hat does the decline of the Christian denominations in the west mean for the world of religion? How will the growth of Christianity in the global south and east impact religion? Are the situations of the congregations and traditions in these geographic regions capable of meeting in the middle to lead to a more unified Christian Church than has been possible in the past half a millennia? In his Presidential Community Enrichment Series lecture, “Global Christian Faith,” Dr. Conrad Kanagy, associate professor of sociology, offered some research that may provide the answer.
Kanagy grew up in an Anabaptist community in Mifflin county and is now the pastor of the Elizabethtown Mennonite Church on Spruce Street. “This topic that I’m going to talk with you about today, for me, originated in 2003,” Kanagy said. “I visited Ethiopian Kenya and what I saw there amazed me because I saw a church that I was not familiar with, a church that was exploding with growth.” As both a pastor and a sociologist, Kanagy wanted to be more aware of what was going on in the wider world of Christian tradition. The research he presented at this lecture series stemmed from his wish to study the contrasting situations of the Anabaptist tradition and Christianity at large in the west and the global south from a sociological perspective.
Kanagy presented his research in the Susquehanna Room at Myer Hall Tuesday Oct. 22 at noon. His lecture sought to explain the similarities shared by different geographical regions of Christian faith using Anabaptist congregations as a case study.
Their circumstances, though wildly different, stem from the same set of factors, namely demographics and evangelism. Anabaptist congregations in Europe and North America are not bringing new members into their churches at a sustainable rate, either through family or conversion. Nor are they evangelizing as they used to. Without these two factors, the decline of western congregations is inevitable.
According to Kanagy, these same factors contribute enormously to the explosion of growth these traditions are experiencing in the global south. Kanagy also said that these same factors are involved in the growth of Anabaptist traditions in the global south. While families in the west usually contain one or two children, families in the global south tend to contain about four children.
“In many ways, this is not a Mennonite story,” Kanagy said. “It’s a story that many Mennonites in North America and Europe are not aware of, but it’s not uniquely a Mennonite story.”
The Anabaptist traditions in these geographics share many similarities with the other Christian traditions that surround them. “These churches are by and large Orthodox in their beliefs,” Kanagy said. They are more holistic in their ministry and mission, to the surprise of many Mennonites in North America. “There is a combination of word and deed that you find in the global south,” Kanagy said. “There is not the separation of evangelism by word with a focus on social justice that divides many Christians in North America. In the global south you find these churches simply doing both.” The all-encompassing holistic approach of these congregations adds fuel to the argument that the global south may lead Christianity to a more united front in the future.
The Presidential Community Enrichment Series offers real-world learning opportunities for students and the wider community.
This lecture housed the largest audience the series has garnered this semester. Each event in the series begins with a luncheon at noon, followed by the main lecture with a question and answer session following the presentation.
Upcoming programming includes, “Beyond Home Plate: Jackie Robinson on Life After Baseball,” a lecture by Dr. Michael Long, associate professor of religious and peace and conflict studies. For information on future events in the series, contact Jennifer Landis at LANDISJ@ETOWN.EDU.
