No full-text available
To read the full-text of this research,
you can request a copy directly from the authors.
Introduction:: Diakonia as Christian Social Practice
... The concept of diaconia within the CoN has changed over the last decades in a manner that led to a paradigm shift characterised by three aspects (Dietrich et al.: 2014): 1) an emphasis on the ecclesial dimension of diaconia, that is, diaconia is an integral part of being church, 2) the demand that diaconal work be holistic (acknowledging the physical, mental, spiritual, and social dimensions), and 3) solidarity with suffering and marginalised people. In this way, diaconia is "moving away from traditions of conceptualizing diakonia as humble service" (Dietrich et al.: 2014, 2). ...
The article contributes to the conceptual discussions on the nature of the existential and "existential conversations" (ECs). It provides empirical research on the perspectives of deacons within the Church of Norway (CoN) on specified terms and ECs between deacons and older people. The article also explores how the deacons in our study describe ECs with older people. The data stem from focus-group interviews with 18 deacons, which were analysed by drawing on pastoral care literature and other relevant research. Our findings show that the deacons understand the concept of "existential" as more inclusive than that of "spirituality, " involving both cognitive thinking and experiential phenomena. Moreover, they perceive ECs as broader and less private than pastoral care conversations (PCCs). Finally, to reduce thresholds, distance, and skepticism toward the church, the deacons are pragmatic and strategic in their terms for their conversations, depending on the specific context. Keywords
... However, the discussion is dominated by "good works," and spirituality enhances the social aspect of diakonia. Nordstokke (2014Nordstokke ( , 2016Nordstokke ( , 2019 does not give substantial attention to the liturgical ministry of the diaconate. However, his expertise in diakonia is widely accepted in the parts of Europe where diakonia forms an integral part of the church and educational institutions, particularly at VID Specialized University, Norway, and he plays a leading role within the LWF's vast diaconal resources. ...
Urbanisation takes on different forms, including industry expansion, technological innovation, modern architecture, new business forms, and new infrastructure. However, in many city centres, such development is accompanied by uprooting people, splitting families, identity loss, and increased poverty and health and mental complications. It is within this juxtaposition that the church is called to exercise effective ministry and mission. The dialogical retrieval of the ministry of the deacon or diaconal ministry is both liturgical and social. The tension between the two-pronged ministry of liturgy and social responsibility makes the deacon an interlocutor for effective urban ministry. The research investigates how the church, as an interlocutor between urbanisation and local communities, creates a safe space for meaning-making.
... diakonia-world.org/; Dietrich et al., 2015 (F) diakonijas māsas, arī diakonisu māsas (deaconess nurses) ir vēsturisks termins, kas 19. gs. ...
Sociālā darba vārdnīca ir tapusi, apzinoties nepieciešamību pēc informatīva un atbalstoša rīka sociālā darba praksē, sociālā darba izglītības nodrošināšanā un sociālās politikas veidošanā, lai veicinātu vienotu izpratni sociālā darba terminoloģijas lietojumā latviešu valodā. Pastāvot kopējām globālā sociālā darba attīstības tendencēm, katrā pasaules reģionā un katrā valstī sociālais darbs attīstās, ņemot vērā vietējās vajadzības, kultūru, sociālekonomisko situāciju un labklājības valsts modeli. Attīstoties profesijai, attīstās arī profesijā lietotā valoda un terminoloģija, kas ir nozīmīga kā sociālā darba speciālistu saskarsmē ar pakalpojumu lietotājiem, tā arī savstarpējā komunikācijā un starpprofesionālajā sadarbībā. Profesijā lietotā valoda, tāpat kā valoda kopumā, gan atspoguļo, gan konstruē noteiktu pasaules ainu, tā ir būtisks instruments profesionālās darbības interpretācijā, speciālistu sadarbībā un profesijas pašizpratnē. Sociālā darbinieka lietotā valoda var ievirzīt to, kādā veidā sociālais darbinieks redz noteiktu problēmu vai tās risinājumu, kā arī to, kā izprot cilvēkus, kuriem palīdz. Vārdi ir valodas pamatvienības, tie apzīmē priekšmetus un parādības, to attiecības, vārdi palīdz izprast pasauli, bet, aplam lietoti, tie var arī maldināt. Tāpēc ir svarīgi iedziļināties lietoto vārdu nozīmēs, lai noskaidrotu, ko tie atklāj par sociālā darba būtību.
