6
Interpretations of God in the Global South

For Orientation: Theology Goes Global

The Korean American Jung Young Lee, whose yin-yang vision of the trinitarian God was discussed in the previous chapter, reminds us of the ways radical changes in global Christianity affect theology and theological education:

As the demographical picture of Christianity shifts from the First World to the Third World countries, Christianity is no longer exclusively identified as a Western religion. In fact, Christianity is already not only a world religion but a world Christianity. This means Christianity cannot be understood exclusively from a Western perspective: Our understanding of Christianity requires a world perspective. Likewise, theological education must also take a global perspective, for our theology is also a world theology.1

Indeed, the world in which Christian faith is lived out, churches do their ministry, and theology is practiced dramatically changed during the second half of the last century.2 Theologies are yet to fathom the implications of the “globalization” of the church.3 Indeed, we can speak of the “macroreformation”4 taking place before our very eyes as Christianity is moving from the Global North (Europe and North America) to the Global South (Africa, Asia, and Latin America). This demographic shift has turned the tables:5 by 2050, only about one-fifth of the world’s three billion Christians will be non-Hispanic whites. The typical Christian in the first decades of the third millennium is a non-white, non-affluent, non-Northern person, more often female than male. “If we want to visualize a ‘typical’ contemporary Christian, we should think of a woman living in a village in Nigeria or in a Brazilian favela,”6 as “the centers of the church’s universality [are] no longer in Geneva, Rome, Athens, Paris, London, New York, but Kinshasa, Buenos Aires, Addis Ababa and Manila.”7

Not only are the statistics staggering; also occurring is a radical transformation of the global church with regard to its denominational and tradition-driven composition. Whereas the Roman Catholic Church is still holding its membership and global influence as the largest church family, most mainline Protestant and Anglican churches are struggling, particularly in the Global North. At the same time, the massive growth of Pentecostal/charismatic movements, independent churches, “emerging” churches, and others are helping dramatically reshape Christianity. Theology has a hard time staying up to date in this regard. This new global church, which combines elements of older traditions, new Pentecostal/charismatic spiritualities, and independent, locally colored beliefs and practices, represents a fourth major force next to Catholicism, Protestantism, and Orthodoxy.8

In addition to those changes, one more feature is highly important to theology: the new Christianity in the Global South, rather than being liberal or secular after trends in the North, tends to be more conservative and traditional.9 Theologically speaking, churches in the two-thirds world live partially in a “pre-Enlightenment” era. By this comment, I am not suggesting that these churches are “primitive.” What I mean is that most of these churches read the Bible literally, believe in miracles and the supernatural, and expect God to intervene in human affairs. Traditional spiritual experiences such as dreams, visions, prophecies, and especially healings belong to normal Christian life along with preaching, sacraments, and prayer.

What is the significance of these developments for the doctrine of God? To begin with, Lee illustrates the need for a genuinely cross-cultural interaction in contemporary theology:

An Asian perspective complements a Western or an American perspective because Christianity belongs to both Asia and the West simultaneously. If Christianity is a Western religion only, non-Western perspectives on Christianity should be regarded as subsidiaries to the Western perspective. Even today [in 1999] many traditional theologians view most Third World theologies, including liberation and indigenous theologies, as subsidiaries of traditional Western theologies. As long as Third World theologies continue to attempt to validate their work according to the views of Western theologies, they will continue to be supplementary to Western theologies. . . . My work intends not to supplement the traditional idea of the Trinity but to complement it by presenting a new interpretation of the Trinity from an Asian perspective.10

Does this mean, then, that European and North American theologies of God, including the tradition of classical theism, need to be replaced? Of course not. Even though nobody denies the urgency of developing culturally relevant doctrines of God, it is also true that even in Africa, Asia, and Latin America theology is a response to the past two millennia of Christian tradition. Furthermore, the current form of Christianity of the Southern Hemisphere is to a large extent a Christianity indebted to Euro-American theologies and practices as a result of centuries-long missionary work. Even in their criticism against the missionary legacy, its influence cannot be denied. Hopefully in the near future, a fully authentic African, Asian, and Latin American Christian existence will enrich and challenge theologies of the Global North. That said, in the midst of this dramatic transformation, it has to be remembered that Christianity everywhere, in both the North and South, owes equally to Augustine, Aquinas, Calvin, Luther, and other traditional teachers. We all stand on the same scriptural and historical-doctrinal tradition.

To make a difference in the way theology is practiced calls for the cultivation of “multiperspectivalism” and inclusivity. This kind of attitude allows for diverse, at times even contradictory and opposing, voices and testimonies to be part of the dialogue.11 Pentecostal theologian Amos Yong, a Malaysian-born Chinese American, reminds us that it means “taking seriously the insights of all voices, especially those previously marginalized from the theological conversation—for instance, women, the poor, the differently abled or disabled, perhaps even the heretics!”12

What follows is a discussion of African, Asian, and Latin American views of God as represented by some leading theologians.

God in African Theologies

The African Context and Background for God-Talk

The way the Kenya-based Nigerian Jesuit priest Agbonkhianmeghe E. Orobator begins the delightful—if we can say so of theology!—discussion of the doctrine of the Triune God in his own context, by citing a modern East African prayer, illustrates wonderfully a unique spiritual and theological sentiment:

Glory be to the Father, the Creator and Source,

To the Nursing Mother,

to Jesus, the Healer and Eldest Brother

And to the Unsurpassed Great Spirit. Amen.13

Even though Andrew Walls has recently claimed that “anyone who wishes to undertake serious study of Christianity these days needs to know something about Africa,”14 systematic theological reflection on God has not paid much attention to African theologies and spiritualities. This is deplorable in light of the fact that, as is well known, currently Africa is the “most Christianized continent” with a significant presence of not only traditional Christian churches but also African Instituted (or Initiated) Churches and Pentecostal/charismatic communities. Indeed, after around 2020 there will be more Christians in Africa than on any other continent. With that in mind, we should note what John Pobee has argued, “If there is to be a serious and deep communication and rooting of the gospel of Christ, the African stamp will have to replace the European stamp.”15

Can anything general be said about the African worldview as a background to God-talk in the midst of literally thousands of ethnic groups and languages? Understandably, scholarly assessments vary. Yet it seems reasonable to assume some basic orientations underlying most African cultures, which have been shaped by traditional religions and have in turn shaped Christian interpretations of God. Features routinely assigned to diverse African contexts include:16

• Perhaps the most common characteristic of the African worldview (as well as much of Asian and Hispanic cultures) is that religion permeates all of life. In the words of John S. Mbiti: “There is no formal distinction between the sacred and the secular, between the religious and non-religious, and between the spiritual and material areas of life.”17
• A sense of harmony and well-being is reflected in the African focus on the order of creation. Seasons of nature as well as human life exemplify order. Harmony is affirmed even when facing life’s fears, ambiguity, and many threats.
• To the African mind, the world of the spirits is as real as the visible world, perhaps even more real. The visible world is thought to be permeated and influenced by the invisible world of spirits and powers.18
• Life and world are believed to be governed by God, the ancestors, and (other) spirits. In a study by Mbiti of over three hundred peoples in Africa, all had some notion of God as the Supreme Being.19 There is a hierarchy of beings, from God, to angels and powers, to ancestors. They all have bearing on life on the earth.
• A this-worldly orientation, including a focus on the human community and its well-being, is a well-known feature of African religiosity. This orientation does not exclude the other-worldly reality; rather, religions are brought to bear on this life and these particular people.20
• Conversion is often understood as an encounter between two or several systems of salvation, a kind of power encounter. The God who is believed to be the strongest is given allegiance.

What complicates the study of African conceptions of God is that much of the theology is in oral form and in sources other than typical written theological treatises. This does not mean that Africans are necessarily less “theological” about their faith in God; they merely employ different forms of theologizing.21 Stories, songs, dramas, dreams, and other nonconventional sources might serve well African ways of doing theology, although they are suspect in the Western academia.22

Another distinctive feature of the context for God-talk in Africa is the tension between the persistent and growing influence of traditional religious beliefs and the conservative, often fundamentalist versions of Christianity brought by many Western missionaries.23 Few if any theologians would contest the influence of traditional African beliefs in God on contemporary Christian views of God in Africa. Yet opinions among African theologians vary from the emphasis on continuity with African traditional religions to the suspicion or even rejection thereof.24

Finally, there is the difficulty and challenge of how to even begin to address meaningfully any theological issue concerning such a vast continent with myriad cultural, social, political, and religious contexts. In the words of the senior female theologian Mercy Amba Oduyoye of Ghana: “Writing about Africa is a hazardous enterprise. One needs to draw up many parameters and make explicit the extent of the study. This becomes even more difficult considering the subject in hand. Whose experience of God are we dealing with? What is the extent of the Africa we are talking about?”25

A number of leading African theologians have reflected on the nature and distinctive features of the Christian doctrine of God through the lens of their particular African context. These include Kwesi Dickson, a Methodist from the Akan cultural context in West Africa; John Pobee, an Anglican theologian from Ghana; Charles Nyamiti, a Roman Catholic originally from Tanzania who has written extensively on the Gikuyu theology from Kenya; and the Nigerian A. Okechukwu Ogbonnaya, who now resides in the United States.

