Overview

The 2007 federal government intervention in Northern Territory Aboriginal communities provided impetus for the churches to review their own efforts on behalf of Indigenous communities. Writing out of his personal experience in the Roman Catholic parishes of Kununurra and Halls Creek in East Kimberley, Noel McMaster drafts a new approach to mission and church presence. He uses a hermeneutic of suspicion, starting from the premise that the church is captive to an ideology that needs to be undone in order to allow a fruitful theology and missiology. In particular, he notes that much church patronate has been a debilitating phenomenon which amounts to a failure to establish partnership with Indigenous people. He examines what a true partnership in mission could be, against the backdrops of syncretism and what anthropologist Kolig called eutrapelia - the appearance of a 'light' substitute for older Indigenous religious ways - and against the negative aspects of hierarchy and institution. For authenticity, local mission needs to address these issues.& #xD; The book looks to an alternative missiology by promoting an improved anthropological and theological awareness. In a word, the local church needs to relinquish its evangelising efforts within parish schools hitherto burdened with transient teachers and voluntaristic religious practices, and seek an authentic discipleship and partnership with fewer agents of mission committed over longer periods of time.

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9781863551267

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