DAVID ADAMS speaks to Latin American theologian Ruth Padilla DeBorst during a recent visit to Australia…
Christians need to “look at the Gospel afresh and try to do so from outside the expectations of Christendom” while adopting a much more “radical commitment” to following Jesus than just “ascribing to a certain religion”, according to Latin American theologian Ruth Padilla DeBorst.
Ms Padilla DeBorst, World Vision International’s director of Christian formation and leadership development, was in Australia briefly earlier this month to run a series of workshops. Conducted under the banner of The Faith Effect (the name is also that of a five part interactive Bible study series created by World Vision), the workshops are what Ms Padilla DeBorst calls “an attempt to explore and promote a much more integral understanding of the Gospel and the mission of the church”.
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Ruth Padilla DeBorst. PICTURE: Tina Francis Photography “Too often in Christians circles there’s this very artificial split between what we believe and how we live or what we think and what we do or the idea of proclamation on the one hand and service on the other.”– Ruth Padilla DeBorst |
“Too often in Christian circles there’s this very artificial split between what we believe and how we live or what we think and what we do or the idea of proclamation on the one hand and service on the other,” she says.
“So The Faith Effect is really trying to convey the central message that I believe it the central message of the Gospel – that is, that the ‘good news’ has to do with all areas of life and our faith is not something just for Sundays and for the religious dimension of our life but for all areas and so it should be accessed in all areas and that means…that all that we do is part of our witness of God’s love.”
Ms Padilla DeBorst, who is the daughter of renowned theologian Dr René Padilla and who, before taking up her current position, was general secretary of the Latin American Theological Fellowship, says that while the idea of a wholly integrated faith “is as old as human history”, there have been moments throughout history which have led “Christians to separate things that never really should have been separated”.
In recent times, this separation has often been caused by fear that the church “will just become a social service agency or something”. “So then people retrench and say, ‘No, we’re just about preaching’ and such.”
Hence for the church – and particularly the church in the developed world – the challenge is to overcome that fear – to “unlearn” some of the beliefs and practices which have governed the way people function.
To that end, Ms Padilla DeBorst says the West can learn from some expressions of church which have emerged in the developing world and which have not been home to the powerful but to the marginalised.
“(T)hose expressions of church are much closer to the experience of the first followers of Jesus in the time of the Roman Empire where they did not have power…” she says.
“The experience of the integral perspective was just a natural expression of their faith. And, I’m afraid, too often when religion is associated with power, then one can often be blinded to the social implications because those might threaten the conditions of those in power.
“So I think in some ways there are places in the two-thirds world where this ‘integrality’, this wholeness, is more natural. Others, of course, still do perpetuate some of the splits that were brought to be them by missionaries or even the powers that be in their own context, so it’s a pretty mixed bag.”
Meanwhile Ms Padilla DeBorst, who was born in Colombia and has since lived in Argentina, Ecuador, El Salvador and now Costa Rica, says that along with confronting the poverty, injustice and violence that wrack South American countries, one of the biggest challenges facing the church on that continent is that of the so-called “gospel of prosperity”.
“Teaching people that they can basically manipulate God into giving them what they want and what they want is just expressions of consumer society – more stuff, bigger cars, bigger homes, whatever…” Ms Padilla DeBorst says.
“It’s a big challenge, people are getting hurt, people are leaving the church…once they see that things are not really as they’ve been told they are. So it’s a challenge to really live it out.”
Asked who inspires her, Ms Padilla DeBorst cites examples of religious leaders who have captured a sense of what it means to live an integrated life of faith – “people who dared…to stand out and often-times suffered a lot for speaking the truth, for challenging people, for calling people back top God’s purposes and not just their own individual and greedy agendas”.
They include Methodism founder John Wesley, Czech reformer Jan Hus, Moravian Count Von Zinzendorf, anti-slavery campaigner William Wilberforce and, more recently, people like assassinated El Salvadorian Catholic Archbishop Oscar Romero – whom Ms Padilla DeBorst quotes as saying: “Preaching of the Gospel that doesn’t denounce injustice is not preaching of the Gospel”.
Reflecting on the many people she has encountered in her own walk of faith, she adds: “And the many less known others committed to serving and maybe not making a big splash and getting into the history books but living faithfully in their context.”
For more on The Faith Effect, see www.worldvision.com.au/Partner-with-us/ChristianEngagement/TheFaithEffect.aspx.