Interpretations of God from the African Soil

God and World in the Akan Context

Kwesi Dickson distinguished himself as one of Africa’s leading biblical scholars, arguing for the importance of particularly the Old Testament for African Christianity and its view of God. Dickson did much of his theological work in the Akan context (Akan is the major tribe and a national language of Ghana). According to him, there is both continuity and discontinuity between Israel’s and Africa’s conceptions of God.26 He insists that a genuine African theology must be relevant to the culture and possess a methodology suitable for its context rather than just be contained by Western categories. At the same time, he develops an African theology that is suitable for other contexts on the continent as well, since he believes there is an underlying united core in African Christianity and its doctrine of God.

The various names for deities in the Akan context reveal that God is understood as the ultimate reality on whom all things depend. As Peter Fulljames summarizes in reference to Dickson and some other African theologians’ work: “God is the supreme being, the creator, the originator, the power that sustains all things, the infinite, the one who endures from ancient times and forever. Everything is from God and ends up in God, who himself is uncaused.”27

As an African theologian, Dickson speaks of the importance of ancestors in representing a sense of community and the “concept of corporate personality,” not unknown in Israel either.28 The ancestors are regarded as part of the community, and by their presence they express the solidarity of the community. The spirits of the ancestors use their power for the well-being of the community; this is consistent with the fact that not all the dead become ancestors—only those who lived a good, virtuous life or served as leaders of the community.

Dickson notes that the Akan theology of God includes a distinctive theology of nature, even though the specific term nature is missing (the closest term means “God’s created things”). The Akan view perceives nature as a vital, dynamic part of the reality created by God. The principle “kinship with nature” is an affirmation of the interconnectedness of everything. “The universe is for him [the African] a living universe, and he is part of it.”29

John Pobee’s method of approaching the doctrine of God in the African context is similar to that of Dickson’s. He takes into consideration both the biblical teaching and the cultural context; similarly, Pobee has worked mostly with the Akans of Ghana. One of the ways he contributes to a distinctively African theology of God is by utilizing African proverbs and other folk wisdom.30

For Pobee, the leading theme from the Akan context is the sense of community. He illustrates the critical role of the community in African theology: “Whereas Descartes spoke for Western man when he said, ‘cogito ergo sum,’—I think, therefore I exist—Akan man’s ontology is ‘cognaturs ergo sum’—I am related by blood, therefore I exist, or I exist because I belong to a family.”31 This is reminiscent of John Mbiti’s statement, “I am because we are, and since we are, therefore I am.”32 This concept of community also has an important christological implication. As sin in Akan society is essentially an antisocial, anticommunal act, Jesus’s life of perfect love cultivating rather than damaging communities speaks highly of Pobee’s meaning.33

As with many African contexts, in the Akan context God is viewed as great and powerful. Divine power comes to the fore, for example, in healings. The power seen in the work of healers is traditionally understood to come from God and is associated with the power of God as creator.34

God and Ancestors

One of the reasons why Christology rather than trinitarian doctrine is prominent in the African context has to do with the centrality of the ancestorship motif in many—though not in all—African cultural contexts.35 The reason is simple: “In many African societies ancestral veneration is one of the central and basic traditional and even contemporary forms of cult.”36 Christ has been envisioned as the Ancestor in highly creative ways, particularly among some Catholic theologians.37 The most famous is Charles Nyamiti’s Christ as Our Ancestor,38 in whose ancestral theology trinitarian considerations also play an essential role.39

The many meanings and implications of the ancestral belief in that continent include the following:

• kinship between the dead and the living kin
• sacred status, usually acquired through death
• mediation between human beings and God
• exemplary behavior in community
• the right to regular communication with the living through prayer40

An important characteristic of the sacred status of the ancestor is the possession of “superhuman vital force” deriving from the special proximity to the Supreme Being. That gives the ancestor the right to be a mediator. Ancestors, as well as those not yet born, are regarded as part of the community, and by their presence they express the solidarity of the community. The spirits of the ancestors use their power for the well-being of the community. Ancestors are called on at the important moments of life.

In general, the link to the importance of family and community is a defining theme not only in ancestral theology but everywhere in African theology.41 This is the focus and stated theme of the study by the US-based Nigerian A. Okechukwu Ogbonnaya, titled On Communitarian Divinity: An African Interpretation of the Trinity, which also gleans from the early North African theologian Tertullian.42

Nyamiti applies the ancestor theme to Christ on the basis of his role as the mediator between God and humanity. Christ as brother ancestor is the means by which God communicates with humanity. Within the Trinity is an eternal ancestral relationship between the Father and the Son, who are therefore described as ancestor and descendant. As humans are incorporated into the descendancy of Christ, they come to share in his relationship with God as ancestor.

The Holy Spirit as part of the Trinity is introduced here. Nyamiti argues that “in God the ancestral relationship between the Father and the Son essentially demands the presence of the Holy Spirit, and that this relationship can be lived only through the same Spirit who is spirated by both and mutually given to each other in token of love, veneration (oblation), and gratitude.”43 In other words: “As Ancestor and Descendant of each other the Father and Son have mutual ancestral contact through reciprocal giving of the Spirit.”44 Consequently, Nyamiti adds, “our ancestral relationship with the Son . . . bears striking similarities to the pneumatic ties between the Father and the Son in the Trinity.” How so? He explains: “Being our Ancestor Christ is, like His Father (Ancestor), entitled to regular communication with us, His descendants, in the Holy Spirit.”45

Liberation Theologies in the African Context

One does not have to be technically a “liberation theologian”46 to advocate and champion issues of liberation and the church’s political engagement. For many African theologians, liberation is an integral, natural part of church life and theological agenda.47 Indeed, according to Bénézet Bujo, African theology is by nature liberation theology, since the idea of liberation is inherent in the concept of life in Africa. This is accentuated by the this-worldly orientation of the African mentality, which focuses on the now rather than the future. “Though God is present implicitly in every situation, the African outlook is essentially anthropocentric.”48 That said, worth noting is the reminder from Charles Nyamiti that when addressing social and political issues such as racism and oppression, one’s theology should not be based on a secular foundation. Furthermore, the relation of these and related problems to sin and alienation from God should be kept in mind.49

South Africa has become the center of liberation theologies in Africa, which is understandable in light of the history of apartheid. Echoing the terminology and concerns of African American liberationist, Allan Boesak, a pioneer in South Africa, spoke of black “power” and “consciousness.” As do other liberationists, Boesak argues that liberation of the oppressed stands at the heart of the gospel. Widely known is also Archbishop Desmond Tutu’s relentless and tireless work for reconciliation and equality. His widely acclaimed God Has a Dream: A Vision of Hope for Our Time puts the doctrine of God in the midst of a struggle for liberation and hope in the postapartheid context.50

John W. de Gruchy’s Liberating Reformed Theology is another South African contribution, one that harkens back to John Calvin to glean resources for a liberating view of God. In his view, Calvin’s theology is “best understood as a liberating theology that is catholic in its substance, evangelical in its principle, and socially engaged and prophetic in its witness.”51 At the same time, de Gruchy acknowledges that his own tradition has been slow to respond to injustice and has to be reminded of the need to follow up with these liberative impulses at the heart of its heritage.

African Women on God

Theologies of African women share the following kinds of features with those of female theologians of the majority world at large:

• doing theology rather than speculating on topics unrelated to the real world;
• using the depth of oppression and suffering as the starting point for doing relevant theology;
• valuing dreaming, not as a way of escape but as a way of empowerment and creativity;
• cherishing the theme of church-as-community as the appropriate framework for relevant theologizing; and
• focusing on the need for liberation at all levels as the guiding principle.52

Along with oppression and denial of opportunities,53 patriarchy and male superiority are major challenges to women all over the world. In the Global South these issues are often even more urgent.54 All of these problems bear on the doctrine of God and its meaning to Christians.

Mercy Amba Oduyoye, the most noted African female theologian, writes that “since in the Church in Africa men and the clergy presume to speak for God, and to demand the obedience of women, it is not easy to experience God as empowering and liberating when one is in the Church’s ambit.” She adds, “For many women, however, this is a clear substitution of the will of God for the will of the male of the human species.”55

Instead of letting patriarchy or any other earthly ideology guide us, Oduyoye urges us to imagine the more meaningful and community-building diversity of Pentecost: “life in the Spirit of God as opposed to the mentality of ‘let us . . . make a name for ourselves’ (Gen. 11:3–4).” She notes that we are indeed united in our reading of biblical motifs and imagery, the exodus, the Magnificat, the proclamation from Isaiah that Jesus read at Nazareth, and so on.56 This kind of imagination may foster new opportunities and lasting hope. While acknowledging the special situation of oppression and subjugation in most African countries, Oduyoye breathes hope: “Happy and responsible in my being human and female, I shall be able to live a life in doxology in the human community, glorifying God for the gifts I receive in others and the possibility I have of giving myself freely for the good of the community while remaining responsible and responsive to God. It is only thus that I can say I am fully human.”57

God in Latin American Theologies

The Latin American Context for God-Talk

The story behind the popular cult of Guadalupe reveals much about the Latin American context. The Virgin appeared to a poor Indian by the name of Juan Diego to convey a message to the bishop of Mexico. The bishop, of course, did not want to listen to this unlearned, common man until a miracle assured him that the Virgin had indeed manifested herself to this man. “Thus the Virgin of Guadalupe became a symbol of the affirmation of the Indian over against the Spanish, of the unlearned over against the learned, of the oppressed over against the oppressor.”58 Behind this story lies a lot of sad history of subjugation, colonialization, and oppression of the indigenous peoples of Latin America.59 At the end of the fifteenth century when Latin America was “discovered” under the leadership of Christopher (“Christ bearer”) Columbus and taken over by the conquistadors (Spanish soldiers), the Christ presented to the Indians represented the side of the powerful and the ruler.60 At the same time, the figure of the suffering Christ was portrayed in popular piety.