... 5 It is ecumenical both in the sense of being globally engaged (e.g., north-south) and in the sense of working across Christian denominational differences, constantly aware of power and privilege differentials in our common mission. In addition, diaconal engagement does not mean Christians working in isolation but often alongside civil society actors, knowing that this partnered work can help in the renewal of the church itself (Hanover Report 1996;Böttcher 2002;Nordstokke 2009;Nordstokke 2011b;Dietrich et al. 2014;Phiri 2018). ...
This article argues for the necessity of an approach to diaconal work that can best be defined as active and sustainable peacebuilding and reconciliation toward social transformation. It explores ways in which a diaconia specifically informed by justice and peace perspectives, called “justpeace-diaconia” by the author, should serve as an entry point for engagement into the complex dynamics towards reconciliation in the Canadian context, deepened by its colonial legacy that still pervades the social fabric. These challenges and diversities—even complicities—of perspective are viewed through the lens of peace-diaconia to examine the implications for diaconal work in Canada and explore whether meaningful journeys for reconciling and building relationships are possible.
... In the international dialogue in the second decade of the 21st century, one could sense increasing signals of a renewed interest in the ecumenical rediscovery of the ancient tradition of diaconal witness and services, particularly in churches in the nonwestern world (Ham 2015;Dietrich et al. 2015). Since 2012, international gatherings and consultations have called for a new attention and greater emphasis on the diaconal ministry of the church and the relevance of diaconia and advocacy in theological training and ministerial formation. ...
There has always been a conviction in the ecumenical movement that social service is part of the essence of what it means to be the church. The strengthening of social and political witness of churches through church-related agencies and networks in the context of the beginning development discourse from the 1960s until the 1990s, however, led to a scenario in which the secular language of development and political action received much attention. In 2014 at the Malawi consultation, the World Council of Churches (WCC) and Action of Churches Together (ACT Alliance) reviewed their working relationships and explored better collaboration between agencies and churches, stating that the specific nature of churches as entities with an added value and particular profile in the area of social and political service would be strengthened. From this consultation, a mandate was given by the WCC Central Committee to develop a study document on the understanding and core components of the concept of “ecumenical diaconia”, which then was made available to the 11th Assembly of the WCC in Karlsruhe, 2022. This article introduces the context, major content, and key convictions of this study document and related discussions in Karlsruhe. It answers the question: what is the significance of the global ecumenical fellowship of churches in focusing on a common language of diaconia and a more explicit church-related terminology to describe and strengthen the social services of churches and their engagement in diaconia and social witness? It is recognized that this article is predominantly written from a German context and perspective in its construction of the international discourse on ecumenical diaconia.
... Diakonien forutsetter og bekrefter det kristne menneskesynet som understreker menneskets enestående verdi ved å vaere skapt i Guds bilde. Visjonen for Den norske kirkes diakonale tjeneste er «Guds kjaerlighet til alle mennesker og alt det skapte, virkeliggjort gjennom liv og tjeneste» (Kirkerådet, 2008, s. 6), en visjon som understreker nettopp det at alle mennesker er innlemmet i Guds kjaerlighet (Dietrich, 2014), og som et konkret eksempel kan nevnes boken Diakoni og velferdsstat , der Inger Marie Lid med flere synliggjør hvordan dette skiftet kommer til uttrykk gjennom den diakonale stiftelsen Signos historie. Det er for enkelt å si at veldedighet og objektivering av hjelpemottakere ikke finnes i dag, men det har uten tvil skjedd store endringer. ...
