Prompt: critical realism, theology, anthropology, mission
This last book by Paul G. Hiebert, Missiological Implications of Epistemological Shifts: Affirming Truth in a Modern/Postmodern World, though thin is the most difficult reading for me. It only has 135 pages but to do justice with the author's content, I have to go through the whole book from page one to the last page in order to understand his argument.
Unlike the other books, this one is more philosophical. In a way, I could say that this book serves as the conclusion of the philosophical discussion started by James F. Engel & William A. Dyrness in their concept of Gracious Revolution and picked up by Andy Hartropp in his article, The Challenge of Secularization: A Self-Reflection by a British Economist Theologian where I summarized in Mission Reflections from Two Different Fields Part 2.
Hartropp discussed in his article heavy words like secularization, modernity, materialism, privatization, and pluralization. For him, these ideas undermine the existence of the church and the reason for the withdrawal of the religious language from the public sphere. His idea of mission is one of transformation and he is looking for literature on the subject as part of the Christian's intellectual task and at the same time, he wants to see active Christian engagement in the public square.
Turning to Paul G. Hiebert, he made my writing task more complicated for in his book he discussed philosophical ideas like positivism, instrumentalism, idealism, and critical realism.
In the Preface of the book, Hiebert acknowledged that both Christian mission and modern culture are in the critical stage right now. He confirms Hartropp's thesis about the role of modernity in pushing back religion to the private sphere. And then after mentioning the collapse of communism in the 1980s, he also identified secularism's hostility towards religion echoing Hartropp's insight and the emergence of technology as the new power. In his mind, both these trends confront the Christian faith with important questions, and this is the reason why he wrote the book.
Hiebert explores the ongoing developments from four different perspectives with the intention to assist the church in understanding her mission in the midst of a culture in crisis.
The author at the outset recognizes his limitation in dealing with the subject. Though he has little training in philosophy, he cannot avoid to wrestle with epistemological questions due to the nature of his work in mission and anthropology. In fact, his interest in this study is caused by his commitment to Christian missions and at the same time, his desire to integrate theology and anthropology in doing mission.
We have here two examples of questions that he has wrestled with (p. xiv):
What is the relationship of the gospel to human cultural, social, and historical contexts?
How should we do missions in an anticolonial, postmodern era characterized by religious relativism and accusations of Christian imperialism?
Struggling with questions cited above and other related questions, the author came to a realization for his need to undergo an epistemological change in order to understand his context better and to do mission in a more realistic way. He became aware of the epistemological foundations of his intellectual commitments based on positivism that helped him shift into critical realism. He became conscious that without changing his epistemological foundation, there is no way for him to integrate his theological and anthropological ideas. It is at this point that he found the ideas of Charles Peirce, Ian Barbour, and others very helpful in his transition. As a whole, his book reflects this integration in the cause of mission.
Note: I think I will conclude this article here. I never expect that this brief book would be this difficult that would require me to write a separate article for each chapter. This would mean that instead of just one article, I have to add three more to give the author a fair hearing.
Reference:
Hiebert, Paul G. 1999. Missiological Implications of Epistemological Shifts: Affirming Truth in a Modern/Postmodern World. PA: Trinity Press International.