Of Bananas and Hard-Boiled Eggs, Thriving in a Foreign Culture through the Journey toward Biculturalism by Mary Lou Codman-Wilson, Ph.D.

Of Bananas and Hard-Boiled Eggs, Thriving in a Foreign Culture through the Journey toward Biculturalism by Mary Lou Codman-Wilson, Ph.D. 

Westbow Press, 2012.

In our globalized world many of us are involved in cross-cultural living.  Interacting intentionally with those of another culture is an opportunity to broaden our own perspectives and become genuine “world Christians’ –i.e, Christians who have God’s heart for the world at their core.

David Augsburger has said: Anyone who knows only one culture knows no culture.  In coming to know a second or third culture, one discovers how much that was taken to be reality is actually an interpretation of realities that are seen in part and known in part; one begins to understand that things assumed to be universal are local; one realizes that culture defines both what is valued and which values will be central and which less influential.” (David Augsburger, Pastoral Counseling Across Cultures, 1986, p.18)

There are several terms used in cross-cultural literature to describe the change in identity people experience in engaged cross-cultural living.  Some people use the term “bicultural” –i.e., I am part my culture of origin and part the new culture I have internalized.  For the sake of simplicity, that is the term being used in this book.  It describes people who move in and out of their dominant culture and are able to mix values and behavior from both their culture of origin and their new culture. Bernard Adeney, in Strange Virtues, Ethics in a Multicultural World, says: “As we live in another culture, our goal is to become bicultural - to become fluent in two languages and two cultures” (p. 72). 

The book title Of Bananas and Hard Boiled Eggs actually comes from this identity journey for the author: “I have chosen to be changed as I have internalized many exceptional values of the Asian peoples and cultures with whom I interact. One Chinese international student was in a seminar I co-taught in the USA with an Asian Indian.  Midway through the seminar the student gave this assessment of me to the whole class:  “I know who you are,” he said to me. “You are a hard-boiled egg.  I am Chinese. I am a banana: I am yellow on the outside (Chinese looking) but I am white on the inside (with Caucasian values).  You are white on the outside but yellow on the inside.”  The journey of bicultural identity.

Other people describe those involved in this journey as “third culture people.”  This is technically the more accurate term.  Third culture people live close to the boundary edge of two cultures and can cross over from one to the other culture with relative ease.  But as they cross back and forth, they create a new composite identity within themselves.  Such people are no longer solely people of their culture of origin – it is evident they are different from the values and behavior of their heritage.  But they also are not recognized as legitimate people of the culture they have internalized – since they are not of that culture by blood or heritage.  They are a synthesis – a third culture people – with a composite identity that mixes differently for each person. 

Whether you speak of this cultural journey of identity as the journey towards biculturalism or the journey towards third culture identity, the journey itself is one of the benefits of our globalized world.  People who want to be relevant in such a world and who want to thrive in relationships with those of a foreign culture will be able to do so when they are able to go in and out of that culture comfortably.  They can make friendships and contributions in the dominant culture while still maintaining their roots and friendships in their culture of origin. 

This workbook has been developed for that goal– to help people grow in confidence and in English language usage so they can cross over easily and often and adapt to life in the dominant culture and not be limited to life within their ethnic cocoon.  It is also written to create more understanding between the different generations within immigrant communities.  Children raised in a foreign culture will tend to internalize the dominant culture’s values rather quickly. But parents and grandparents who have recently come to that foreign culture will tend to retain the values from their culture of origin and expect their families to keep those values and not embrace the dominant culture.

Rather than a treatise on principles for cross-cultural living, Of Bananas and Hard Boiled Eggs is a discussion based workbook that deals with the life issues involved in adapting to a foreign culture.  Each chapter has a story describing an experience or perspective of the particular writer.  Contributors are from Indonesia, Nigeria, Austria, Mexico, Japan and the author’s own experience.  Discussion questions (and vocabulary for ESL usage) are based on the theme raised in that story.  Topics covered include Depression, Saying No, Building Trust, Stereotypes, Maintaining Your Cultural Identity, Developing A Bicultural Identity.  The content of the book can be adapted but it is set up as a 20 week guide.