The article examines recent understandings of vulnerability and exposedness, and studies proving that people with disabilities are more exposed to violence, discrimination, and various forms of exclusion. Diversity has been elevated as a value, both in societies and in churches. The UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) is the only human rights treaty that names specific human rights principles, and one of these principles is diversity. There are also opposing trends to the enhanced recognition of diversity, summarized in three points: preservation of status quo; highlighting majority normality; and budgetary efficiency are given priority over empowering solutions. The Church of Norway, inspired by the World Council of Churches, wants to promote inclusion and empowerment, but is itself lagging behind, for instance in providing access to enabling technology.
The thesis qualitatively explores existential issues and existential conversations in old age from a diaconal perspective. It is placed within the science of diaconia, with the psychology of religion and existential psychology as its main perspectives. The study is divided into three hermeneutical sub-studies. The first is based on individual interviews with 11 older people aged 73 to 91 years, while the
two others are based on three focus group interviews with 18 deacons within the Church of Norway. Regarding analysis, Sub-studies 1 and 2 are based on thematic analysis, while Sub-study 3 is inspired by qualitative content analysis.
Sub-study 1 explores older people’s reflections on existential issues and their possible need to discuss them with others, adding new knowledge to empirical research in a Norwegian context. The theoretical framework includes Yalom’s ultimate concerns and Tornstam’s theory of gerotranscendence. Findings from Sub-study 1 show that the participants were mostly satisfied with life, a few were lonely, and most were not afraid of death. Meaning was primarily experienced on a
horizontal rather than a vertical level. Due to life events and illness, a few of the participants experienced an increased interest in existential issues in old age, and a few wanted to talk about existential issues with others.
The second sub-study explores deacons’ conceptual understandings of existential
conversations with older people and what terms they use for these conversations. We found that the deacons experienced a gradual transition between existential conversations (ECs) and pastoral care conversations (PCCs). ECs were perceived as broader than PCCs. The deacons also made a demarcation between pastoral care on the one hand and existential and spiritual care on the other, especially for
people with dementia. Lastly, the deacons used different terms for their conversations with older people depending on whom they talked to. We thus interpreted the deacons to use language strategically and pragmatically.
In Sub-study 3, we explored the deacons’ perceived competence as conversation partners with older people. The deacons emphasised their relational skills and conversation skills, existential and religious literacy and having time as a resource. We introduced the term “approachable deacons” as an analytical innovation. Based on the empirical material and the perspectives from diaconia and the psychology of religion, arguments are made for how the deacon profession can contribute to societal mental health.
The dissertation meets the demand for empirical research into the science of diaconia. There is scant Scandinavian empirical research on deacons as existential conversation partners, nor on older people’s reflections and experiences of existential issues. Furthermore, much of diaconal research is focused on social work, congregational work or institutional work, whereas my contribution is at the service and professional levels rather than the organisational level. The innovation of this thesis is its clear existential health perspective in combination with diaconia and heterotopia.
Itinerant Roma migrants travelling from Eastern European countries have featured across the European Economic Area (EEA) since the European Union’s eastward expansions in 2004 and 2007. Being unskilled, many Roma migrants engage in casual work and street work such as playing music, selling magazines, collecting and recycling bottles and cans, and begging, making them conspicuously visible in countries with public welfare services and low poverty levels. Citizens of EEA countries can enter and stay legally in other countries in the EEA for up to three months, after which they must register as workers or jobseekers, and generally leave. It is well documented how the countries Roma citizens of EEA countries travel to have enacted migration control measures, often in the form of complex and fine-grained regulations, that exclude them from public welfare services. This is also true of the Nordic countries, such as Norway, where they coincide with universalistic welfare states aiming to cover everyone living in their territories with the same benefits and services. In the Nordic countries, as in other countries, service provision for Roma migrants is largely in the hands of non-governmental organisations, many of them diaconal organisations running emergency shelters, soup kitchens, and other humanitarian services to alleviate suffering for people at the margins of the welfare state. The diaconal organisations also engage in case work and advocacy work to ensure the realisation of the Roma migrants’ rights. Many of the organisations depend on public grants, making their relationship to the welfare state ambiguous. This article investigates Christian social practice in the form of diaconal engagement for Roma migrants in Oslo, Norway at the intersection of migration control, the universalistic welfare state, and the theological underpinnings of the organisations.