The two images [of Christ presented to the Indios] are to some degree two sides of the one coin of colonialist propaganda. The dying or dead Christ is an offer of identification in suffering, without arousing hope—the resurrection is distant. Even today, in the popular Catholicism of Latin America, Good Friday is the greatest day of celebration. The other side, Christ the ruler, is embodied in the Spanish king and the colonial rulers, to whom the Indios are to bend the knee in veneration. In both cases the christology degenerates into an instrument of oppression. At an early stage resistance against it grew.61

It has been said that whereas African theology begins with a shout of joy, Latin American theology begins with a cry of despair. One could also say that while African theologians are drawn to issues of culture and identity, many Latin American theologians wrestle with social and political issues.62 Even the majority of those who dare not speak of revolution in its real sense63 feel compelled to take action and think theologically in a way that has political implications.

Ronaldo Muñoz, a Chilean theologian who lives and works in the working-class barrio of Santiago, has analyzed various uses of God-talk as the key to developing a proper doctrine of God from the liberation perspective. He speaks of the “God of the poor,” who is at the same time the God of all people, not only the poor. According to Muñoz, the main question for Christians today is not whether we are believers or atheists; the fundamental issue is which God we believe in and which gods we deny. He notes that in the churches of Latin America, the topic of God is approached from many angles:

• For the privileged minorities, God is used as the weapon to defend their own privileges.
• The underprivileged majority invokes the name of God to survive. Among them many resign to their faith, but some are rising to the task of liberation.
• For some, the most important thing about the doctrine of God is orthodoxy and right belief, and they try to convert others to their own particular understanding.
• Finally, some use the name of God to urge solidarity with the impoverished masses, “making taking their side in the struggle for a more just world the all-important task.”64

The human reality in Latin America—what it is to be the poor, the despised, the marginalized—is taken as the “praxis” of theology. This term has three interrelated facets. First, human beings are heavily shaped by political-historical reality. Second, human reality is intersubjective: “Human beings are not first ahistorical ‘I’s’ that express their unique essences in relations to others through language. . . . All subjectivity arises out of intersubjective relations between human beings.” Third, humans must and can intentionally create history, “transforming and shaping reality for the improvement of human flourishing.”65 In light of this, Pablo Richards summarizes much of the agenda of Latin American liberation theology: the “mystery of the presence of God in the world of the poor” is that “God personally comes to meet us and to bestow a self-revelation. The world of the poor is now seen for what it is: the privileged locus of the presence and revelation of God.”66

Ideological Critique and the Doctrine of God

Various Latin American liberationists have made contributions to the doctrine of God. Gustavo Gutiérrez of Peru, though not the founder of Latin American liberation theology, has become its embodiment, especially in North America and Europe. Juan Luis Segundo of Uruguay, while less known, has helped hone theological method and its implications for the doctrine of God. Leonardo Boff of Brazil, who was silenced by his superiors, distinguished himself in several areas, especially Christology, ecclesiology, and the doctrine of the Trinity. Other names that could be added include Jon Sobrino, a premier christologist from a liberation perspective; José Comblin, a noted pneumatologist;67 and others.

While all liberation theologies tend to be critical of the existing world order and the subjugation of the marginalized by the powerful, Segundo has made ideological critique the methodological center of his theology. He presents his methodology using a hermeneutical circle:

1. Our way of experiencing reality leads to ideological suspicion.
2. We apply our ideological suspicion to the ideological superstructure in general and to theology in particular.
3. A new way of experiencing theological reality leads to exegetical suspicion that the prevailing interpretation of the Bible has not taken important pieces of data into account.
4. The final result is a new hermeneutic, a new way of interpreting Scripture with the new elements at our disposal.68

This hermeneutical circle—or, perhaps, spiral—“keeps moving on to an ever more authentic truth that is to be translated into an ever more liberative praxis.”69 There is a mutual relationship between theory and practice, each of which constantly informs the other.70

Particularly important for Segundo is the “critique of knowledge” with regard to the doctrine of God, as carefully and thoughtfully analyzed in Our Idea of God.71 He maintains that the typical Christian (Catholic) conception of God is that God is more interested in timeless values than in efforts to solve historical problems in this world. This is the heritage of classical theism. Segundo finds the same world-distancing tendency in Catholic sacramental theology, which serves the “interests of the ruling classes and is one of the most powerful ideological factors in maintaining the status quo.”72 In the end, Segundo’s analysis of the ideological conditions of our belief in God leads to an inevitable conclusion regarding radically differing ends in the perception of God. These contrasting images of God serve radically different purposes:

One person pictures a God who allows dehumanization whereas another person rejects such a God and believes only in a God who unceasingly fights against such things. Now those two gods cannot be the same one. So a common faith does not exist within the church. The only thing shared in common is the formula used to express that faith. And since the formula does not really identify anything, are we not justified in calling it a hollow formula vis-à-vis the decisive options of history?73

Encountering God in History74

Gutiérrez’s landmark work A Theology of Liberation can be hailed as the leading proposal for Latin American liberation theology. As do other liberationists of his own context and, say, feminists and black theologians in the United States, Gutiérrez seeks to revise the traditional notion of revelation as abstract and theoretical into an engaged, critical reflection on praxis.75 He reminds us that the question of liberation is not a new one but rather a “classic question of the relation between faith and human existence, between faith and social reality, between faith and political action, or in other words, between the kingdom of God and the building up of the world.”76 In Gutiérrez’s understanding, this calls us to shift from considering theology primarily as “wisdom,” as in the early centuries, or as “rational knowledge,” as from the twelfth century on, to considering theology “as critical reflection on praxis.”77 This kind of approach would foster “a greater sensitivity to the anthropological aspects of revelation,”78 and only that could genuinely represent “theology from the underside of history.”79 A truly liberationist approach comes to acknowledge God as the “God of life,” who liberates, executes justice, shows his faithfulness, and comes to meet us in our particular situation.80

Liberationists rightly remind Christian theologians of the often too narrow outlook on salvation and insist that sociopolitical aspects not be overlooked. In keeping with this call, instead of the narrow “salvation of the soul” approach of tradition, Gutiérrez champions a comprehensive soteriology based on the Old Testament concept of shalom (peace, well-being, harmony), a multidimensional and inclusive concept that bridges otherworldly and this-worldly dimensions. In his terminology, traditional theology errs in viewing salvation as exclusively “quantitative,” that is, as “guaranteeing heaven” for the greatest number. Rather, this liberationist argues, in the Latin American context there is an urgent need to reinterpret salvation in “qualitative” terms as a way of social, political, and economic transformation.81

A careful analysis leads Gutiérrez to the conclusion that the Christian sense of salvation has three interrelated facets: first, personal transformation and freedom from sin; second, liberation from social and political oppression; and third, liberation from marginalization (which may take several forms, such as unjust treatment of women and minorities).82 To facilitate this kind of world-embracing soteriology, he champions, with many other liberationists, a robust panentheistic theology by speaking of the divine presence not only in the world and among human beings in general, but particularly among the poor, marginalized, and exploited ones.83

Human Society as the Image of the Triune God

The Franciscan priest Leonardo Boff encountered harsh opposition from the ecclesiastical establishment because it was believed that he was championing the cause of liberation theology in a way that threatened the hierarchy and because of his views of Mary as an expression of the “humanity” (if not the incarnation) of the Holy Spirit. What is interesting about Boff’s highly acclaimed Trinity and Society, however, is that it is not a controversial book at all. It is a tightly argued, warmly written treatise on the trinitarian doctrine of God, based on the best of biblical, historical, and contemporary traditions.

Boff sets forth a powerful proposal for a view of the trinitarian God as a communion of equal persons. This social doctrine of the Trinity serves as a critique of oppressive models of communities, whether political, social, or ecclesiastical. A model of community patterned after the Trinity is inclusive and egalitarian. For his social program of the Trinity, Boff has gleaned from the works of several contemporary theologians, especially Karl Rahner, Jürgen Moltmann, and John Zizioulas.

