Towards an emerging "coconut tree missiological imagination" : an enquiry into climate change and its relevance for ministerial formation at Tangintebu Theological College
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2018
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Abstract
This study examines the ways in which the phenomenon of climate change is affecting
the people, indigenous culture, and environment of the Micronesian island nation of
Kiribati, in the South Pacific. Even though climate change impact is a global issue, this
study focusses on the mission of the Kiribati Uniting Church in Kiribati in the context
of global warming and sea level rise. It utilised the emerging indigenous missional
concept of coconut tree theology to interface with the realities of climate change within
the context of Kiribati. A missiological lens is therefore employed to interrogate the
relevance of the ministerial formation curriculum at Tangintebu Theological College
that is used to equip local ministerial students of the Kiribati Uniting Church and how
they can respond to the life-threatening challenges of climate change.
The study argues that when the church fails in its mission in developing a proactive and
indigenously-informed approach to addressing environmental issues, then the fullness
of life that is embedded within its missio-ecclesial identity and vocation that is bequeath
by Jesus (John 10:10) will not be realised. In the context of climate change where
people’s future on this planet is being negatively compromised, Christians, especially
within the vast Pacific Region,1
must focus more on developing a theology of creation
to respond to the contemporary environment threats to life rather than giving a very
narrow evangelising focus to classical theological themes such as sin, redemption and
judgment. Serious attention must therefore be given to addressing the wider
environmental concerns, and to developing a vision of justice and human equality that
needs to be embedded, in the wider theological educational curriculum (Conradie,
2009:42-43).
The significance of this study is that it brings into conversation indigenous knowledge
perspectives that have evolved through an emerging coconut tree missional and the
1
Pacific is a foreign prescribed name and not one given by the local people. According to the National
Oceanic Service, the term Pacific was coined by Portuguese navigator Ferdinan Magellan who in 1519
on a journey across the Atlantic Ocean seeking a western route to the Spice Island via South America
came across the ocean and its calm and peaceful nature, leading him to designate the name (National
Ocean Service 2017).
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local narratives of the Kiribati people through a qualitative study which included
questionnaires, in-depth interviews, observation and a collection of songs in which
indigenous express their eco-relationality and interpretation of the environmental
challenges of climate change. This study therefore necessitated an in-depth examination
of the role that the church and the Tangintebu Theological College plays in equipping
clergy leadership to respond to environmental and human challenges of climate change,
and the extent to which the environmental and ecological issues are integrated into the
development of the overall theological curriculum (PCC Report, 2007:107-108).
Description
Doctoral Degree. School of Religion, Philosophy and Classics, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg. 2018