Rapid urbanisation, globalisation, and the advancement of information and technology come as a challenge for theological education in South Africa, generally, and, specifically, in an emerging city like Pietermaritzburg. This is a city with a multitude of urban fractures: the contesting space between informal traders and the taxi industry; rife political violence; gender- based violence; the spread of HIV and AIDS; and informal housing. This article, in relation to theological education, seeks to imagine curricular changes through using the city as classroom, and collaborating with different community organisations, to help shape our theology for urban ministry. The pastoral praxis cycle (insertion, analysis, reflection, and planning for action) was used in describing these fractures and evaluating the current theological offering. Recommendations for curricular changes that could help to shape our theology for urban ministry in this city are offered.
This article sets out a Christian theological anthropology for community development. This critical engagement with traditional and doctrinal forms of Christian theological anthropology will analyse two contrasting perspectives of theological anthropology to construct a contemporary community development model that considers the responsibility of communities for community development. The theological model of community development considers narrative as an interlocutor of personhood and community development. This article further investigates conceptual linkages between personhood and community development through classification or categorisation of Catholic and Eastern Orthodox views of personhood. I will use the narrative as a lens to interpret the two perspectives and identify foundations for a triad community development model of personhood, narrative, and community development.
This article aims to respond to Vuyani Vellem’s challenge to black theology of liberation (BTL) to ‘think beyond rethinking and repeating its tried and tested ways of responding to black pain caused by racism and colonialism’. Vellem argued that ‘BTL needs to unthink the west by focusing on and retaining African spirituality as a cognitive spirituality’ for the liberation of black people in South Africa. This article argues that Ubuntu is the spirituality of liberation that BTL needs to advance as one of its interlocutors. This research work will consult the literature emerging from African philosophy, ethics, spirituality and BTL arguing that Ubuntu is an indigenous philosophy, spirituality that continues to exist in the languages and culture of the Abantu (Bantu) speaking people. This article is dedicated to the memory of Vellem as a BTL scholar and a faithful believer of the liberative paradigms of BTL. Contribution: The scholarly contribution of this article is its focus on the systematic and practical reflection, within a paradigm in which the intersection of religious studies, social sciences and humanities generate an interdisciplinary contested discourse.
How can congregational diakonia contribute to community development
in the absence of external resources? Community-driven development
rests on the principle of development through community participation. Faithbased
communities have the potential to be important stakeholders in civil societies
and local communities through the participation and involvement of their
members and thereby contribute to community development. However, the resources
may not always benefit the local communities, as institutional structures
in the Church may claim their share. This article studies two Lutheran Church
of Malagasy congregations in South-West Madagascar, where an asset-based
congregational community development approach called “Use Your Talent”
(UYT) is applied. Through qualitative interviews with volunteers and project
leaders we analyze the implementation of UYT approach and methodology
of asset-mapping and mobilization. Overall, our results point to a contraction
in strengthening the local communities and collecting resources for Church
structures
Youth ministry is to help youth – children, adolescents and young adults – to become what they were created and called to be. However, many local churches fail to notice that adolescents growing up without a father figure are an integral part of the faith community. They are inclined to neglect the father’s role relative to these adolescents in a local church. The responsibility of faith communities towards children and adolescents with absent or uninvolved fathers is unquestionable. This study has its focus on youth ministry and specifically the topic of absent or uninvolved fathers and adolescents without a father figure as challenges for youth ministry in an attempt to address the concern for an effective youth ministry towards those young people with an inclusive and congregational approach. The article focuses on an empirical research with two groups: adolescents growing up without a father figure and local pastors of these adolescents. Twenty-one adolescents without a father figure and 12 local pastors of these adolescents were approached to participate in qualitative interviewing. This article seeks to describe how the adolescents feel about the absence of their fathers and God as their Father. It also presented the situation of the local church with adolescents with absent fathers and indicates that there is a lack of interaction between them and pastors or congregations.