For Boff, the leading aim is to take the doctrine of God “from the solitude of One to the communion of Three,” as the opening section in Trinity and Society puts it.84 In the spirit of Moltmann, he offers a critical reconstruction of the kind of monotheism that sees God as unrelated to the world and its suffering. In the spirit of Zizioulas, Boff argues: “In the beginning is communion.”85 God exists in a loving, mutual relationship. This kind of communion in the Godhead “can be seen as a model for any just, egalitarian (while respecting differences) social organization. On the basis of their faith in the triune God, Christians postulate a society that can be the image and likeness of the Trinity.”86

According to Boff, most societies in Latin America and throughout the third world have lived under the stigma of dependence, which has produced a deep dualism between rich and poor, privileged and underprivileged, power-holders and oppressed. Christian faith has had an ambiguous role in this. Often the Christian message has served the purposes of the oppressors. Boff mentions several “disintegrated understandings” of God that have served counterpurposes in society. One-sided focus on the Father may lead to authoritarian notions; one-sided focus on the Son “without reference to the Father and union with the Spirit can lead to self-sufficiency and authoritarianism.” Finally, focus on the Spirit alone may give rise to “anarchism and lack of concern.”87 Ultimately, the result may be “an a-Trinitarian monotheism.”88

Instead, Boff recommends communion theology, based on the inner-trinitarian love and mutuality of Father, Son, and Spirit. It is based on the ancient principle of perichoresis:

Speaking of God must always mean the Father, Son and Holy Spirit in the presence of one another, in total reciprocity, in immediacy of loving relationship, being one for another, by another, in another and with another. No divine Person exists alone for its own sake; they are always and eternally in relationship with one another: the Father is Father because he has a Son; the Son is Son only because he has a Father; the Spirit is Spirit only because of the love in which the Father begets the Son and the Son gives back to the Father.89

In this perichoretic unity, “each [person of the Trinity] is itself, not the other, but so open to the other and in the other that they form one entity, i.e., they are God.”90 That said, Boff is well aware of the danger of making theology—trinitarian or another type—a mere servant of earthly needs. That would mean theology done from a “utilitarian” perspective—for example, considering how the Trinity might help inform our conceptions of the nature of the community. Instead, Boff wishes to start “from above,” that is, from a cautious and humble inquiry into the life of the Triune God as revealed in Holy Scripture, spiritual traditions, prayer, and liturgies. Only thereafter is it appropriate to reflect on lessons toward developing a socially and politically relevant liberation program drawing from the Trinity as the template of loving, egalitarian, and inclusive community. “Trinity is not something thought out to explain human problems. It is the revelation of God as God is, as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.”91

One aspect of liberation dear to Boff’s heart is overcoming sexism. His trinitarian vision of God holds to a “trans-sexist theology of the maternal father and paternal mother.” The dynamic, living, biblical doctrine of God, Boff claims, can be expressed by the symbols of either father or mother or by a combination of them. Boff notes that this is not contrary to the classical tradition; the Council of Toledo (675) spoke of the “Father’s womb,” in which the Son was conceived.92

Latin American Women on God

Since we have already looked at some leading themes of Latina God-talk in the North American context, this section highlights only those perspectives that come from female theologians in Mexico, Central America, and South America. Ivone Gebara of Brazil outlines some characteristics of the way Latin American women do theology:

• Theological reflection begins with the living realities and shared experiences of women in Latin America.
• Re-creating, but not simply repeating, tradition in a way that makes sense to the particular context of Latin American women is a leading principle.
• Theological work reflects an ability to view life as the locus of both oppression and liberation, grace and a lack of grace.
• The contributions of disciplines other than theology, such as anthropology, psychology, and other social sciences, are used in order to relate to the whole tapestry of life.
• Major loci for doing theology are the basic ecclesial communities, the grassroots ecclesial units.93

Rather than trusting male-dominated philosophical, ideological, and analytical concepts, Latinas go back to the biblical ways of talking about God that relate to their specific situation. Frequent listening to stories and testimonies is evident, for example, in the anthology Through Her Eyes edited by Elsa Tamez, a leading Latina theologian from Mexico.94 The God of Latinas is a living, dynamic, relational God. “From our perspective the Presence of Creative-Recreative Spiritual Force, the source of Life and Love, is like an ongoing movement, an ebb and flow that moves in growing waves that wash over everything. It is like throwing a rock into a still pond; the ripples spread out wider and wider until they reach the shore where they seem to bounce back toward the spot from which they started; it affects the whole surface of the pond.”95 Along with other female theologians, Latinas also do their best to make God-talk more inclusive and liberating. “It is no longer adequate to reflect on the Divine Mystery that creates, saves, and sanctifies us as identified primarily with one of the two sexes. Rather, the Divine Mystery should integrate and harmonize the two sexes without suppressing their enriching differences, while at the same time it also transcends them.”96

In the context of Latin America, the doctrine of God is approached from the perspective of liberation. In the next section, which focuses on conceptions of God in Asia, the theme of liberation reappears, but it takes a new focus in this context of rich religious and cultural traditions.

God in Asian Theologies

The Asian Context for God-Talk

With no other area of the world should we be more cautious when trying to say anything general and representative than with Asia, the largest one. The sheer size and its diversity and plurality are simply mind-boggling. In the words of the Chinese postcolonial feminist Kwok Pui-lan:

More than half of the world’s population live in Asia, a multicultural and multireligious continent that has undergone tremendous transformation during the past several decades. From Japan to Indonesia, and from the Philippines to Central Asia, people live in different socio-political realities and divergent cultural worlds. Divided into at least seven linguistic zones, Asia is also the birthplace of the major historical religions of humankind. For centuries, Asian people lived under the heavy yoke of the Portuguese, Spanish, British, French, Dutch, American and Japanese colonial powers. After World War II, many Asian peoples regained their independence, but the search for their national and cultural identities continues into the present.97

It is in Asia where modernization and cultural heritage meet in a manner comparable only to the African continent—so much so that we could speak of “multiple Asias” in which “the waterbuffalo and the skyscraper” stand next to each other, with masses of the world’s poorest and least educated people and some of the richest and most luxurious cities of the globe.98

What about Christianity? It is surprising that it was only in the last part of the twentieth century that distinctively Asian Christian theologies began to emerge on a wider scale even though “it was on a hill in Asia, at the far western edge of the continent, that Jesus said to his disciples, ‘Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel’ (Mark 16:15),”99 and “it was in Roman Asia that Jesus Christ was born.”100 Even nowadays there is a relatively small number of Christians in Asia, apart from some pockets in China, the Philippines, South Korea, areas in South India, and some other locations. Reasons are well known: “It was largely colonization and evangelization in tandem that brought and propagated the western understanding of Jesus. . . . Not only was it foreign to Asia, it was also an understanding which was polemical against non-Christian religions, disrespectful of indigenous cultures and insensitive to the injustices which colonialism brought about.”101

Three main layers of Christian traditions are present in Asia. The first one, following the oldest tradition, is linked with Thomas the apostle, who helped spread the gospel to the western and southern coast of India. The second tradition concerns the Catholic missions work after the discovery of the sea route to India and the rest of Asia in the later Middle Ages. This proliferation of Christian churches spread all over Asia. The third and more recent tradition is largely attributed to the modern missionary movement of European (and later American) origin, which was mainly Protestant.102

Today, the continent on which more than half of the world’s population lives is not easily divided into theological centers. Perhaps the most fertile soil has been India and Sri Lanka. Because of the long tradition of English-speaking education in these countries, they have contributed significantly to emerging international theologizing. Theologians such as Raimundo Panikkar, Swami Abhishiktananda, M. M. Thomas, Stanley J. Samartha, and Aloysius Pieris are well-known figures within and outside Asia. Some Japanese theologians such as Kosuke Koyama have made headway into the international theological academy, as has the Taiwanese Choan-Seng Song.103 A rising center of theological thinking is Korea, with its phenomenal church growth. Korean theology ranges from conservative evangelical theology that cuts across denominational boundaries to a more liberal strand of Asian pluralism and Minjung theology.

Asian Christian theology is still emerging and distinguishing itself after a long hegemony of Western influence.104 What concerns Christology certainly applies to the doctrine of God or any other theological topic: “There is a quiet determination among Asian Christians that their commitment to Jesus Christ and their words about Jesus Christ must be responsible to the life they live in Asia today. Such theology is called a living theology. . . . Asian theology seeks to take the encounter between life in Asia and the Word of God seriously.”105 Understandably, Asian theologians show no lack of criticism of Western theology and its view of God. At the same time, many of them are also seeking to develop a Theology from the Womb of Asia or A Third-Eye Theology, to cite the delightful book titles of the Chinese Choan-Seng Song.106 We may also wonder how theology would look if God is “rice” rather than a “substance,” as Masao Takenaka from Japan has creatively suggested in his book God Is Rice.107 These are but some of the attempts to acknowledge the wide and deep cultural differences between what are popularly called East and West.

