| Myra Watkins

Sunday evening services each week held in an auditorium on the main university campus. With a population of nearly 100,000, Hradec Králové is the region’s cultural center.

The church leadership chose the name Mozaika to be sensitive to nonbelievers who understand “mosaic” as a nonreligious concept that communicates unity with diversity. Their church website states,

Every piece is important in a mosaic. If one is missing, then the picture is no longer complete. We are not talking about any religious endeavors or ceremonies, but about every single person being able to experience key connections in their lives. A mosaic is a colorful puzzle where the individual pieces are joined together. There are several such connections that play an important role in our Christian community and thus form our values.74

Pastor Jakub Limr invited me to visit Mozaika Church, but I have been unable to go there, so I am limited to my conversations with Pastor Limr. When asked about the public witness of Mozaika, he said, “It’s common for churches to look for a need, and in the small towns there are many needs, so people are thankful for what the church does. But our city has high employment. We are a wealthy city and a cultural center, so people don’t see many needs in their lives.” However, the church discovered that the main need in their city is relational connection, and ninety percent of the people come into the church through relationships.

The church leaders build Sundays and other activities around the Gospel, so they communicate the Gospel in

3,000–3,500 adult members, and the largest Evangelical denomination, the Czech Brethren Church, has 10,000 adult members.

74 https://www.mozaika.hk/kdojsme their words and deeds. Limr said, “We try to create a space outside of the church so people have a safe place to bring their nonbelieving friends.” The church has started several initiatives so that nonbelievers can learn something practical and meaningful for their lives. However, he explained that many Christians struggle with disappointment because it takes so long to help their unbelieving friends get in touch with God. It’s a long journey. Nonbelievers typically come to these spaces outside of the church where they interact with Christians for three to fve years before they ever come to church.

I will describe some of the connections the church ofers in their community. Except for Sundays, the church meets in a cofee shop in the city center that they rebuilt with a welcoming, open venue. They ofer courses and seminars on marriage and relationships during the week where people bring their nonbelieving friends. According to Černý, more than half of all marriages in the Czech Republic end in divorce, so many people and their children live in broken relationships and sufer because of severe loneliness. Černý says people appreciate an incarnational approach when Christians humbly enter into their difcult situations to share in their pains and problems.75 Mozaika Church makes such connections a priority. At their cofee shop venue, the church started a club for high school and university students where counselors are available to mentor them and help them with issues they face. In their advertising, they state the club’s purpose: to be a blessing to students in the community.

The leaders of the church encourage people not only to join activities organized by Mozaika to reach the community but to come up with their own ideas for outreach. Limr said,

75 Černý, “Mission in the Czech Republic,” Mission in Central and Eastern Europe, 612.

| Myra Watkins

“We listen to and celebrate testimonies from people’s daily lives and how they serve others.” A church member who volunteers in a senior home also serves as a bridge to the church so church members can adopt an elderly person and serve them in various ways. They take Christmas packages to them and hold concerts at the senior home. The church also serves at a shelter for women who sufer from domestic abuse. Some of the women who were not believers started coming to church, so the church bought a minivan to serve them. They have baptized former prostitutes from the shelter.

Limr said Czechs have a saying that “every Czech is a musician,” so worship music is a powerful form of witness. At their twentieth church anniversary, they held a Gospel choir outreach in an outdoor theater where a couple of hundred people came. Limr related the story of a university student who brought two nonbelievers to church for the frst time, but one was strongly against coming. After the worship meeting, he said he lost most of his biases against the church because he was touched by what he heard and saw among the people.

As Mozaika Church moves outward into the public spaces in their city, they have discerned that blessing, adoption, hospitality, and reconciliation to God and between people in community are messages of good news connected with God’s salvation. The sermons at Mozaika Church focus on how God’s love, power, and character afect people in everyday life. Limr said, “We always try to present the Bible in very practical ways showing how the Scripture can form not only our spiritual life, but also our thinking, behaving, loving, etc.”

Mozaika Church fts Černý’s depiction of efective new church plants in the Czech Republic in several ways. Mozaika stresses relationships and responds to contemporary citizens’ lack of family life, trusting friendships, and deeper fellowship. Their worship style is fexible and informal. Finally, they form bridges into society in diferent ways from more traditional and established churches and attract university students, families with children, and various generations.76

Conclusion

In conclusion, I will mention a dichotomy that sometimes exists in the mission of the church. George Hunsberger asks if the church should be shaped more by the ecclesial practices by which it is a social ethic or by the missional practices by which it testifes in word and deed to the coming of God’s reign.77 While he proposes that the posture and voice of the church lie within the tension between the two, he goes on to say that the church is a body of people sent, “pressed into the fabric of life, living it in all the public dimensions shared by others.”78

Perhaps it’s a nuance, but to me, this metaphor rings hollow. If you press a patch into a fabric, it’s not integral to the weave of the fabric. We’re in the world but not of the world, yet as difused witnesses we are meant to be part of the weave, integral to the fabric of society, sharing hope in the same struggles with our fellow humanity. Okesson reframes public witness so that any perceived tension is rendered a moot point. When witness moves back and forth across all spaces of public life to weave a thickness of the persons of the Trinity for the fourishing of all of life, then the church gathered and the church sent is not in tension. The interiority of the church moves outward. When I lived in Ukraine, I experienced this reality in the life of the church and discovered its language through Okesson.