The book is relevant in at least three different settings:

1.      ESL advanced class for students able to discuss issues together in English.

2.      Discussion material for immigrant churches to help first generation immigrants move out of their ethnic cocoon and understand their 2^nd and 3^rd generation family members who are more openly engaged with the dominant culture’s values.

3.      Discussion material for international students or business people seeking to acculturate to an English speaking context.

More information about the book and the author is on www:maryloucodmanwilson.com

The book is sold on Amazon and is also available in e-book format:

http://www.amazon.com/Bananas-Hard-Boiled-Eggs-Mary-Codman-Wilson/dp/1449735754/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1335215349&sr=8-1

Global Theology - Asian Perspectives

Global Theology Asian Perspectives from book Global Theology in Evangelical Perspective, eds. Greenman and Green, IVP. 2012.

(This last review of Global Theology features 3 Asian perspectives from K.K. Yeo, Ken Gnanaken and Amos Yong.)

For those interested in connecting Chinese culture and contextualizing it to the Christian gospel, K.K. Yeo offers an interesting approach.  In his article, “Christian Chinese Theology, theological ethics of becoming human and holy”, Yeo makes the link between Confucian ethics and Pauline ethics in the New Testament.  He says of himself: “I, as an interpreter, have the Chinese DNA, I also have the Christian DNA – one who has been shaped by the Bible and by the Chinese tradition”(p. 106).  He promotes “Christian Chinese Theology as a way to maintain Chinese cultural identity and Christian theological identity concomitantly”(p. 103). He says: “The intertextual reading that is inherent in the Confucian classics and biblical canon via a Christian Chinese approach extends itself into the interscriptural reading between these two texts with the hope that the Bible will be expressed using Confucian language and the Confucian ethics will be fulfilled by the gospel” (pp. 106-107). For those working among Chinese peoples, his approach bears careful exploration and discussion.       (Reviewed by M.L. Codman-Wilson, Ph.D., 4/17/12)

1.      “Christian Chinese Theology, theological ethics of becoming human and holy”. K.K. Yeo.

“Both the evangelical Christians and the Confucianists treasure their respective scriptures as authoritative rules of life.  But for the Christian Chinese who are familiar with both texts, CCT will seek to fulfill the Chinese text with the Bible…I hope the proposed thesis of theological ethics in CCT will benefit both parties: on the one hand, the Chinese culture that awaits its fulfillment from Christian theology and on the other hand, a global theology that is often dominated by a Eurocentric mindset and thus such ‘normative’ theology is in need of critiques from global theologies.  A truly CCT will maintain a Chinese cultural identity and a Christian theological identity concomitantly.” (pp. 102-103)

“The key concept in Confucius’s ethics can be seen in his usage of Dao – Dao is the vision of life to be practiced…The way of Tian is the divine paradigm for culture…Confucianists seek to follow the pattern of heaven and earth and hope that they will be led by the rightness of the heavens and the benefits of the earth so that all under heaven might be in harmony” (pp.107-108). The word dao connotes the universal way or cosmic moral principle. Just like tian, Dao is eternal in its existence and creative in its power…

“According to Confucius it is the ethical life that actualizes the creativity and goodness of heaven (tian). Confucius seeks being human as loving others and that loving others fulfills the mandate of heaven… Freedom results from following the right course and being in tune with how things are as ordered by Dao, the cosmic way. Paul’s ethic of freedom is rooted in God’s act of forgiving love in Jesus Christ that liberates, through faith, those enslaved by the power of sin and death” (pp.109-110). “Both Confucius and Paul include the ethical quality of the eternal power and nature of God, the ethical demand implicit in the self-revelation of God’s righteousness and the universality and clarity of God’s self-revelation in creation” (p. 111).

