who

otherwise will disrupt the homogenization process of the nation which the state will do at any cost.

Homogenization is not a smooth process in the nation making process. It has to suppress other

voices but still, the differences continue to be. The modern state with its enlightenment ideology of

monologism has become the authoritative power homogenizing and excluding others who have a

different religious ideology, racial identity, and political ideology. The state from its very origin has

been homogenizing and excluding those who do not fit into the nationalist narrative creating

refugees. The inability of monologism to dialogue as it does not recognise the different other hence

there is a need for an alternative. Dialogism of the Bakhtin comes as an answer to the problem of

monologic state structure that excludes others denying space for plurality.

World Christianity

At the beginning of 19th century, Europe was predominantly Christian, but by the beginning of 20th

century, the centre of Christianity moved from Europe to the non-western world. While Europe was

becoming more secular on the other hand the southern Christianity was growing rapidly. Asian and

African nations are now sending missionaries to other parts of the world. World Christianity is a

movement of Christianity from the global north to the global south. There is a change in the

demography of Christianity. Europe is not the centre of Christianity anymore and World

44
Arendt H., The Origins of Totalitarianism, 301.

16
Christianity is multi-centered, therefore plurality of centres is acknowledged. Multi-centeredness

gives rise to multiple expression of Christianity. The shift is not only in terms of numbers in

Christianity, but the shift is also in leadership in Christianity from west to east.

It is obvious that colonial Christendom has already failed and World Christianity is flourishing. In

World Christianity, there is no domination of any particular culture or territory since the difference

is celebrated. World Christianity is not aggressive and colonial, rather it is all de-colonial, inclusive

and open for dialogue. World Christianity has diverse expressions of faith which are clearly

articulated by Lamin Sanneh. He says:

“World Christianity” is the movement of Christianity as it takes form and

shape in societies that previously were not Christian, societies that had no
bureaucratic tradition with which to domesticate the gospel. In these
societies, Christianity was received and expressed through the cultures,
customs, and traditions of the people affected. World Christianity is not one
thing, but a variety of indigenous responses through more or less effective
local idioms, but in any case without necessarily the European
enlightenment frame.45

Recognizing different expressions of faith, World Christianity is dynamic and relational as Charles

Farhadian argues that “what is important to recognise is that World Christianity is not only dynamic

but relational…. And studying World Christianity helps us to appreciate its trans-local,

interconnected nature.”46 World Christianity is not only relational it is also de-colonial in nature

therefore it does not seek to conquer the other. In other words, World Christianity, unlike

45
Lamin Sanneh, Whose Religion is Christianity? The Gospel Beyond the West (Grand Rapids, Michigan: William B.
Eerdmans Publishing House, 2003), 22
46
Charles Farhadian, Introducing World Christianity (Oxford: Wiley – Blackwell, 2012), 3.

17
Christendom, does not place itself in a higher ground with other religions. Decolonial nature of

World Christianity allows itself to respect the other and to enter into dialogue with other religions

acknowledging differences.

As different expressions are celebrated in World Christianity, plurality is integral to World

Christianity. Peter Phan shows the plural nature of World Christianity by saying:

The expression refers to the historical, sociological, cultural and theological

diversity and multiplicity of Christianity. From its very beginning,
throughout its two- millennia history, arguably more so in the future. The
legitimate concern for the unity of the church, especially after the of heresies
and schisms and, for the Catholic Church, during the centuries- long
concentration of ecclesial power in the papacy, has masked this diversity
and multiplicity in favour of an imagined and often enforced uniformity.
There is not, nor has there ever been, one Christianity; rather there exist
Christianities (in the plural), all over the world and all the time.47

Unlike Christendom, World Christianity is plural by its nature and there is no one culture that forms

Christianity as an all-time standard. As there are different cultures, there are also different

expressions of Christianity Lamin Sanneh points out that the Christianity that dominated Europe

was territorial and the Christianity that emerged beyond Christendom’s boundary is non- territorial.