Although, as said, one has to exercise utmost caution when speaking of such a vast entity as Asia in any general terms, it is also the case that some kind of defining characteristics can be found. The following lengthy citation by the noted Indian Jesuit Michael Amaladoss summarizes the distinctiveness of religion in Asia:

It is customary to talk of the Prophetic religions of West Asia and the West (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) and the Mystical religions of the rest of Asia (Hinduism, Daoism, and Buddhism). While the abstract rationality of Greek culture, with its concepts and logic, is at the root of much of Western culture, a certain experiential, intuitive non-duality characteristic of Hinduism and Daoism and of the psychophysical meditative practices of Yoga and Buddhism mark the East. . . . In a broad sense, while the West reaches out to the transcendent Absolute through the reality outside, the East looks inward. The Greek approach to reality is also dichotomous, distinguishing between God and creation, the divine and the human, the spirit and the body, the human and the cosmic. It leads to abstract conceptual systems that have to be applied to the realities of life, as it were from the outside. . . . The Asian way of thinking is holistic and integrated, experiencing reality as one and interdependent. It uses symbols that seek to seize reality imaginatively in its lived complexity. Unlike abstract universal and univocal concepts, symbols are earthy, plural, metaphorical, and polyvalent. A narrative method is more suitable to speak about life than a logical network of concepts. The story also stays close to life in its complexity.108

As in Africa, not only is there a difference in theological formulations in Asia as compared to the West, but the (re)sources that Asians employ differ as well. According to the Vietnamese Peter C. Phan, it is of course Scripture and tradition that serve as the foundation for a distinctively Asian theology and doctrine of God, but for most Asians the scriptural theology does not necessarily come through historical-critical analysis. Rather, it is conveyed through their daily “stories of joy and suffering, hope and despair, love and hatred, freedom and oppression.” This collective memory includes stories by both men and women. The second set of resources is the sacred texts and ethical and spiritual practices of Asian religion and philosophy. In Asia, religion and philosophy are inextricably joined, not unlike in medieval Christendom. The third source of resources is Asian monastic traditions with their rituals, ascetic practices, and social commitment. The fourth consists of Asian cultures in general, which include myths, folklore, symbols, poetry, stories, songs, visual art, and dance.109

Asian religiosity, far from being marginalized or waning, is alive and well. With all the rapid developments in technology and education, Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism, and a host of other religions, most of them manifested in forms that used to be called “animistic” (having to do with spirits) and permeating all of life, continue to shape the worldview and everyday life of Asian men and women. Religion is visible and a part of everyday life. Therefore, talk about God/gods can be carried on everywhere, from the street markets to luxurious hotels to desperate slums to exotic restaurants.

Everywhere in Asia, Christian theology dialogues with and is shaped by encounters with other living religions. Indeed, the challenge of pluralism is nowhere stronger than in Asia. Since the topic of religious pluralism is so central particularly to the Asian context, the pluralistic views of some leading Asian theologians such as Stanley J. Samartha and Raimundo Panikkar will be looked at in some detail in part 3 with the focus on interfaith issues and comparative theology.

Metaphors and Symbols of God from the Asian Soil

Not only are Asian theologians rightfully reminding their Western counterparts of the limitations of traditional ways of conceiving God, but they are also working toward more authentic forms of Asian imaginations. Just consider this example: “One of the first intellectual converts, Brahmabandhab Upadhyay saw the Trinity through the Indian image of Saccidananda. This term combines Sat (being or truth), Cit (consciousness), and Ananda (bliss). The unity of the Godhead seems to be better protected by this image than the One Nature/Three Person model [of the Western tradition].”110

Following the narrative style of Asian theologians,111 Choan-Seng Song, who moved from Taiwan to teach in the United States and was at one time the president of the World Alliance of Reformed Churches, discerns in the narrative method parallels in Jesus’s story and God’s own story.112 Theology, therefore, is “a humble effort on our part to grapple with God’s storytelling.”113 Turning to stories, narratives, and poems highlights the importance of intuition, imagination, and the aesthetic in visioning God—hence the title of Song’s book, Third-Eye Theology, which refers to a capacity claimed to be possessed by some Buddhist masters and sages.

Narrative theology also helps acknowledge the compassionate God, the one whose “heart aches because of an immediate danger to creation,” as the creation story implies.114 Kazoh Kitamori of Japan, after returning home in the aftermath of the devastation of World War II, wrote a passionate book titled The Theology of the Pain of God.115 In that formative work, Kitamori describes God’s suffering through pain. Even though Kitamori wrote in the aftermath of the destruction of his homeland, he emphasizes that the idea comes primarily from the Bible and is also rooted in Buddhist tradition with its foundational concept of dukkha (suffering). For Kitamori, the main impetus for divine suffering does not come from involvement in history but from internal conflict within God’s own nature. God is a God of love, but he is also a God of wrath. Pain comes out of this dilemma. Theology of pain describes “the heart of God most deeply,” following Jeremiah and Paul. Gleaning from Luther’s theology of the cross, Kitamori’s theology of divine pain came to inspire Jürgen Moltmann and others.116

In the work of another Japanese theologian, Kosuke Koyama, who served as a missionary to Thailand before moving to teach in the United States, the rich cultural-religious resources of creativity, imagination, and intuition come to the fore in a most delightful manner. He is known for witty book titles such as Waterbuffalo Theology,117 based on his pastoral experience with Thai mountain farmers; Three Mile an Hour God,118 reminding us that God, unlike most human beings, is not in a hurry but takes time; and No Handle on the Cross, a meditation on Jesus’s sufferings and divine pain.119 Keen on pain and suffering, Koyama reminds us that God’s love enters the human situation, taking risks and paying the price for this painful encounter. This is the pattern to be followed by those who have a “crucified mind.” It is also what distinguishes God from idols. “God carries us. Any ‘god’ we can carry is . . . an idol. That which we can carry is subject to our control. . . . But in trying to carry the living God of Mount Sinai, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, we insult him and we destroy ourselves.”120

The theme of suffering and pain is present in many Asian theologies of God, forming the background for distinctively Asian theologies of liberation.

God and Liberation

The Indian Jesuit Amaladoss reminds us of the obvious but at times forgotten fact that “apart from the few (economic) tigers, Asia is a continent of poor people. They are further oppressed by economic, political, and social domination by privileged groups.” No wonder, “in such a situation, the Gospel has always been received as good news by the poor and it has empowered them to struggle for their liberation.”121 Consequently, it is not only Latin America or, say, South Africa in which liberationists have sought to envision a God who is on the side of the oppressed. Asian theologians and churches have joined forces to develop authentically liberationist theologies for that context.122 In 1979 the Asian Conference of Third World Theologians held a consultation in Sri Lanka under the rubric of “Asia’s Struggle for Full Humanity: Toward a Relevant Theology.” The consultation took notice of problems such as poverty, unemployment, child labor, and the exploitation of women, and called Christians to work for salvation and solidarity with the poor and oppressed as well as attempt a true dialogue with the ancient religions of the area.

M. M. Thomas, a lay theologian from the Mar Thoma Church in India and a former World Council of Churches official, has made the struggle for the humanization of Asia the cornerstone of his theology.123 Thomas’s gateway to theology involved the emergence of the political and social consciousness. The title of his main book, Salvation and Humanization,124 sets forth the thesis that the validity of religion in general and Christianity in particular is based less on its doctrinal orthodoxy than on its contribution to the human quest for a better quality of life and social justice. The book calls for a determined effort for Christians to join with the followers of other religions with goodwill to seek for equality and justice. It means no less than, as another book title of his puts it, Risking Christ for Christ’s Sake.125 This he calls “Christ-centered humanism,” which is based on a syncretistic view of religions. Thomas’s view is that all religions, not only Christianity, are supposed to contribute to the alleviation of social problems. He believes that even the atheistic secular ideologies of India have a role to play for the well-being of others.126

The Sri Lankan Jesuit Aloysius Pieris is also well known for a determined effort to develop an authentic Asian theology of liberation. As with Thomas, who comes from the Hindu context, Pieris, working in the Buddhist environment, has critiqued other liberationists for neglecting the liberative power and presence of God among efforts by followers of other religions. Pieris has untiringly reminded his fellow Christians that true spirituality of the kingdom of God and love of mammon do not go together. Indeed, Jesus denounced striving for the accumulation of wealth and placing one’s trust in riches. His radical social call finally led Jesus to the cross, on which he was executed by the powerful elite. The powerful crucified him on “a cross that the money-polluted religiosity of his day planted on Calvary with the aid of a colonial power (Luke 23:1–23). This is where the journey, begun at Jordan, ended.”127

In the Indian context, the most well-known liberation impulses come from the so-called Dalit contexts, people groups on the lowest of the low level of the society, almost without any human status.128 In South Korea, many liberationists are known under the umbrella term minjung, speaking of the “masses” of people under oppression and suffering.129

The Voices of Asian Women Theologians

The Diverse Context for Theologizing

From the first major English-language publication on feminist theology in Asia by the Indonesian Marianne Katoppo, titled Compassionate and Free: An Asian Woman’s Theology,130 there began to emerge female theological consciousness.131 “As a grassroots movement, Asian feminist theology began when Asian women gathered together to discuss the Bible and their faith in the context of their own lives and Asian realities.” Among these diverse women were “social activists, church reformers, community organizers, women priests, and religious women, academics, theological students, and lay leaders of local churches.”132 Just consider that roughly one-fourth of the globe’s women reside in Asia—including a significant number of Christians! As with their male counterparts, Asian women share in the multireligious, multicultural, and multiethnic contexts as well as the suffering under the legacy of colonialism (including the present neocolonialism), militarism, poverty, and lack of access to education.133

The term feminism is not universally embraced by women theologians and advocates in Asia; indeed, in many settings it would either communicate white, upper-middle-class values of women in the Global North or be linked with the suspicious connotations of “man haters” of the secular suffragettes movements of the mid-twentieth century. However, because of a lack of distinctively Asian female theologies—distinct from womanist or mujerista theologies—the term feminism is used in many publications and addresses even in relation to the Asian context.134

Somewhat parallel to all Asian theology, feminist theologizing utilizes distinctive sources. Kwok Pui-lan summarizes them under three inclusive and comprehensive categories:

• the life experiences of Asian women in various contexts and locations;
• the desire to liberate Bible reading and appropriation from its colonial, Western tutelage to open a “local” hermeneutics; and
• critical employment of diverse Asian religious and cultural tools and resources.135

  Imagining God in a New Key

A basic challenge to both male and female theologians in many Asian contexts has to do with the simple fact that in many languages and some religious traditions, the term god is either missing or used differently from Western languages.136 Chung Hyun Kyung, a female theologian from Korea, received much controversial attention at the 1991 World Council of Churches Canberra Assembly because of her stirring plenary address in which she utilized shamanistic and other religious traditions to speak of God and God’s Spirit. She has persistently urged her Christian people to develop an authentically Asian theology that would make it possible “to touch something really real among and around us in order to meet God.” This means doing theology on the basis of “God’s revelations in our ordinary everyday experiences.” It is not enough to try to articulate Korean women’s God-experiences using biblical or other traditional theological sources apart from their experiences within their “cultural context of suffering and life giving.”137 Not all Asian feminists agree with such a radical standpoint but even they likely appreciate the enthusiasm for constructive authentic Asian interpretations.

