The Gospel and Urbanization PDF Print E-mail
Christian Direction has just finished a new updated version of the urban reader The Gospel and Urbanization.  It is now available in a CD-ROM-(PDF) format for $15 CDN.  This fifth edition contains new articles on the challenges of ministry facing urban Christians and churches with regard to globalization, ethnopolitical conflict, poverty and AIDS, street children and development practice.  In addition, two small books are also included on this CD-ROM at no additional cost: A Manual of Ministry to People with AIDS and Towards the Transformation of our City-Regions.

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Here is a summary of the Table of Contents:

SECTION 1:  TOWARDS A THEOLOGY OF CITY

1.     Reaching the City:  Is it Possible?                                                    Raymond Bakke                   1-2

2.     The Biblical Meaning of the City                                                        Francis M. DuBose              1-7

3.     Biblical Direction for an Urban Theology                                        E. Luther Copeland              1-11

4.     Seek the Peace of the City: Social Ethics According to I Peter    Bruce Winter                        1-14

5.     The Battle for Cities                                                                             Raymond Bakke                   1-21

6.     Doing Theology in the Canadian Urban Context                           Glenn Smith                           1-28

7.     Hermeneutics and Culture – A Theological Perspective               René Padilla                          1-49

8.     Questions                                                                                                                                              1-60

SECTION 2:  THE URBAN CONDITION

1.     Evangelizing the Sinned-Against                                                      Raymond Fung                     2-2

2.     Three  “R's” for Ministry in the City                                                    John Perkins                         2-8

3.     Defining Globalization                                                                         Charles Taylor                      2-9

4.     The Depersonalization Misunderstanding                                      Harvey M. Conn                    2-16

5.     Ethnopolitical Conflict and the Changing World Order                 Ted R. Gurr                            2-28

6.     Reducing Poverty by Combating AIDS                                             Peter Okaalet                         2-50

7.     Welcome to an Urban World… But What is the Mission of God   Glenn Smith                       2-59

8.     Questions                                                                                                                                              2-65

SECTION 3:  INTERNATIONAL URBAN CASE STUDIES

1.     The Street Children Scene                                                                  Jeff Anderson                       3-2

2.     Engaging in Art with Missional Intent in France                           Steve Thrall                           3-12

3.     Distinctives of African Urban Ministry                                           John J. Shane                        3-16

4.     An Inquiry on Urban, Francophone, Theological Education       Glenn Smith                           3-25

5.     Networking:  Hope for the Church in the City                                 Robert C. Linthicum             3-51

6.     The “Team Approach” to Urban Church Planting                         Roger S. Greenway              3-66

7.     Urban Places and Islam:  Past and Present                                 Samuel Wilson                     3-68

8.     The Québec Challenge for French Evangelical

       Church-Planting Initiatives                                                                 Glenn Smith                           3-76

9.    Questions                                                                                                                                               3-95


SECTION 4:  A MODEL IN CONTEXTUAL URBAN MINISTRY

1.     Development Practice:  Principles and Practitioners                      Bryant Myers                       4-2

2.     The New Age Movement                                                                   Timothy Ernst                       4-14

3.     Profiles of Effective Urban Pastors                                                   Ray Bakke                             4-17

4.     How to Exegete a Neighbourhood                                                    Glenn Smith                           4-25

5.     Contextualizing Theological Education                                            Jules Casseus                       4-29

6.     Postmodern Canada                                                                            David Lyon                           4-38

7.    Urbanisation, Christianity and Contributions to Social Capital:

       Can Committed Christians be in the City, but not of the City?      D. Posterski-A.Grenville     4-42

8.     Questions                                                                                                                                              4-51