“The shared concern of the Confucianists and the Christian texts for Christian Chinese lies in their concern for the formation of a community rule that leads to freedom and integrity.  As a Christian Chinese I find that Confucius’s ethic teaching can be enriched by Paul’s understanding of God’s Spirit – that which give birth to and enables the ethical life…

“There are subtle differences between the ethics of Confucius and Paul but the end result of CCT may be the same.  According to Confucius to be human is to be a holy person...He approaches anthropology from a cosmological and sociopolitical perspective; Paul’s anthropology is Christologically defined and is subsumed under divine grace…Paul believes the power of God’s Spirit is essential for believers to live a life of holiness, a life pleasing to God. ..There are ethical imperatives Christians must carry out…Being in Christ moves toward being like Christ. This understanding of ethics, of course, is distinctly Christian though to my Chinese ears the language sounds Confucianist with respect to a life of holiness as a process of obedience”…Both Pauline and Confucian ethics understand that the process of sanctification is aimed toward loving one’s neighbor…Paul speaks most clearly of sacrificial love” (pp.112-113).

“I believe that Christ completes or extends what is merely implicit or absent in Confucius; with Christ, the Confucian ethic too quickly generates into a system of ritualistic behavior. But the Confucian ethic amplifies various elements of Christian theologies (for example community, virtues) that are underplayed in Western Christianity” (p.114).

In Ken Gnanaken’s article “Some Insights into Indian Christian Theology,” he asserts: “To say that as Christianity gets embedded into India it should maintain Western forms would be depriving the gospel of its dynamic power.  The gospel that came into a Jewish setting has continued to adapt itself wherever it is making inroads” (P.118). He acknowledged the concern that “the search for an Indian theology was an objectionable exercise because it diluted the purity of the gospel and biblical theology” and briefly  surveys radical Indian theologies who did that in their effort at contextualization (i.e., Chakkarai, Panikkar, Fanquhar, M.M. Thomas, S. Samartha). But he moves to an evangelical perspective as he promotes “a theology of religion appropriate to our [Indian] context, yet true to the biblical claims” (p. 131). His insights lay a basic foundation for those Christians seeking to do evangelism or dialogue within a pluralistic religious context.              (Reviewed by M.L. Codman-Wilson, Ph.D., 4/17/12)

2.”Some Insights into Indian Christian Theology,” Ken Gnanaken

            “As a theologian wanting to base conclusions on the facts revealed in the Bible, I find no problem in accepting that there is some commonness in all religions. Take, for instance, prayer and meditation… Christians in India, meeting men and women who truly desire to worship the true God but who still linger within idolatry face this situation [i.e., Paul’s distress in Athens with their many idols].  We are distressed by some practices but discern a longing for God.  The understanding of God and salvation are different but the desire is the same…Just like the Greeks (Paul addressed) there are many Hindus who search for the unknown beyond the known, the truth beyond all the falsehood, the light beyond the darkness.  Rather than defining the differences, it is best to build on commonalities.” (p.129). 

 “Although we may speak of God revealing himself to religious people even outside of Jesus Christ, this revelation does not directly bring salvation. It points toward, even leads toward, salvation. It has pre-salvific significance, preparing people to accept the grace and truth of God. A person or a community may genuinely experience the revelation of God outside of Jesus Christ, but the test of its genuineness is that the Holy Spirit will lead the individual or the community to an encounter with the Lord Jesus Christ, through whom alone salvation is available for all who believe…Evangelism and dialogue based on this continuity will bring a more positive involvement in the lives of men and women searching for God in many different directions” (132).

3.      “Asian American Evangelical Theology” by Amos Young

Amos Yong’s article “Asian American Evangelical Theology” gives a brief survey of notable Asian American theologians who have written from an Asian perspective – i.e., C.S. Song, Andrew Park, Yung Young Lee, Rita Nakashima Brock, Peter C. Phan and K.K. Yeo.  But his dominant emphasis is a call for Asian American evangelicals to bring the dynamics of their cultural issues and background to the broad evangelical table:

He laments the paucity of publications by Asian American evangelicals saying: Asian American evangelicals [who are generally conservative] have “a cultural hermeneutics of suspicion that is always concerned about syncretism with the world.  They have thus usually understood their Christian conversion to involve either a turning away from their Asian cultural roots or a minimizing of such aspects of their identity, emphasizing instead their new life in Christ and as Christians” (p.203).  He believes “this fundamental worldview orientation is reinforced in evangelical seminary education” which resists pluralism and “insists on a biblical orientation that maps the totality of the human experience, regardless of cultural particularities.  Thus, for example, humankind suffers from one overall problem, that of sin against God, and that one problem demands basically one solution, the substitutionary atonement of the Son’s death of the cross. It does not matter that Asians have a shame rather than guilt culture, since, in this evangelical framework, there is no need to rethink the inherited theology of atonement from Asian perspectives” (pp.204-205).   