Another Korean, An Hee Choi, reminds us of the many influences on women’s visions of God in particular Asian locations, in her case Korea’s shamanism, Buddhism, Confucianism, Christianity, and rapidly changing modernization. From this rich tapestry, she imagines God under creative symbols and metaphors, including God as Family, God as Mother, God as Daughter, God as Liberator, and God as Friend.138 To these can be added other symbols from various Asian locations, such as God as Creator, imagined through the lens of “creativity as a woman who gives birth, as a cook, gardener, communicator, as a writer, as a creator of the environment, atmosphere, life.”139 Following the Asian “both-and” logic rather than exclusivist Western thinking, it seems natural for many women to imagine God both in female and male terms; it is noteworthy that in many Asian religious traditions, both female and male names are used of deities.140 Furthermore, Pui-lan reminds us: “In religiously pluralistic Asian societies, the issue of whether there is one God or many gods seems unimportant and has not created such controversy as in the West.”141

Much of Asian women’s theology—similar to the theology of many male Asian theologians—can be found in the form of narratives, poems, stories, and testimonies. Lee Sun Ai’s pictures of God are typical of this theology:

God is movement

God is the angry surf

God is like mother

God is like father

God is like friends

God is power of being

God is power of living

God is power of giving birth142

Having now surveyed symbols, metaphors, and theologies of God in various Global South locations among male and female theologians from across the ecumenical and theological spectrum, some final reflections are in order to wrap up this part of the book.

Reflections on Non-Western God-Talk

Perhaps the best way to take stock of the various interpretations of God among African, Latin American, and Asian theologians is to discern the common orientations and emphases of these otherwise different theologies. A related task involves assessing their significance in relation to classical theistic traditions.

First, these theologians have a genuine desire to relate Christian God-talk to their local religious and cultural heritage. For example, African theologies harken back to the variegated tapestry of traditional religions. Thus, several African theologians have adopted perspectives such as God as Ancestor. It is not enough to add something exotic to the otherwise predominantly Western God-talk. Rather, these theologians seek a genuinely Asian, African, or Hispanic/Latino interpretation of God. Opinions vary regarding how much traditional classical theological language can be retained in a contextualized approach; all, however, agree that Christians of the Global South deserve and need an authentic local theology faithful to tradition and to the context.

Second, these theologians use a theological method that differs from the Western method. Most often, particularly those in Asia and Africa, they use a type of narrative theology. They approach the theological task from the heart rather than from a detached analytical perspective. This narrative approach makes use of folktales, myths, and poems.

Third, as a result of their theological method and consideration of context, the doctrine of God is dynamic, concrete, and “tangible.” The emphasis in contextual Christian interpretations of God is God’s presence in the world—in creation, human beings, human struggles.

Fourth, community—God as community and human beings as a community relating to God and one another—is a crucial category in most third-world theologies of God. The communal, corporeal emphasis of many non-Western cultures will certainly help Western theologies rehabilitate the often forgotten biblical communion theology.

Fifth, Latin American theologians have been at the forefront of focusing the doctrine of God on society, politics, and economics. Asian liberationists have appropriated the category of liberation to their specific context, relating it not only to social and political concerns but also to Asia’s pervasive religious context. In the African context, the South African fight against apartheid set the precedent for a genuinely black theology of liberation.

Sixth, concerning the majority world women’s voices: speaking from their positions of marginalization, poverty, oppression, and abuse, Hispanic, Asian, and African women theologians have advocated not only feminine images of God, such as mother or parent, but also images associated with birth and nature. While learning from their European and North American colleagues, those feminists have also adopted their own agenda.

Seventh, the all-pervasive challenge of other religions shapes the doctrine of God. Religious pluralism will undoubtedly be a major challenge—if not the major challenge—to the Christian doctrine of God in the third millennium. Western discourse on pluralism will benefit immensely from third-world theologians’ extensive dealings with the issue.

Finally, although the doctrine of the Trinity has not been the focus of the majority world interpretations of God—perhaps because those theologies have been less speculative and philosophical in nature—some exciting developments regarding the Trinity have taken place. For example, Leonardo Boff’s idea of God as “egalitarian community” speaks powerfully for social and ecclesiastical equality.

How do these orientations relate to their contemporary European and North American counterparts? Contextual differences aside, several common features are

• a focus on the immanence of God and God’s presence in the world instead of on his transcendence; an emphasis on the attributes of God that have to do with his love, responsiveness, and dynamism;
• an emphasis on salvation history, including social and political realities, as the proper locus of the doctrine of God;
• a rehabilitation of the category of community;
• an effort to speak inclusively of God and thus make the discourse meaningful to both sexes and all classes; and
• a growing interest in relating God-talk to other religions.

What contributions do the majority world interpretations of God make to classical theistic traditions? Not surprisingly, they have helped theologians acknowledge the biblical dynamism and narrative form of God-talk. They also point to the need to reassess God’s relation to the world in terms of God’s active involvement. Furthermore, they reveal the contextuality of all God-talk, already visible in the Bible’s variety. Rather than a universal “world theology of God,” a locally contextual, salvation-historical, and socially as well as politically relevant interpretation of God is emerging to challenge more sterile, academic traditions.

The last part of this book will delve into what might become the main challenge to Christian theology in the third millennium, namely, religious plurality, the existence of many faiths side by side, and forms of religious pluralism. How does a Christian doctrine of God compare with the teachings of Islam, Buddhism, and Hinduism? Are there genuine similarities? What about the differences? This takes us to the questions of the theology of religions and comparative theology.

  

1. Jung Young Lee, The Trinity in Asian Perspective (Nashville: Abingdon, 1996), 11.

2. For these and similar facts and analyses, see the detailed report, “Christianity in Its Global Context, 1970–2020: Society, Religion, and Mission,” by the Center for the Study of Global Christianity, Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, June 2013, www.gordonconwell.edu/ockenga/research/documents/ChristianityinitsGlobalContext.pdf. This section is based on Veli-Matti Kärkkäinen, Christ and Reconciliation, vol. 1 of A Constructive Christian Theology for the Pluralistic World (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2013), 16–21.

3. The reason “globalization” is in quotation marks is that it is a highly contested and widely debated issue among philosophers, sociologists, scholars of (international) politics, and others—the details of which we are not examining in an introductory survey text. In this book, the term is used in its everyday meaning, that is, that theologies and churches find themselves in a world in which various cultures, nations, and influences interact closely with one another.

4. Justo L. González, Mañana: Christian Theology from a Hispanic Perspective (Nashville: Abingdon, 1990), 49.

5. For a current, short statement, see John Parratt, introduction to An Introduction to Third World Theologies, ed. John Parratt (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 1.

6. Philip Jenkins, The Next Christendom: The Coming of Global Christianity (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), 2.

7. John Mbiti, quoted in Kwame Bediako, Christianity in Africa: The Renewal of a Non-Western Religion (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1995), 154.

8. This is a leading theme in Bediako, Christianity in Africa.

9. See, e.g., Jenkins, Next Christendom, 7–8.

10. J. Lee, Trinity in Asian Perspective, 12.

11. See Amos Yong, The Spirit Poured Out on All Flesh: Pentecostalism and the Possibility of Global Theology (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2005), 239–40.

12. Ibid., 240.

13. Agbonkhianmeghe E. Orobator, Theology Brewed in an African Pot (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 2008), 26.

14. Andrew F. Walls, “Eusebius Tries Again: Reconceiving the Study of Christian History,” International Bulletin of Missionary Research 24, no. 3 (July 2000): 106.

15. John Pobee, Toward an African Theology (Nashville: Abingdon, 1979), 17.

16. In addition to specific references, for this section I have gleaned from Tokunboh Adeyemo, “Unapproachable God: The High God of African Traditional Religion,” in The Global God: Multicultural Evangelical Views of God, ed. Aída Besançon Spencer and William David Spencer (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1998), 127–45; William Dyrness, Learning about Theology in the Third World (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1990), chap. 2.

17. John S. Mbiti, African Religions and Philosophy (London: Heinemann, 1969), 2.

18. For a highly useful discussion of this and related issues, see Cyril Okorocha, “The Meaning of Salvation: An African Perspective,” in Emerging Voices in Global Christian Theology, ed. William A. Dyrness (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1994), 59–92.