SECTION 5:  MODELS FOR TRAINING

1.     A Manual of Ministry to People with AIDS                                    Pamela Gebauer                   

Preface to the Fifth Edition

            In 1983, I left a ministry to university students to give direction to the ministry of Christian Direction in Montreal.  It is interesting for me to reflect back on how a relevant theology of the city evolved through that change.  One day, as I was looking out the window from the sixth floor of our office, I asked myself a question that initiated a reflection that continues to this very day. “I wonder what is being done in my city to reach people who work in the downtown core from Monday at 8am until Friday at 5pm?”  Much to my chagrin, I learned that very little was happening.  I began to read about ministry with people in the marketplace and saw the relationship to the needs of urban ministry.  At that same time, I was reading in Jeremiah.  Having been raised in the context of a family that placed a high priority on the Bible and the church, I am not sure how many times I had read that particular book or skimmed this particular chapter.  But in that cold winter of 1983, the words of chapter 29:4-7 took on a new meaning.  As God Almighty had called those 10,000 exiles to seek the shalom of the foreign city, I began to see that the spiritual needs of downtown Montreal could not go by me easily.  So began the reflection and the action that have informed life over this period. The context was shaping how I listen to the Bible. I had to join with others to pursue a contextualized action and reflection.

            Yet along the way, I learned that this one text would never inform all that is the mission of God in the city. Harvey Conn taught me well (I trust). I remember him saying, “Picking one biblical text to sum up my view of urban ministry is an assignment too awesome and dangerous for me. Too awesome because wherever I turn in my Bible it shouts ‘urban’ to me.  Too dangerous because the text I select could leave out a piece of the picture too crucial in another text and distort the whole.  We need a hermeneutic serious enough to link Genesis to Revelation in the unending story of Jesus as an urban lover and the church as God’s copycat.”  I realized that I needed to keep studying the text!

            At the same time several authors, speakers and teachers began to shape by practice of urban ministry. I learned how to exegete a city and use the social data to understand my city.  Many authors invited me to pursue a fresh encounter with our culture taking the social category of “space” seriously.  I learned that understanding culture, worldviews and thinking is critical to pursuing the mission of God.  But I live in a “place”, which is contextually specific. Place is space with historical meanings, different identities, varied societal preoccupations.  For example, I live in the city where philosophical postmodernism* was first coined and studied as a social and philosophical expression. The unending story we find ourselves in always needs to be woven into the fabric of place a little differently.

These dimensions to urban ministry practice are critical in the pursuit of the mission of God. We need to understand (the spirituality of) the community.  This is rooted in its worldview, its culture and its understanding of religion.  We must cultivate an authentic spiritual formation of those involved in that community development.  Holding text and context together is vital as we continue in an era of rapid urban growth, urbanization and globalization. It is a noble task!

This reader will help you put some of those pieces together. Since the first edition in 1989, we have occasionally added or subtracted articles. This edition is a major overhaul! There are five sections to the reader. In the first section we present the best articles on a theology of the city. The second section provides an overview of the urban condition in a contextual yet global perspective. In the third section we present eight global case studies. The fourth section presents a model for urban mission from a North-American perspective…biased towards Canada for once! In the fifth section we present models for training for urban mission in light of current issues including HIV/AIDS. We include the Lausanne Occasional Paper (#37), Towards the Transformation of our City-regions.

I want to thank Pamela Gebauer who did the research and the lion’s share of the preparation. Luc Lambert helped with the technological aspects of the reader. I continue to thank all those who help conceive this reader right from the start – especially my colleagues at Christian Direction who continue to dream and work for the spiritual transformation by Jesus Christ of all of life in our cities.

                                                                                    Glenn Smith

                                                                                    (B.A.; M.A.; D.Min.; D.Hon.)

                                                                                    Executive Director

                                                                                    Christian Direction Inc.

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   * In 1979, Le CRÉPUQ (Conseil des recteurs et principales des universités du Québec) requested a report on “knowledge in the most highly developed societies.”  Montréal was the context from which Jean-François Lyotard wrote the book,  La condition post-moderne, Collection «Critique », Paris: Les Éditions de Minuit.