This article reflects on missional-diaconal practices in the ecumenical partnership between the Dutch Reformed Church in South Africa and the Reformed Church in Japan. In both -albeit radically different - contexts, the issue of church formation in a secular age is at stake. How can these Reformed faith communities remain relevant in their respective societies? Can deeper fellowship (koinonia) and more direct community involvement (diakonia) constructively embody the gospel and foster church formation? The article indicates that, in light of frequent natural disasters, sharing God's compassion in concrete ways has become vital to these churches' existence. Christians face new challenges, as they deepen their involvement in existential challenges caused by disasters and other existing sociopolitical realities. The article explores the potential of missional-diaconal practices of local congregations and argues that diakonia in all its dimensions embodies the missio Dei and contributes to church formation in significant ways.2
One of the ways Jesus lived his message of the coming Kingdom
was through table fellowship. In modern society, where religious and cultural
diversity is growing, our daily bread can be a source of both separation and
solidarity. Can table fellowship today be an adequate answer to the societal
challenges diaconal practices are confronted with? This article explores the field
of meal sharing from a diaconal-theological perspective. First, it describes a
meal-sharing project in The Hague, the Table of Hope, as an example of the
popular practice of meal sharing in diaconal contexts in The Netherlands. It then
explores the hermeneutical relationship between the Eucharist and Diakonia,
and between table fellowship and Diakonia, by drawing on the writings of Calvin
and the discussion on Diakonia within the ecumenical movement. Thereafter,
the question is raised how meal sharing in diaconal contexts might contribute
to three current societal debates: food, social segregation, and religious and
philosophical diversity. The article concludes that meal sharing deserves serious
attention from diaconal theology, since it is a promising practice for engagement
in society and enjoys support within different theological traditions. The nature
of the triangular relationship of table fellowship, Diakonia, and the Eucharist
needs further research. When searching for relevant diaconal practices of meal
sharing in today’s changing world, recalling the passion of Christ, the presence
of the Holy Spirit, and the longing for the coming Kingdom in the Eucharist
can prove to be meaningful guides.
This article reflects on the challenges to systematic theology that arise from students' struggles against capitalism in Brazil and South Africa. It suggests an understanding of the social, political and economic reality, emphasising that these struggles are part of the new social movements that struggle against capitalism. Epistemologically, a kairos and decolonial theology is suggested as a meaningful theological response to the contemporary struggles. Lastly, it affirms that a decolonial theology may help to create hope in struggles to overcome capitalism. It suggests ways to embody this theological approach in political praxis, in a creative way trying to overcome capitalism. 2018 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands.
This article analyzes how ecumenical diakonia contributes to a critical view of the power dimension of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). At the same time, it presents both the opportunities and the challenges the SDGs provide in rethinking diakonia and diaconal praxis. The commitment of the global community to the SDGs signifies a new context for diaconal praxis at local and international levels. In this article, power relations and the priority of the marginalized are presented as key concerns for rethinking diakonia in the current context. A model for diaconal reflection, based on perspectives from development studies and theology, is suggested as a tool for an interdisciplinary rethinking of diakonia aiming at renewed praxis in the context of the SDGs.
What is the relationship between practices of care towards people living in marginalized life situations and liturgy? This article addresses this question by exploring the liturgical theology of Gordon Lathrop as the theoretical starting point for analysing a practice that would conventionally not be described as “liturgy”, but “ethical practice”. At the heart of the liturgical theology of Lathrop is the idea that the ordo of the Sunday service is organized by juxtapositions and broken symbols. In this article, Lathrop’s theology is brought into a hermeneutical dialogue with empirical material constructed from the Church of Our Lady, Trondheim, Norway, a Lutheran medieval church located in the middle of the city of Trondheim. Since 2008, the church has been run by the Church City Mission as an open church for all who need an open and hospitable sacred space in the city centre, especially people who live in marginalized life situations. The article demonstrates that when working inductively with an empirical material, Lathrop’s concepts are too narrow and hermeneutically closed. In order to be theoretically sensitive to the experiences of people who live in marginalized life situations and the ethical practices of care, liturgical theology has to reimage its understanding of space.
ResearchGate has not been able to resolve any references for this publication.