19. John S. Mbiti, Concepts of God in Africa, new ed. (London: SPCK, 1998); see also Charles E. Fuller, “God of African Thought and Life,” in God in Contemporary Thought: A Philosophical Perspective, ed. Sebastian A. Matczak (New York: Learned Publications, 1977), 19–47.

20. See Cyril C. Okorocha, “Religious Conversion in Africa: Its Missiological Implications,” Mission Studies 9, no. 1 (1992): 168–81.

21. For a useful discussion on theological method in Africa, see John Parratt, Reinventing Christianity: African Theology Today (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1995), esp. chap. 2.

22. See further Joseph Healey and Donald Sybertz, Towards an African Narrative Theology (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1996), esp. chap. 1.

23. Highly useful discussions are E. Bolaji Idowu, “Introduction” and “God,” in Biblical Revelation and African Beliefs, ed. Kwesi A. Dickson and Paul Ellingworth (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1969), 9–16, 17–29, respectively.

24. Defining early works, along with Mbiti’s Concepts of God, are E. Bolaji Idowu, African Traditional Religions: A Definition (London: SCM, 1973); Charles Nyamiti, African Tradition and the Christian God (Eldoret, Kenya: Gaba, 1976). For an overview and perspective, consult various responses to African cultural-religious background by leading African theologians as analyzed by Kwame Bediako, Theology and Identity: The Impact of Culture upon Christian Thought in the Second Century and the Modern World (Oxford: Regnum, 1992), chaps. 6–11.

25. Mercy Amba Oduyoye, “The African Experience of God through the Eyes of an Akan Woman,” Cross Currents 47, no. 4 (Winter 1997–1998): 493; available at www.crosscurrents.org/african.htm. See also her important contribution Hearing and Knowing: Theological Reflections on Christianity in Africa (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1986).

26. For details, see Kwesi A. Dickson, Theology in Africa (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), chap. 6.

27. Peter Fulljames, God and Creation in Intercultural Perspective: Dialogue between the Theologies of Barth, Dickson, Pobee, Nyamiti, and Pannenberg (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 1993), 41.

28. Dickson, Theology in Africa, 170–84.

29. Ibid., 52.

30. Evident throughout in Pobee, Toward an African Theology.

31. Ibid., 49.

32. Mbiti, African Religions and Philosophy, 106.

33. Pobee, Toward an African Theology, 92.

34. See further Healey and Sybertz, Towards an African Narrative Theology, chap. 2.

35. See Mika Vähäkangas, “African Approaches to the Trinity,” in African Theology Today, ed. Emmanuel Katongole (Scranton, PA: University of Scranton, 2002), 69–83; Jele S. Manganyi and Johan Buitendag, “A Critical Analysis on African Traditional Religion and the Trinity,” HTS Teologiese Studies/Theological Studies 69, no. 1, www.hts.org.za/index.php/HTS/article/view/1934.

36. Charles Nyamiti, “African Ancestral Veneration and Its Relevance to the African Churches,” African Christian Studies (Nairobi) 9, no. 3 (1993): 14, cited in Mika Vähäkangas, In Search of Foundations for African Catholicism: Charles Nyamiti’s Theological Methodology (Leiden: Brill, 1999), 171n106.

37. There are also some Asian theologians interested in ancestor theology: see, e.g., Jung Young Lee, “Ancestor Worship: From a Theological Perspective,” in Ancestor Worship and Christianity in Korea, ed. Jung Young Lee, Studies in Asian Thought and Religion 8 (Lampeter, UK: Mellen House, 1988), 83–91.

38. Charles Nyamiti, Christ as Our Ancestor (Gweru, Zimbabwe: Mambo Press, 1984).

39. Charles Nyamiti, “The Trinity from an African Ancestral Perspective,” African Christian Studies 12, no. 4 (1996): 38–74; Charles Nyamiti, African Tradition and the Christian God. In this section I am indebted to Vähäkangas, “African Approaches to the Trinity,” 69–83; Samuel Waje Kunhiyop, “The Trinity in Africa: Trends and Trajectories,” in The Trinity among the Nations: The Doctrine of God in the Majority World, ed. Gene L. Green, Stephen T. Pardue, and K. K. Yeo (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2015), chap. 3.

40. Slightly adapted from Nyamiti, Christ as Our Ancestor, 103.

41. See Vähäkangas, “African Approaches to the Trinity,” 71–72.

42. A. Okechukwu Ogbonnaya, On Communitarian Divinity: An African Interpretation of the Trinity (New York: Paragon House, 1994).

43. Nyamiti, Christ as Our Ancestor, 58.

44. Ibid., 60.

45. Ibid., 58.

46. Still a useful discussion is Alfred T. Hennelly, Liberation Theologies: The Global Pursuit of Justice (Mystic, CT: Twenty-Third Publications, 1995), chap. 5. Other standard works, though some of them a bit outdated in literature, include Deane William Ferm, Third World Liberation Theologies: An Introductory Survey (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1986), chap. 3; Basil Moore, ed., The Challenge of Black Theology in South Africa (Atlanta: John Knox Press, 1974). For more recent ones, see Dwight N. Hopkins, Black Theology USA and South Africa: Politics, Culture, and Liberation (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1989); Dwight N. Hopkins, Introducing Black Theology of Liberation (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1999), 159–66; Harvey J. Sindima, The Gospel According to the Marginalized (New York: Peter Lang, 2008), chap. 3.

47. See, e.g., John S. Pobee, “Political Theology in the African Context,” Africa Theological Journal 11, no. 2 (1982): 168–75.

48. Parratt, Reinventing Christianity, 125, with reference to Bénézet Bujo’s thought.

49. Nyamiti, African Tradition and the Christian God, 26–43.

50. Allan Boesak, Farewell to Innocence: A Social-Ethical Study of Black Theology and Black Power (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1977). Desmond Tutu, God Has a Dream: A Vision of Hope for Our Time (Colorado Springs: Image Books, 2005). A recent book, coauthored with his daughter, is Desmond Tutu and Mpho Tutu, The Book of Forgiving: The Fourfold Path for Healing Ourselves and Our World (New York: Harper, 2015). For the Desmond Tutu Peace Centre with a number of programs and resources, see www.tutu.org.

51. John W. de Gruchy, Liberating Reformed Theology: A South African Contribution to an Ecumenical Debate (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1991), xii.

52. Ursula King, introduction to Feminist Theology from the Third World: A Reader, ed. Ursula King (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1994), 16–19.

53. See Roxanne Jordaan and Thoko Mpumlwana, “Two Voices on Women’s Oppression and Struggle in South Africa,” in King, Feminist Theology, 150–69.

54. See Mercy Amba Oduyoye, Daughters of Anowa: African Women and Patriarchy (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1995).

55. Oduyoye, “African Experience of God,” 500.

56. Mercy Amba Oduyoye, “Reflections from a Third World Woman’s Perspective: Women’s Experience and Liberation Theologies,” in King, Feminist Theology, 24.

57. Mercy Amba Oduyoye, Hearing and Knowing (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1968), 137.

58. González, Mañana, 61.

59. For an accessible account, see Volker Küster, The Many Faces of Jesus Christ: Intercultural Christology, trans. John Bowden (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 2001), 41–46.

60. For political and religious motives behind the conquest, see Anton Wessels, Images of Jesus: How Jesus Is Perceived and Portrayed in Non-European Cultures (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1990), 58–61.

61. Küster, Many Faces of Jesus Christ, 42.

62. Dyrness, Learning about Theology in the Third World, 72.

63. Cf. José Míguez Bonino, Doing Theology in a Revolutionary Situation, ed. William H. Lazareth (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1975).

64. Ronaldo Muñoz, The God of Christians, trans. Paul Burns (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1990), 9–11 (quotation from 9).

65. Rebecca S. Chopp, “Latin American Liberation Theology,” in The Modern Theologians: An Introduction to Christian Theology in the Twentieth Century, 2nd ed., ed. David F. Ford (Cambridge, MA: Blackwell, 1997), 412.

66. Pablo Richard, “Theology in the Theology of Liberation,” in Mysterium Liberationis: Fundamental Concepts of Liberation Theology, ed. Ignacio Ellacuría, SJ, and Jon Sobrino, SJ (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1993), 150–51.

67. José Comblin, The Holy Spirit and Liberation, trans. Paul Burns (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1989).

68. Juan Luis Segundo, The Liberation of Theology, trans. John Drury (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1976), chap. 1 and a brief summary on 39–40.

69. Ibid., 97.

70. Juan Luis Segundo, Faith and Ideologies, trans. John Drury (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1984).

71. Juan Luis Segundo, Our Idea of God, trans. John Drury (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1974), 27.

72. Segundo, Liberation of Theology, 41.

73. Ibid., 43.

74. The heading for this section is the title of chap. 10 in Gustavo Gutiérrez, A Theology of Liberation: History, Politics, and Salvation, rev. ed., trans. Sister Caridad Inda and John Eagleson (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1988); originally published in Portuguese in 1971.

