|
Editorial |
|
|
|
Written by John Shortt, David I. Smith, and John Sullivan
|
|
IN THE FIRST article in this issue, Michael Goheen paints with broad strokes to give us a big picture of western Christians living at a crossroads where the cultural and biblical stories meet. This is, or should be, a place of tension because the stories are different and incompatible. In some parts of the world, the tension is experienced very strongly but, for western Christians, it is often absent. This is because the biblical story is fragmented, comfortable cohabitation within a seemingly neutral culture is adopted, the privatization of faith is accepted and an emphasis on the goodness of creation and cultural involvement has eclipsed the reality of the spiritual battle for the direction of cultural development. Goheen calls for a recovery of a focus on “education for witness” since that restores the tension of the clash between fundamental assumptions that western Christians have tended to lose. |
|
Read more...
|
|
|
The Surrender and Recovery of the Unbearable Tension |
|
|
|
Written by Michael W. Goheen
|
|
FAITHFUL
CHRISTIAN ENGAGEMENT in education means both being at home and at
odds with dominant culture. This stance of critical participation
should produce an unbearable tension: can one both live in solidarity
and dissent? Yet this unbearable tension is often not present in
Christian experience — why? This article suggests four reasons: the
fragmentation of the Scriptural story, a comfortable cohabitation in
a seemingly neutral culture, a Christendom mindset that accepts a
privatized role, and an eclipse of the antithesis by an emphasis on
creation. The articles closes suggesting that seeing education in
terms of witness to God's kingdom may help us recover this tension. |
|
|
The Challenge of Passionate Religious Commitment for School Education |
|
|
|
Written by Trevor Cooling
|
The Challenge of Passionate Religious Commitment for School
Education in a World of Religious Diversity: Reflections on Evangelical
Christianity and Humanism
PASSIONATE
RELIGIOUS COMMITMENT is often viewed as a problem in education
because believers are thought to impose their views on others in the
belief that they are public truth. This article examines two case
studies and concludes that this concern is real. An influential
response is to argue that religious commitment should therefore be a
private matter. However, using ideas from a significant English
report on Citizenship Education, I argue that if teachers can make
the distinction between secured public truth and controversial public
truth, this difficulty with passionate religious commitment is
overcome.
|
|
|
Education as Mission: The Course as Sign of the Kingdom |
|
|
|
Written by Telford Work
|
|
EDUCATION
IS AN opportunity for cross-cultural mission on behalf of the
eschatological Kingdom of God. The cross-cultural exchange that
happened between Jews and Gentiles at Antioch (Acts 11:19-26) was a
moment of true education that makes the town a fitting metaphor for
educational excellence: an eschatological location at which the old
creation meets the new in unpredictable encounters that leave all
parties forever changed. A course in any field across the curriculum
is an event of situated Christian mission whose devices,
relationships, and goals invite the manifestation of the
eschatological Reign of God. Awareness of this fact can inform
pedagogy fruitfully. |
|
|
Afrocentric Christian Worldview and Student Spiritual Development |
|
|
|
Written by Margaret S. Edgell
|
Afrocentric Christian Worldview and Student Spiritual Development: Tapping a Global Stream of Knowledge
A
LOCALIZED ETHNOGRAPHY of African Christian students revealed
consistently robust Christian faith across all respondents, the core
elements of which were rooted in an explicit Afrocentric worldview.
These findings support multicultural critiques of classic student
spiritual development theory, and point toward further research from
a multicultural frame into the many ways that Christian students form
their worldviews, form their identities, and act on their beliefs. |
|
|
Reconciliation, Constructivism, and Ecological Sustainability: A Review Essay |
|
|
|
Written by Harro Van Brummelen
|
|
THIS
ARTICLE REVIEWS and explores the links between Chet Bowers' recent
book on constructivist theories of learning and the paper by Gormas,
Koole, and Vryhof on learning for reconciliation published in this
journal (Spring 2006). The reviewer holds that Bowers' critique of
constructivism has merit, but that his emphasis on eco-justice leaves
gaps in both the foundations and practices of education. While the
biblical concept of reconciliation is more encompassing, the reviewer
questions whether it can be the sole chief purpose of education and
suggests that Christian educators need to develop a defensible
comprehensive pedagogical framework. |
|
|
Volume 11 (2007) 