As a result he believes “If Asian Americans were to write their own theologies, these would be [seen as] parochial undertakings, with marginal relevance from the evangelical perspective only for “those  people (maybe immigrants, refugees or exiles) who have not yet assimilated into the broader American evangelical culture.  Little wonder, then, that few Asian Americans have ventured into this theological territory” (pp.205-206).

            Yong’s plea is that “both my Asian American evangelical associates in particular and my evangelical colleagues in general take Asian cultural, philosophical and religious resources seriously in our global context…The forces of globalization, immigration and transnationalism have produced an Asian diaspora not only in the Wet but around the world….Theology cannot remain merely an exercise in philosophical speculation...but must be touched by and get its hands dirty” with the “practical realities of Asian American life in particular, including the travels of migration, the burden of being a moral minority, the challenges of ethnicity in a world of ‘whiteness,’ and the task of living betwixt and between, which oftentime means neither ‘here’ nor there’” (pp.206-208). 

He insists such “evangelical theology should also be fully trinitarian, which means Christ-centered and pentecostally oriented.” He chooses to “supplement the Christocentric emphases of much of evangelical theology with a Pentecostal and pneumatological accent” (p. 207).Yong’s believes the issues raised by relevant contextual thinking by Asian American Evangelicals “will enrich the evangelical theological conversation” (p.208) worldwide. 

Yong voices the critical plea for inclusion and openness that all the presenters from the Global South make consistently throughout  the Global Theology book. Westerners need to seriously ponder these perspectives.  As Yeo’s says: the current “ global theology is often dominated by a Eurocentric mindset and thus such ‘normative’ theology is in need of critiques from global theologies” (Yeo, p. 103).

(Reviewed by M.L. Codman-Wilson, Ph.D., 4/17/12)

Global Theology - African Perspectives

Global Theology - African Perspectives

Excerpted from Global Theology in Evangelical Perspective, eds. Greenman and Green, IVP 2012.

“African Theology” by James Kombo

“African theology appreciates Africa and its dynamics as well as the yawning gap between the continent and the Bible in its historical and cultural setting. African theology has attempted to bridge this gap by …4 dominant patterns of conversation:

1.        Identity theology based on African primal religions and African philosophy.  The debate is whether pre-Christian Africa had a sense of God.  Some scholars have concluded that “the God of the Bible was the same God known to Africans by various names” (p.135).

2.      Incarnation/Translation Theology – i.e., “transposing the Bible into respective contemporary indigenous languages” (p. 134). “Our theologizing process must recognize African cosmology” and specifically “identify and employ those African primordial narratives or categories of reality already available” (p. 138).

3.      African/World Christian theology. “Africa embraced Christianity because it resonated so well with the values of the old religions…People sensed in their hearts that Jesus did not mock their respect for the sacred or their clamor for the invincible Savior, so they beat their sacred drums for him…Christianity helped Africans to become renewed Africans, not remade Europeans” (p. 139).  “The numerical and ethnic shift in global Christianity to the global South and to Africa in particular…creates space for African theology in the global arena” (p. 140).

4.        Contextual Theologies – i.e., African inculturation theology, African black theology (“the gospel has a political dimension and could only be relevant to the extent that it centered on justice, liberation and a preferential option for the poor”), African liberation theology (which “exposes and corrects the causes of poverty, political oppression, disease and ignorance”), and African women theology (concentrating on “Christology and forms of church life such as constitutions of churches, liturgies, catechesis and moral options [so that] women’s issues are paramount and classical church divisions are rendered irrelevant” (pp.140-144).