75. Ibid., chap. 1.

76. Ibid., 29.

77. Ibid., 4–6.

78. Ibid., 6 (italics original).

79. Heading in Gustavo Gutiérrez, The Power of the Poor in History, trans. Robert R. Barr (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1983), 169.

80. These and related themes are developed in detail in Gustavo Gutiérrez, God of Life, trans. Matthew J. O’Connell (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1991).

81. See esp. chap. 9 in Gutiérrez, Theology of Liberation.

82. As summarized in ibid., xxxviii.

83. See ibid., chap. 10 particularly.

84. Leonardo Boff, Trinity and Society, trans. Paul Burns (1988; repr., Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2005), 1 (title of the introduction).

85. Title of chap. 1 in ibid.

86. Ibid., 11.

87. Ibid., 13–16 (quotations from 15).

88. Ibid., 20.

89. Ibid., 133.

90. Ibid., 32.

91. Ibid., 3.

92. Ibid., 120–21. For the feminine characteristics of each of the trinitarian persons, see 170–71 (Father), 182–83 (Son), and 196–98 (Spirit).

93. Ivone Gebara, “Women Doing Theology in Latin America,” in King, Feminist Theology, 55–59.

94. Elsa Tamez, ed., Through Her Eyes: Women’s Theology from Latin America (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1989).

95. Alida Verhoeven, “The Concept of God: A Feminine Perspective,” in Tamez, Through Her Eyes, 54–55.

96. María Clara Bingemer, “Women in the Future of the Theology of Liberation,” in King, Feminist Theology, 315.

97. Kwok Pui-lan, Introducing Asian Feminist Theology (Cleveland: The Pilgrim Press, 2000), 12.

98. Ibid., 13.

99. Samuel Hugh Moffett, A History of Christianity in Asia, vol. 1, Beginnings to 1500 (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1992), 4.

100. Ibid., 6 (italics original).

101. José M. De Mesa, “Making Salvation Concrete and Jesus Real: Trends in Asian Christology,” Exchange 30, no. 1 (2001): 2.

102. George Gispert-Sauch, SJ, “Asian Theology,” in Ford, Modern Theologians, 455.

103. For details, see ibid., 455–76; a massive new resource is Felix Wilfred, ed., The Oxford Handbook of Christianity in Asia (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014); part 1 (“Mapping Asian Christianity”) gives a most detailed survey.

104. Aloysius Pieris, An Asian Theology of Liberation (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1988), 81–83.

105. Kosuke Koyama, “Foreword by an Asian Theologian,” in Asian Christian Theology: Emerging Themes, ed. Douglas J. Elwood (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1980), 13.

106. Choan-Seng Song, Theology from the Womb of Asia (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1986); Choan-Seng Song, Third-Eye Theology, rev. ed. (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1990).

107. Masao Takenaka, God Is Rice: Asian Culture and Christian Faith (Geneva: World Council of Churches, 1986), 8.

108. Michael Amaladoss, “Asian Theological Trends,” in Wilfred, Oxford Handbook of Christianity in Asia, 105.

109. Peter C. Phan, “Introduction: An Asian-American Theology: Believing and Thinking at the Borders,” in Journeys at the Margin: Toward an Autobiographical Theology in American-Asian Perspective, ed. Peter C. Phan and Jung Young Lee (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1999), xiv–xviii (quotation on xvi); I have modified Phan’s categorization.

110. Amaladoss, “Asian Theological Trends,” 110–11.

111. Choan-Seng Song, The Believing Heart: An Invitation to Story Theology (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1999).

112. Choan-Seng Song, Tell Us Our Names: Story Theology from an Asian Perspective (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1984); for comments, see Amaladoss, “Asian Theological Trends,” 105–6.

113. Choan-Seng Song, “Five Stages toward Christian Theology in the Multicultural World,” in Phan and Lee, Journeys at the Margin, 3.

114. Song, Third-Eye Theology, 35. Another book title of his is Compassionate God (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1982).

115. See Kazoh Kitamori, Theology of the Pain of God (1946; repr., Richmond: John Knox Press, 1965).

116. For a succinct account, see Hans Schwarz, Theology in a Global Context: The Last Two Hundred Years (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2005), 510–12.

117. Kosuke Koyama, Waterbuffalo Theology, 25th anniversary ed., rev. ed. (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1999).

118. Kosuke Koyama, Three Mile an Hour God: Biblical Reflections (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1979).

119. Kosuke Koyama, No Handle on the Cross: An Asian Meditation on the Crucified Mind (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1977).

120. Koyama, Three Mile an Hour God, 34–35.

121. Amaladoss, “Asian Theological Trends,” 113.

122. See Virginia Fabella, ed., Asia’s Struggle for Full Humanity (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1980); Michael Amaladoss, Life in Freedom: Liberation Theologies from Asia (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1997); Bastiaan Wielenga, “Liberation Theology in Asia,” in The Cambridge Companion to Liberation Theology, 2nd ed., ed. Christopher Rowland (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), chap. 3.

123. M. M. Thomas, “My Pilgrimage in Mission,” International Bulletin of Missionary Research 13, no. 1 (1989): 28–31.

124. M. M. Thomas, Salvation and Humanization (Madras: Christian Literature Society, 1971).

125. M. M. Thomas, Risking Christ for Christ’s Sake: Toward an Ecumenical Theology of Pluralism (Geneva: World Council of Churches, 1987).

126. For a useful account, see Schwarz, Theology in a Global Context, 522–23.

127. Pieris, Asian Theology of Liberation, 49.

128. For a short orientation, see Schwarz, Theology in a Global Context, 529–31; Arvind P. Nirmal, ed., Towards a Common Dalit Theology (Madras: Gurukul Lutheran Theological College and Research Institute, 1990); X. Irudayaraj, SJ, ed., Emerging Dalit Theology (Madras/Madurai: Tamil Nadu Theological Seminary, 1990).

129. For a succinct orientation, see Andrew Sung Park, “Minjung Theology: A Korean Contextual Theology,” Indian Journal of Theology 33, no. 4 (October–December 1984): 1–11, available at http://biblicalstudies.org.uk/pdf/ijt/33-4_001.pdf. For details, see Kim Yong Bock, ed., Minjung Theology: People as the Subjects of History (Singapore: Christian Conference of Asia, 1981).

130. Marianne Katoppo, Compassionate and Free: An Asian Woman’s Theology (Geneva: World Council of Churches, 1979); subsequent defining publications include Chung Hyung Kyung, Struggle to Be the Sun Again: Introducing Asian Women’s Theology (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1990). Still useful essays can be found in the following global collections of essays: Kwok Pui-lan, ed., Hope Abundant: Third World and Indigenous Women’s Theology (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 2010); King, Feminist Theology; Virginia Fabella and Mercy Amba Oduyoye, eds., With Passion and Compassion: Third World Women Doing Theology (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1988); Letty M. Russell et al., eds., Inheriting Our Mother’s Gardens: Feminist Theology in Third World Perspective (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1988).

131. For an accessible account, see Pui-lan, Introducing Asian Feminist Theology, chap. 2 (“The Emergence of Feminist Theological Consciousness”). See also Kwok Pui-lan, “The Emergence of Asian Feminist Consciousness of Culture and Theology,” in We Dare to Dream: Doing Theology as Asian Women, ed. Virginia Fabella and Sun Ai Lee Park (Hong Kong: Asian Women’s Resource Centre for Culture and Theology and Women’s Commission of the Ecumenical Association of Third World Theologians, 1989), 92–100.

132. Pui-lan, Introducing Asian Feminist Theology, 9. See also Hyun Hui Kim, “Asian Feminist Theology,” at www.drew.edu/theological/2012/03/30/asian-feminist-theology. A useful resource is Womenet, published by the Asian Women’s Resource Centre for Culture & Theology, www.awrc4ct.org/womenet; that center also publishes the leading Asian feminist journal, In God’s Image.

133. For these and other background factors, see Pui-lan, Introducing Asian Feminist Theology, chap. 1. Consult also Namsoon Kang, “Re-constructing Asian Feminist Theology: Toward a Global Feminist Theology in an Era of Neo-Empire(s),” in Christian Theology in Asia, ed. Sebastian C. Kim (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008), 205–26. Highly useful insights can also be gleaned from Kwok Pui-lan, Postcolonial Imagination and Feminist Theology (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2005).

134. See further Pui-lan, Introducing Asian Feminist Theology, 9–10.

135. Ibid., chap. 3.

136. See ibid., 68.

137. Chung Hyun Kyung, “‘Han-pu-ri’: Doing Theology from Korean Women’s Perspective,” in Fabella and Park, We Dare to Dream, 136.

138. An Hee Choi, Korean Women and God: Experiencing God in a Multi-religious Colonial Context (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 2005); part 1 speaks of various religio-cultural influences and part 3 of metaphors of God.

139. Rita Monteiro, “My Image of God,” In God’s Image (September 1988): 35, cited in Chung Hyun Kyung, “To Be Human Is to Be Created in God’s Image,” in King, Feminist Theology, 254 (I have been unable to secure the original source).

140. For a detailed discussion, see chap. 5 (“Speaking about God”) in Pui-lan, Introducing Asian Feminist Theology.

141. Ibid., 68.

142. Lee Sun Ai, “Images of God,” In God’s Image (September 1988): 37, cited in Kyung, “To Be Human,” 255 (I have been unable to secure the original source).