Between Babel and Pentecost

Between Babel and Pentecost
Author: Andre Corten
Publisher: Indiana University Press
Total Pages: 328
Release: 2001-08-22
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780253213785

This text considers the important transnational character of Pentecostal movements in Africa and Latin America and their tendency to foster identities that transcend national and cultural contexts.

Between Babel and Pentecost

Between Babel and Pentecost
Author: André Corten
Publisher: C. Hurst & Co. Publishers
Total Pages: 311
Release: 2001-01
Genre: Africa
ISBN: 9781850654384

Over the past two decades, Latin American and African countries have experienced a phenomenal growth of Pentecostal movements. This form of Christianity, only marginally present in these areas in the middle of the 20th century, is now embraced by more than a hundred million faithful across two continents and continues to grow at an astonishing rate. Despite the enormous differences which separte these lands and the individual societieis within them, one is struck by the similarity of Pentecostal manifestaitons in these diverse cultures. Contemporary Pentecostalism provides a striking example of the paradox of difference and uniformity, of flow and closure, that seems to be at the heart of processes of transnationalism and globalisation.

Fijians in Transnational Pentecostal Networks

Fijians in Transnational Pentecostal Networks
Author: Karen J. Brison
Publisher: ANU Press
Total Pages: 172
Release: 2023-04-20
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1760465607

In Fijians in Transnational Pentecostal Networks, Karen J. Brison examines the Harvest Ministry, an independent Fijian Pentecostal church that sends Fijian and Papua New Guinean missionaries to East Africa, Southeast Asia, Europe and elsewhere. After studying the ministry’s main church in Suva for several years, Brison visited its missionaries and their local partners in East Africa and Papua New Guinea. The result of those visits, this book provides an unusual insight into Pentecostal churches in the global south, arguing that they seldom produce novel visions of Christianity and world inequality. It also offers new perspectives, by situating Pacific island churches within a global community and by examining social class formation, which is increasingly important in the Pacific. Pentecostalism has a consistent culture all over the world, but shared themes take on different meanings in the face of local concerns. In Fiji, Pentecostal churches are part of middle-class projects constructing leadership roles and highlighting transnational ties for a growing group of indigenous urban professionals. In Papua New Guinea, church leaders promote the idea that youths with blocked aspirations are tough and humble and therefore make invaluable missionaries. In East Africa, Pentecostal churches are part of a networking strategy that entrepreneurial individuals see as essential to survival. As these local groups each use Pentecostalism to advance their own agenda, they endorse Euro-American racial stereotypes and ideologies about social evolution and progress.

Pentecostalism in Africa

Pentecostalism in Africa
Author:
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 397
Release: 2014-10-16
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9004281878

Within recent decades Pentecostal/charismatic Christianity has moved from an initially peripheral position to become a force to be reckoned with within Africa’s religious landscape. Bringing together prominent Africanist scholars from a wide range of disciplines, this book offers a comprehensive and multifaceted treatment of the ways in which Pentecostal-Charismatic movements have shaped the orientations of African Christianity and extended their influence into other spheres of post-colonial societies such as politics, developmental work and popular entertainment. Among other things, the chapters of the book show how Pentecostal/charismatic Christianity responds to social and cultural concerns of Africans, and how its growth and increasingly assertive presence in public life have facilitated new kinds of social positioning and claims to political power.

Global Pentecostalism: An Inquiry into the Cultural Dimensions of Globalization

Global Pentecostalism: An Inquiry into the Cultural Dimensions of Globalization
Author: Matthias Deininger
Publisher: Anchor Academic Publishing (aap_verlag)
Total Pages: 107
Release: 2014-02-01
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 3954895706

The rapid global expansion of Pentecostal Christianity is one of the most striking religious phenomena in our contemporary world. Today, Pentecostalism is by no means some marginal or peculiar denomination within world Christianity. It is not simply a niche product in the global religious market, but the most dynamic and fastest growing religious movement within the contemporary Christian world. From Singapore over Brazil to Ghana, Pentecostal Christians are historically and presently rooted in many cultural contexts throughout the world. As such, Pentecostalism is a religious movement that is both shaped by globalization processes, but also a major contributor to the globalization of religion. Until recently, social-scientific approaches to Christianity have often been informed by a rather selective understanding of Christianity, stressing its ascetic components premised on a body-spirit dualism and seeing its importance mainly as a harbinger of secular modernity. Hence, where Christianity was studied outside the ‘West’ it has usually been peripheral and viewed as an alien intrusion, undermining local cosmologies. However, rather than a religious rejection of the world, Pentecostalism accommodates to the world and modernity. It transcends locality by promulgating a universal ‘imaginary of the world’, while at the same time incorporating itself successfully into the socio-cultural contexts of any new cultures it encounters. The fundamental ‘fluidity’ of the transnational Pentecostal network is conducive for its flexibility to react on the enormous upheavals and changes in a globalized world and to accommodate to them in constructive ways. Thus, Pentecostalism can be regarded as a paradigmatic case of a ‘glocalized’ religion: it has the ability to adapt itself to local conditions while maintaining and preserving its distinct religious features at the same time. This study focuses on the different theoretical attempts made to explain the massive global expansion of Pentecostalism, and its relation to broader processes of globalization. It discusses to what extent and in what complex ways the Pentecostal movement is interrelated to processes of cultural globalization. By looking at the internal religious characteristics of Pentecostal discourse and discursive practices, and their articulations within the external circumstances of globalization, it tries to untangle some of the complexities that emerge when theorizing the globalization of Pentecostalism.

