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Emerging Church in the Brazilian Context |
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Por Gustavo K-fé Frederico
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27 de março de 2008 |
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Página 8 de 9
Actually, the availability of books about the emerging conversation in Portuguese is an urgent necessity. I invite publishing houses to make more books available on the subject. As we step outside our artificial evangelical bubbles into the unknown we’ll need to deconstruct our language. We’ll need to rebind new meanings to terms like “gospel”, “church”, and “salvation”, which is no small endeavor. I confess that I despise mumbo-jumbos. Let us rant and rethink our reality, but please let’s not create a new artificial bubble. Let this not be yet another philosophical research project, but a journey (not exactly “uma viagem”<!--[if !supportFootnotes]-->[23]<!--[endif]-->) always associated with practice. The emerging conversation in Brazil can interact with other emerging conversations that have been going on in other regions. Conversations in the United States and in the African continent would be interesting, in my view. The United States are going through big cultural shifts. The number of people that go to a church has been decreasing since the 60s, with minimal percentages among youth. The emerging conversation has a high respect for other cultures. I have read and heard the word “post-colonialism” many times, and that is a good sign. In the initial chapters of the book “Everything Must Change”, Brian MacLaren reports his visit to Burundi, where he met a group of 55 young leaders. I remember hearing him comment in a podcast that he went to hear more than to speak. Maybe more Americans would be interested in “reverse mission trips”. These would allow groups of foreigners to come to Brazil to learn more of its culture and reality. They would have the opportunity to live embedded in our reality and to show some appreciation and genuine interest in the other. As people from outside, they would be invited to provide a fresh and honest perspective on the practical issues Brazilians face at home, work, church and elsewhere. Also, it would be very interesting if Brazilians conversed with Africa. As it was alluded to above, violence, poverty, suffering, corruption and injustice are known words both sides of the Atlantic. Amahoro is a key organization in the African emerging conversation. Besides the United States and Africa, it would be interesting to involve Latin American countries in the conversation too. La Red del Camino is an organization quoted often. In any geographically distributed conversation, simple computer applications are useful. Skype can be used for voice communication. Chat applications such as Windows Live Messenger or Yahoo Messenger can be used with simultaneous translation. Bilingual blogs would also help the dialog. In this article I reflected upon the situation of the Brazilian evangelical church and suggested topics to be addressed in the emerging conversation thinking about the Brazilian context. With so much information and ideas perhaps the reader will feel “not knowing where to start”. The emerging conversation is a journey, and we are all in its beginning. Feel invited to participate in this conversation. My advice to readers who start to familiarize themselves with the ideas is to invest time in reading and, more importantly, in practice.
Gustavo Frederico (33) lives in Ottawa, Canada. He works with software development. He can be reached at u9x3n_15so at hotmail dot com.
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Última Atualização ( 03 de novembro de 2008 )
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