Two of the challenges ahead are (1) “to maintain a candid and vibrant conversation between the good news of Jesus Christ and Africa’s current multidimensional challenges and opportunities. Note that evangelicals have been seen as aloof, preferring to carry only the message of the good news. And (2) to encourage and prepare [African] leadership enabled to answers questions emerging from the African grassroots” (p.146)

“African American Theology, Retrospect and Prospect” by Vincent Bacote

“Black liberation theology originated on July 31, 1966 when 51 black pastors bought a full page ad in the New York Time and demanded a more aggressive approach to eradicating racism. They echoed the demands of the black power movement but the new crusade found its source of inspiration in the Bible” (p.211).  “It emerged as an attempt to answer the questions:

1.      How can a person be Christian and also committed to addressing the oppressive legacy of racism in the United States?

2.      How can you have a gospel that is not only about going to heaven but also about being concerned with justice and peace in the present? 

3.      Can you have a Christian faith that changes the way black people see themselves?” (p. 212).

Quoting James Cone: “The blackness of my theological consciousness...gave me new theological spectacles, which enabled me to move beyond the limits of white theology …and create a new understanding of black dignity among black people and provide the necessary soul in that people to destroy white racism” (pp.213-214).

“Black women scholars began writing womanist theology as a response to their frustrations with white feminist theology and black liberation theology.  “Womanist symbolizes Black women’s resistance to their multidimensional oppression as well as their self-affirmation and will to survive with dignity under dehumanizing social-historical conditions. …[It] critiques a cross-centered theology because of its possible use in sanctioning the victimization of women and children” (p. 216). 

Other current Black scholars critique “black theology as limited in its identification with a particular contextual moment.  It relies on the view of African Americans as perpetual victims.  One of the obvious limitations of victimologist anthropology is that it runs aground when confronted by African Americans who are middle class and above, and more significantly it veers theological reflection away from historic orthodoxy when it is the primary theological starting point” (p.218).  There “needs to be a more direct emphasis on the plight of the poor everywhere, along with a critique of capitalism and its effects on the continent of Africa” (p.217). There also needs to be greater consideration of how “obedience to the second greatest commandment might lead us to give greater priority to engaging and addressing the challenges of race, poverty and class that remain” (p.220).

“African American theology had to be formed in the crucible of the legacy of racism in the U.S, and now we find ourselves in a time where we must address that legacy in a different way as together evangelicals think through the priorities of the mission of the church” (p. 222).

                                                                                                Mary Lou Codman-Wilson, Ph.D.,  4/12/12

Global Theology, Exploring the Contextual Nature of Theology and Mission by Greenman and Green

Global Theology, Exploring the Contextual Nature of Theology and Mission,

Eds. Greenman and Green, IVP 2012 - Latino perspectives

Some highlights for reflection:

Samuel Escobar “Doing Theology on Christ’s Road”

            The context for theology and mission in Latin America in the 1960’s was the challenge of Marxism.  “I found out that the evangelical theological canon was no help in the struggle.” We needed to develop an evangelical theology that addressed “social concerns from a biblical perspective… Liberation theologies “offered a new reading of Scripture, a fresh reading through the perspective of the poor, a vision from the underside.” (pp. 67, 69, 77).

Latin American leader Rene Padilla described “two different attitudes that he called ‘the balcony’ and ‘the road.’ The road is the place where life is tensely lived, where thought has its birth in conflict and concern…it is the place of action, of pilgrimage, of crusade…As Latin American thinkers we chose to do our theology not contemplating Christ from the comfortable distance of the balcony, a secure and easily received orthodoxy [as in North American theology], but following him on the troubled roads of our Latin American lands”...We engaged in the development of a contextual theology…a new open-ended reading of Scripture with a hermeneutic in which the biblical text and the historical situation become mutually engaged in a dialogue whose purpose is to place the Church under the Lordship of Jesus Christ in its particular context” (pp.70-72).

            In the 1980s and 1990s the poor masses in Latin American were opting for the evangelical and Pentecostal churches. [As a result} Evangelical theology in Latin American is now exploring the doctrine of the Holy Spirit in relation to the existence and mission of the Protestant churches there…I ask myself, why is it that as evangelical theologians in Latin America we did not place the Holy Spirit earlier in our agenda?  Could it be that evangelical dialogue at a global scale imposed a ‘modern’ agenda on us so that the role of the Holy Spirit is mainly to help us to arrive at correct propositional truth,” [i.e., truth seen from the balcony]? (p.83). 