The difference between them is that Christendom is structural while World Christianity is not. 48

47
Peter Phan, “World Christianity: Its Implications for History, Religious Studies, and Theology, ” Horizons, Vol 39,
Issue 2, (2012): 175.
48
Lamin Sanneh, Abolitionists Abroad: American Blacks and the Making of Modern West Africa (Cambridge, MA:
Harvard University Press, 2001).

18
Philip Jenkins makes an important point that how the movement of people affects not just human

geography but also religious landscape especially Christianity as a religion.49 The relationship of

World Christianity to the refugee issue is that when Christianity was European religion during the

Christendom era, Christianity was the religion of the powerful majority, but World Christianity is

not the religion of the majority. As Christians are minorities in India, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bangladesh,

Pakistan, china, japan, Indonesia, Malaysia, Cambodia and Vietnam, refugees are the hope of future

Christianity. Their marginal status makes way for inclusivity and they bring new gifts enriching the

Christian faith. When it is said that refugees are hope, it does not mean to romanticize them but to

see them beyond victims as potential people with whom the church needs to work together.

Philip Jenkins has argued that the centre of World Christianity has shifted to the Global south.50

While the western church is searching for its mission, the refugee phenomenon is the situation in

which God has placed the churches. Empty churches can become sanctuaries for people from all

directions. The church now has a purpose and task ahead to address. The shift of centre of

Christianity does not give southern Christianity any imperial attitude to evangelize the ‘heathens’

in the North, but to humbly continue to transcend barriers of north and south. The proclamation of

the Gospel always exposes the gospel and the church to a new environment of outsideness that

shapes the Gospel as well as the church. Fear of encountering the strange, outsideness will not make

any way towards the future. In fact, the gospel has been crossing cultural barriers and enriched itself

in the course of it.

49
Philip Jenkins, The Next Christendom: The Coming of Global Christianity (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2003).
50
Philip Jenkins, The New Faces of Christianity: Believing the Bible in the Global South (New York: Oxford
University Press, 2006).

19
World Christianity does not have a permanent home or centre but it is poly centred. World

Christianity has transcended the centre boundary discourse and hence is the hovering of the gospel

engaging in constant dialogue. The mission of the 21st century calls not only to cross boundaries

but also to welcome those who have crossed boundaries. World Christianity is rich with plurality

acknowledging there are many forms of Christianity. Its diversity makes it inclusive, intercultural

and inter religious.

Jehu J. Hanciles shows that the large migration of the present is from the “new heartlands of the

faith,”51 which is Africa Asia and Latin America. The phenomenon is not just transforming the

western churches but also changing the understanding of Christian mission. Hanciles argues that

the migrations are not just “crucial to the unfolding of the divine plan of salvation, but also the basis

for a biblical critique of global cultural hegemony.” 52 The global refugee phenomenon is the

context of the church today in which the church is called to live the Gospel. As Stephen Bevan says

“if the gospel is to truly take root within a people’s context, it needs to challenge and purify that

context…. some contexts are simply antithetical to the gospel and need to be challenged by the

gospel's liberating and healing power.” 53

Stephen Bevans says “theology today, I firmly believe, must be done in this global

perspective. It must be contextual; but it also must be in dialogue, open to the other, ready to change,

ready to challenge, ready to enrich and to be enriched.”54

51
Jehu J. Hanciles, Beyond Christendom: Globalisation, African Migration, and the Transformation of the West
(Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2008), 3.
52
Hanciles J., Beyond Christendom, 4 .
53
Stephen B. Bevans, Models of Contextual Theology (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2002), 117.
54
Stephen Bevans, An Introduction to Theology in Global Perspective (Mary knoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2009), 5.

