In the towns and cities McDonalds abounds, and, as a westerner, I am constantly offered "Coke" to drink.
I don't as a rule drink Coke or eat McDonalds or want to buy Disney products (although I am grateful for the Starbucks in Taipei where I was able to order breakfast in English on my first morning there!) But, being here with the Siraya people and learning about their struggle to preserve their culture makes me wonder about the balance between globalization and local needs...
Today I visited the Theological training college in Tainan where a a theologian Shoki Coe first coined the phrase "Contextual Theology". It is a way of thinking about the relationship between faith and culture and, put simply, it means that we need to think of God from the context of our own life, our culture, our context; to ask ourselves the question "what does it mean to be a Christian in this place and at this time?" Only then can we work out what God is calling us to do and be.
As I think about what this means for me and for the church here in Khau-pi, I wonder about the human drive to make things the same rather than celebrating the diversity of life that God created...
I don't claim to have any answers, but I wonder...
(PS 60 mosquito bites and counting - guess who didn't pack insect repellent? On the plus side it was 29 degrees C here today!)
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