Ruth Padilla DeBorst “Songs of Hope Out of a Crying Land”

“It is important to understand that Latin American Christianity cannot be understood in terms of North American Christianity – that goes for both Catholicism and Protestantism” (p.100). “Rather than a systemic, academic discipline reserved for intellectual elites, authentically Latin American theologies, in their liberationist, holistic evangelical and Pentecostal strands, are communal practices of hope and indigenous praxis that resist being defined by categories imposed from the outside” (p.88).

“Pentecostal religion provides positive social and economic benefits for many poor women in Latin America…Church becomes for women the place to pool meager resources, find mutual support, childcare and health…Yet further, church helps women gain strength to resist machismo…Not only are the lives of women transformed by the involvement in the church but ‘with family values a high priority in Pentecostalism,’ men change their behavior – they stop drinking and smoking, stop cheating on their wives.’ A certain ‘reformation of machismo’ takes place” (p.91).

“In Latin America as in North America the challenge to all who identify as Christians is the incarnation of a socially committed spirituality…that engages in the deeply complex and painful realities of its context with the hopeful proclamation of a different reality. This presence demands awareness not only of the biblical visions of justice and peace but also of the issues and demands of our day, including the place and responsibility of all nations and peoples in the world scene” (p.101).

Juan Martinez “Outside the Gate” – a view from the perspective of Latino Protestantism in the U.S.

   “Latino theology, like all contextual theologies, creates tensions for evangelicals in the U.S.  The Latino Christian experience in the U.S…forces us to address…issues of conquest and mission, racism, internal colonialism, the benefits that the U.S. economy gains from having undocumented ‘disposable labor’ and related topics…It also calls for a significant reinterpretation of the narrative of evangelical Protestantism in the United States” (p.180).

            “Common cultural themes within the Latino community create the environment for a community-based theology…Most Latinos have experienced exile or have been treated like outsiders, even if they have their historical roots in this country…Latinos are mestizos. The vast majority are the children of multiple cultural, ethnic and racial encounters…Spirituality is another common influence. There is a clear openness to the spiritual and a sense of God’s presence in the world. Worship services often feel like a fiesta where God’s presence and mighty acts are celebrated in the gathering of an extended family.” (pp. 182-183).

            Orlando Costas was a Puerto Rican missiologist who published Christ Outside the Gate: Mission Beyond Christendom. His role was to do missiology from the periphery…working among the poor, outside the gates of power...Christ is outside the gate of power and privilege; therefore those who want to share the gospel...have to return the evangelistic ministry to the grass roots of the church and establish a preferential option for the marginalized of society” (p. 187).

            “Latinos have a noninnocent reading of the Bible and of history…[in contrast to] American exceptionalism…Dominant-culture evangelicalism [in the U.S.] needs to recognize how it has been shaped by its context. Militarism, individualism, materialism and the U.S. story of racism and imperial expansion have all had an influence on evangelical theology” (pp. 185, 193). 

“The Biblical vision of the future is one in which the rich diversity of humanity is joined in the worship of the Lamb (Rev. 7:9-10).  Yet this goes against the assumed models for the unity of U.S. society.  Both the Anglo-conformity and Melting Pot models subsume the diversity into the commonality.  Most U.S. Protestants, be they evangelical or mainline, assume uniformity over diversity…The reality is that race is still a very strong social construct in this country”(p.192).

                Other types of issues Latino Protestant theology raises for Euro-American evangelicals are immigration reform and the undocumented, conquest and gospel, culture and gospel (that accepts the cultural influences of others outside the U.S. dominant culture and takes active steps to limit U.S. evangelical cultural hegemony), Latin American missionaries to the North, visions of the future of the United States.  Will U.S. evangelicalism learn to retell its story in such a way that Latino Pentecostalism plays a role in its self-definition or will it be excluded because of a European slant and a Calvinist restriction?” (pp. 191-193).

                                                                                                Reviewed by    M.L. Codman-Wilson, Ph.D.  4/5/12