Myers asserts, “The goals of transformation are to recover our true identity as human beings created in the image of God and to discover our true vocation as productive stewards, faithfully caring for the world and all the people in it.”50Based on this point of view, I set up the goals of this study: to help everyday people in the Philippines discover true power in their identity as children of God and recover their true vocation as faithful and productive agents for transforming a sense of powerlessness. To achieve these goals, this study refers to the voices, perceptions, stories, and insights of US-based Filipino Protestants, by which this study seeks some positive changes in the whole of everyday people materially, socially, psychologically, and spiritually.
In the process of change, the critical question is, “Who will save us?” I would find the answer to this question in transformational development: “Transformational development journey belongs to God and to those who are on it, not to experts, donor agencies, or development facilitators. Whatever our framework or our methods, we must be willing to set them aside and let the poor discover their own way, just as we have done.”51For this reason, this study sought to find a group of people who believe the transformative power of God and are willing to be the agents for transformation. In this study, Filipino American Protestants were presented as the transforming agents. Some people might conjecture that such a group could be found anywhere, even in the Philippines, who would fit this description. As chapter 5describes, however, we cannot imagine the transformation of the Philippines without thinking of the existence of Filipino diasporas in the USA if we consider their continuous socio-political-economic impacts on the Philippines. Moreover, this study seeks to shine light upon the missional agency of Filipino American Protestants, which has been neglected in the academia of Diaspora Missiology.
The process of change should affirm the joint roles of God and human beings, God and the Church. Hence, in what follows, public theology will be presented as one of the foundational theories for emphasizing the role of the church for the common good in everyday life.
Public Theology
For bringing about the transformation of powerlessness, the Filipino Protestant Church needs a better theology to balance public and individual interests, spiritual and physical realms of the Gospel. Based upon my experiences and observations as a missionary in the Philippines and also the words of the director of the Philippine Council of Evangelical Churches (PCEC) described earlier in this chapter, there has been a dichotomy in the church’s understanding of the physical and spiritual realms. As a result, while people believe that “God’s redemptive work takes place only in the spiritual realm,” the socio-political-economic structures seem to be left to the devil.52In this regard, the term Public Theologyhas seemed an odd concept.
However, if the church is able to actively engage in public issues, it impacts how people perceive and deal with questions of public issues. The church’s participation in the discourse on public issues can be “nurtured by theological thinking and academic discipline, but also by concrete experiences of political and ethical dilemmas.”53Public Theology gives a plausible answer to this dilemma. Heinrich Bedford-Strohm asserts that the task of public theology is “to give orientation to the public in questions of ethical significance, and by addressing such questions of public interest it adds the flesh to the secular constitutional bones of a pluralistic society.”54
In the context of the Philippines, I argue that the Protestant Church needs to be able to “bring the Christian faith into their political activism and moral reasoning in the name of a healthy democracy, and into their economic justice for the common good.”55In this way, Public Theology can offer a theological framework of meaning and values that connect people in a society. Miroslav Volf maintains that Christian faith is “a prophetic faith that seeks to mend the world” and can bring into debate “a vision of human flourishing and the common good.”56Thus, the Christian faith should be active in all spheres of life: “politics, economics, social relations, cultural values, art, communication, and entertainment and more.”57
If Christian leaders or the Church are not able to voice out a prophetic faith in public spheres, “politicians are increasingly charged with the task of providing the bearings for a society’s moral compass.”58This fact verifies the need for the Filipino Protestant Church to be “the public church” that provides meaning, value for the common good to Filipino society where corruption of political leaders is rampant, where economics and the political process are dominated by the elite oligarchy, and where everyday people feel powerless.