76 Černý, “Mission in Central and Eastern Europe,” 616.

77 Hunsberger, “The Missional Voice and Posture of Public Theologizing,” 17–18.

78 Hunsberger, 18.

Myra Watkins

I write as a bit of a wanderer in the lands of Central and Eastern Europe, but I also write as a lover. My husband and I moved to Ukraine in 1993 to plant a church and lived through a broad swath of tumultuous history with the Ukrainian people, intermittently, until 2011, and then moved to Poland in 2016 where we lived for three years, frequently traveling to Romania, Georgia, Armenia, and to the Czech Republic. The Czech Republic captured my heart, then the writings of Havel moved my soul, so I have merely sought to form helpful connections with public missiology, another one of my loves.

The sated moments in my travels have been sitting at the table among “foreign” people with whom I fnd a curious sense of belonging, experiencing the other through the giving of self, fnding joy in their embracing hospitality, and wanting God’s great salvation to heal everything evil has touched in these lands. May God’s mission better be understood as public truth, and may the Church grapple with what it means to be a diferent kind of public in and for their complex new world. Finally, may the fragments of Christian memory in Czech culture that have lost their meaning be re-storied with the efulgent beauty and power of God’s redemptive narrative.

Anderson, Benedict. Imagined Communities: Refections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. Revised edition. London: Verso, 2016.

Anderson, Nate, and Leah Seppanen Anderson. “Under Construction: How Eastern Europe’s Evangelicals Are Restoring the Church’s Vitality.” Christianity Today 49, no. 10 (October 2005)

Bargár, Pavol. “Learning about Spirituality Together with ‘Seekers’: Reading Together towards Life in the Czech Postsecular Context,” International Review of Mission 108, no. 2 (Nov. 2019): 326–36.

Constantineanu, Corneliu Marcel V. Măcelaru, Anne-Marie Kool and Mihai Himcinschi. Mission in Central and Eastern Europe : Realities, Perspectives, Trends. Regnum, 2016.

Froese, Paul. “Secular Czechs and Devout Slovaks: Explaining Religious Diferences.” Review of Religious Research 46, no. 3 (2005)

Greeley, Andrew M. Religion in Europe at the End of the Second Millenium: A Sociological Profle. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction, 2004.

Havel, Vaclav. The Power of the Powerless. Vintage Classics, 2018.

Hošek, Pavel. “Perceptions of the Evangelical Movement in the Post-Communist Czech Republic.” Evangelical Review of Theology 38, no. 1 (January 2014).

74 | Myra Watkins

Hunsberger, George R. “The Missional Voice and Posture of Public Theologizing.” Missiology 34, no. 1 (January 2006).

Murzaku, Ines Angeli ed. Quo vadis eastern Europe? Religion, state and society after communism. Ediz. multilingue. Ravenna, 2009.

Nesporova, Olga, and Zdenek R. Nespor. “Religion: An Unsolved Problem for the Modern Czech Nation.” Sociologický Časopis / Czech Sociological Review 45, no. 6 (2009):

Newbigin, Lesslie. The Gospel in a Pluralist Society. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1989.

Noble, Ivana. Theological Interpretation of Culture in PostCommunist Context: Central and East European Search for Roots. Surry, England: Ashgate Publishing Limited, 2010.

Okesson, Gregg A. A Public Missiology: How Local Churches Witness to a Complex World. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2020.

Pew Research Center’s Religion & Public Life Project. “Religious Belief and National Belonging in Central and Eastern Europe,” May 10, 2017.

Sayer, Derek. The Coasts of Bohemia: A Czech History. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1998.

Taylor, Charles. A Secular Age. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007.

John Amalraj Karunakaran

This essay refects theologically on the culture of populism in the context political of leadership. The thesis is that populism in leadership does not always contribute to the common good and therefore the response of the missional church should be to model a Christ-centered leadership. To arrive at this thesis, frst, the concept of populism is defned to show how this is important for public theology. Second, the paper describes what populism looks like in India and how Indians understand it. Third, the theological refection on populism and leadership culture that seeks to transform the socio-economic justice issues are discussed to draw out the missiological implications for missional churches in India.