Perspectives in Pentecostal Eschatologies

Perspectives in Pentecostal Eschatologies
Author: Peter Althouse
Publisher: James Clarke & Company
Total Pages: 439
Release: 2012-03-29
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0227900324

This collection of essays from established scholars and rising stars offers fresh perspectives in eschatology for the Pentecostal and Charismatic movements. The fresh readings of eschatology in this volume are valuable because they demonstrate that Pentecostals no longer need to look to others to interpret their theology for them but can stand as scholars and thinkers in their own right.

New Ways of Being Pentecostal in Latin America

New Ways of Being Pentecostal in Latin America
Author: Martin Lindhardt
Publisher: Lexington Books
Total Pages: 285
Release: 2016-03-23
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0739196561

The explosive growth of Pentecostalism has radically transformed Latin America’s religious landscape within the last half century or so. In a region where Catholicism reigned hegemonic for centuries, the expansion of Pentecostalism has now resulted in a situation of religious pluralism and competition, bearing much more resemblance to the United States than to the Iberian motherlands. Furthermore, the fierce competition from Pentecostal churches has inspired significant renewals of Latin American Catholicism, most notably the growth of a Catholic Charismatic movement. However, another and more recent source of religious pluralism and diversity in Latin America is an increasing pluralization and diversification of Pentecostalism itself and of the ways in which individual Pentecostals exercise their faith. By carefully exploring this diversification, the book at hand breaks new ground in the literature on Latin American Christianity. Particular attention is focused on new ways of being Pentecostal and on the consequences of recent transformations of Christianity for individuals, faith communities and societies. More specifically, the chapters of the book look into certain transformations of Pentecostalism such as: theological renewals and new kinds of religious competition between Pentecostal churches; a growing political and civic engagement of Pentecostals; an observed de-institutionalization of Pentecostal religious life and the negotiation individual Pentecostal identities, composed of multiple intra- and extra-ecclesial points of identification; and the emergence of new generations of Pentecostals (children of Pentecostal parents), many of whom have higher levels of education and higher incomes than the previous generations within their churches. In addition, Catholic responses to Pentecostal competition are also addressed in several chapters of the book.

Relocating World Christianity

Relocating World Christianity
Author:
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 361
Release: 2017-09-04
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9004355022

Existing scholarship on World Christianities tends to privilege the local and the regional. In addition to offering an explanation for this tendency, the editors and contributors of this volume also offer a new perspective. An Introduction, Afterword and case-studies argue for the importance of transregional connections in the study of Christianity worldwide. Returning to an older post-war conception of ‘World Christianity’ as an international, ecumenical fellowship, the present volume aims to highlight the universalist, globalising aspirations of many Christians worldwide. While we do not neglect the importance of the local, our aim is to give due weight to the significant transregional networks and exchanges that have constituted Christian communities, both historically and in the present day. Contributors are: J. Kwabena Asamoah-Gyadu, Naures Atto, Joel Cabrita, Pedro Feitoza, David C. Kirkpatrick, Chandra Mallampalli, David Maxwell, Dorottya Nagy, Peter C. Phan, Andrew Preston, Joel Robbins, Chloe Starr, Charlotte Walker-Said, Emma Wild-Wood.

To the Ends of the Earth

To the Ends of the Earth
Author: Allan Anderson
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 330
Release: 2013-02-21
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0195386426

No branch of Christianity has grown more rapidly than Pentecostalism, especially in the southern hemisphere. There are over 100 million Pentecostals in Africa. In Latin America, Pentecostalism now vies with Catholicism for the soul of the continent, and some of the largest pentecostal congregations in the world are in South Korea. In To the Ends of the Earth, Allan Heaton Anderson explores the historical and theological factors behind the phenomenal growth of global Pentecostalism. Anderson argues that its spread is so dramatic because it is an "ends of the earth" movement--pentecostals believe that they are called to be witnesses for Jesus Christ to the furthest reaches of the globe. His wide-ranging account examines such topics as the Azusa Street revival in Los Angeles, the role of the first missionaries in China, India, and Africa, Pentecostalism's incredible diversity due to its deep local roots, and the central role of women in the movement. He describes more recent developments such as the creation of new independent churches, megachurches, and the "health and wealth" gospel, and he explores the increasing involvement of pentecostals in public and political affairs across the globe. Why is this movement so popular? Anderson points to such features as the emphasis on the Spirit, the "born-again" experience, incessant evangelism, healing and deliverance, cultural flexibility, a place-to-feel-at-home, religious continuity, an egalitarian community, and meeting material needs--all of which contribute to Pentecostalism's remarkable appeal. Exploring more than a century of history and ranging across most of the globe, Anderson illuminates the spectacular rise of global Pentecostalism and shows how it changed the face of Christianity worldwide.