20
Another world without refugees is possible when a nation can be reimagined with directions from

World Christianity. Therefore, Nation has to be reimagined in the light World Christianity’s frame

work for the wellbeing of humanity. From World Christianity’s perspective, this chapter argues that

nations ought to be dialogic, pluralistic and inclusive, and this approach is argued to be a possible

alternative to a monologic colonial Christendom that is also manifested in monologic nationalism

that creates and rejects refugees. To be practical it is not possible to dismantle the existing political

system within a day and provide an alternative, as the system took many decades to be built, but the

idea of a nation can be reimagined.

World Christianity can be a good reference to reimagine nation. The European idea of nation is

exclusive and depends on the idea of an enemy, World Christianity on the contrary shows directions

and the possibility of a dialogic nation with relationality and interconnectedness that ought to be the

nature of the reimagined nation. Relationality and interconnectedness are great resources that World

Christianity offers to reimagine a nation.

Theologising of the marginalized refugees is important to World Christianity. Some of the

theological works on migrations throw light on the importance of migration as subject to doing

theology.55 Jehu J. Hanciles’ book “Beyond Christendom: Globalisation, African Migration, and

55
Elaine Padilla and Peter C. Phan Ed., Contemprory Issues of Migration and Theology ( New York: Palgrave
Macmillian, 2013) Daniel G. Groody and Gioacchino Campese, eds., A promised land, A perilous Journey:
Theological Perspectives on migration (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame press, 2008).

21
the Transformation of the West” brings in the issue of migration as a topic for doing theology. One

of the main argument of the books is that, the present day massive migration of people are from the

“new heart lands of faith” which is Asia, Africa and Latin America. This movement of people is

challenging the existing understanding of mission. The theme of refugees has immense potential for

missiological thinking. As timothy smith says “migration (is) often a theologising experience.”56

Refugees have deep implication in World Christianity as they are from the margins and not from

the centre. Refugees do not mind working with people of other religions, nationalites, ethnicity, and

culture. Refugees have the potential to work with people of different cultures and religions. These

things do not come in the front line when life is at stake. Refugees live with the hope of bringing

change to a given society, as they are very creative and innovative.

Amos Yong’s work can be seen as a contribution to systematic theology and theology of missions

from World Christianity perspective which can “enable a more genuine and effective engagement

with the post- Christian and postmodern cultures of the twenty-first century, ”57 Yongs’s thesis can

be brought down into three points; God is universally present and active in the Spirit, God’s spirit

is the life breath of the imago Dei in every human being and the presupposition of all relationships

and communities, and The religions of the world, like everything else that exists, are providentially

sustained by the spirit of God for divine purposes.58

56
Quoted by Jehu J.Hanciles, Beyond Christendom: Globalization, African Migration, and the Transformation of the
West ( Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2008), 4.
57
Amos Yong, Beyond the Impasse: Toward a Pneumatological Theology of Religions, ( Grand Rapids, MI: Baker
academic, 2003), 35.
58
Amos Yong, Beyond the Impasse, 44-46.

22
 Yong provides the basis for the particularity to relate with the universal. The presence of God

beyond borders helps one to go beyond nationalism. Yong relates the spirit of God with human

breath saying that all human beings are in the image of God. This opens a new arena, to think of

common humanity, which is in the image of God. Hence there is space to relate with each other

without excluding any one. In the case of refugees, God’s universal presence gives space to respect

all nations. Image of God calls everyone to accept refugees, and since they are in the image of God.

The spirit of God sustaining all religions opens the space for interreligious dialogue so people of

different religions can come together for dialogue. It is this same dialogic nature of World

Christianity that Challenges nationalism for the better.

Conclusion

Christendom and Nationalism continue to create monologism which results to the exclusion, no

recognition of difference and no room for the dialogue. This has led to the refugee’s emergence

from the physical boundaries and borders which exclude the ‘the other’ as seen in the case of the

recent Greek Coast Guard shipwreck that took place in June 14, causing more than 500 death of

migrant, leading to pain and suffering of humanity. These phenomena can be addressed and

mitigated by World Christianity lenses which bear the characteristic of inclusivity, pluralistic, multi-

centeredness and de-colonial in nature.

23
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