Becoming Cosmopolitan

Unfolding Two Centuries of Mission at Virginia Theological Seminary

William L. Sachs, Wanjiru M. Gitau

• Publisher: Pickwick Publications
• Year: 2023
• Print ISBN:
  9781725283541
  9781725283589
• eBook ISBN:
  9781725283619
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Christian Denominations

The legacy of Christian mission seems beyond dispute. Western churches carried imperialist and racist assumptions as they evangelized and encouraged the formation of indigenous churches. Amid those realities a different sensibility took root. As the history of Virginia Theological Seminary illustrates, missionaries who were alumni adapted to contextual circumstances in ways that challenged Western presumptions. Mission encouraged cosmopolitan ties featuring mutuality and reciprocity. The path to such relations was not straight nor always readily taken. Yet, over the seminary's two-hundred-year history, the cosmopolitan direction has become evident on several continents. As missionaries came home, and leaders and students from abroad visited the seminary, the ideal of cosmopolitan relations spread. It became evident as mission churches took indigenous form and control. It was reinforced as Western churches explored the dimensions of social justice. American theological education affirmed the reality of diversity and recast its pedagogies in appreciative ways. This book traces an epic shift in mission and theological education measured by the rise of cosmopolitanism in the life of Virginia Theological Seminary.

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Foreword
• Acknowledgments
• Chapter 1: Introduction
• Chapter 2: American Awakenings
• Chapter 3: Ideals and Outcomes
• Chapter 4: Navigating Sociocultural Difference
• Chapter 5: Fostering Social Aspirations
• Chapter 6: Into All the World
• Chapter 7: Mission amid Social Upheaval
• Chapter 8: Renewing the Church’s Mission
• Chapter 9: Mission and Global Society
• Chapter 10: Toward Mutual Benefit
• Bibliography