John grew up as a pastor’s kid and was actively involved in local church ministries. His education spans across law, management, political science, theology, and intercultural studies. He was privileged to have a ringside view of church, mission, and business leadership. Cross-cultural living and multi-cultural communities are his learning context. Having served with Indian mission organizations in leadership roles for more than twenty-fve years he is now engaged in doctoral research on crosscultural leadership at Asbury Theological Seminary. Along with his wife and two sons, he has lived in four cities in India and Singapore while traveling widely.

| John A. Karunakaran

Mohandas K. Gandhi, along with his followers, on April 6, 1930, in the Western coastal town of Dandi, picked up a handful of salt on the shore to demonstrate and protest the British empire’s repressive policy of taxation on the production and sale of salt which was forcing the poor people to sufer.1 This gave birth to the non-violent civil disobedience movement called satyagraha, which gathered momentum and took on the mighty British empire.2 In the following decades, Gandhi became one of the most charismatic leaders across the large Indian nations and strategically used satyagraha as one of the populist ideologies that mobilized the masses to protest nonviolently, leading to Indian independence.3 He was bestowed the honorifc title Mahatma, meaning “the great soul” while his close associates afectionately called him Bapu, meaning “father.” Eventually, he came to be known as the ‘father of the nation’. The charisma of Gandhi was so evident that the last Viceroy of India, Lord Mountbatten, during the communal riots when India was partitioned into two independent nations in August 1947, called him a “one-man boundary force.”4 The viceroy explained that nearly ffty-fve thousand soldiers were deployed to contain the communal riot in the northern borders while the presence of Gandhi in the eastern city of Calcutta ensured that the Hindus and Muslims in that region were restrained from killing each other.

1 K. Pletcher, “Salt March.” Encyclopedia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/ event/Salt-March.

2 A Sanskrit and Hindi word meaning “holding onto truth,” “satyagraha.” Encyclopedia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/topic/satyagrahaphilosophy.

3 Narendra Subramanian, “Populism in India,” The SAIS Review of International Afairs 27, no. 1 (2007): 82.

4 Satinder Dhiman, “Gandhi: ‘A One-Man Boundary Force’!” in Gandhi and Leadership: New Horizons in Exemplary Leadership, ed. Satinder Dhiman (New York: Palgrave Macmillan US, 2015), 1, https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137492357_1.

Populism is a powerful tool used by leaders to mobilize people, organize movements, and transform society. It is not easy to defne the term. Its usage in diferent cultures and times has evolved to give meaning to what is observed as a phenomenon in history.

It is relevant to theologically refect on how populism in political leadership infuences and impacts the Indian church and missions. The thesis for this essay is that populism in leadership does not contribute to the common good. Therefore, the response of the missional church should be to model a Christ-centered leadership. This refection on populist leadership that seeks to transform socio-economic issues, infuencing the Indian church and missional movements, is the scope for theologizing in the publics.

To argue the above thesis, frst, the concept of populism is defned to show how this is important for public theology and missional response. Secondly, the essay describes what populism looks like in India and how Indians understand it. And fnally, it explores the missiological implications for Christian leadership in India.

In the last few years, we have witnessed the return of populist and charismatic leaders who have been elected to political ofces in diferent parts of the world. This phenomenon of populist leaders emerging within the context of democracy through elections leads to authoritarian regimes.5

5 Vreese, Claes H. de, Frank Esser, Toril Aalberg, Carsten Reinemann, and James Stanyer, “Populism as an Expression of Political Communication Content and Style: A New Perspective.” The International Journal of Press/Politics 23, no. 4 (October 2018): 423–38. https://doi.org/10.1177/1940161218790035.

| John A. Karunakaran

In the American context, the alignment of Christian evangelical leaders with the populist Donald Trump during his presidency was controversial. On the other hand, the rise of the right-wing Hindutva movement under the populist leadership of Narendra Modi in India has brought the Indian church and mission movement to face unprecedented harassment and opposition. We see this now as a global phenomenon in the Philippines, Turkey, Brazil, Hungary, United Kingdom, Russia, Belarus, Venezuela, Mexico, Argentina, and Austria.6 These recent developments warrant a theological response to populism. Kevin Vanhoozer argues that theology encompasses every aspect of our life.7 He suggests that by using faith and studying the word of God, Christian believers are called to read cultural texts and trends. He points out that Christians who read culture should understand it on its terms before discerning the signs of the times to articulate our theological interpretation. Culture is always in public places, which infuences all of us, whether we like it or not. This includes populist leadership in the publics realm.

This then begs the question as to what publics means. Gregg Okesson defnes publics as “common spaces of togetherness where people participate with one another in life and form opinions through the circulation of diferent texts.”8 He further adds that it is inevitable that religion mixes with the publics as political leaders claim divine sanction while religious leaders baptize political ideology with divinity. This shows that the Enlightenment heritage of the dichotomizing of sacred and secular is just on the surface: the publics always interpenetrates the realms of politics, economics, religion, culture, and social interaction.9

6 Ibid.

7 Kevin J. Vanhoozer, Charles A. Anderson, and Michael J. Sleasman, eds., Everyday Theology: How to Read Cultural Texts and Interpret Trends, Cultural exegesis (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007), 16–17.

8 Gregg A. Okesson, A Public Missiology: How Local Churches Witness to a Complex World (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2020), 41.

If theologizing takes place in the publics, we then need to understand public theology. Harold Breitenberg Jr., in his essay “What is Public Theology?,” summarizes the various defnitions in the literature and writes as follows:

Public theology is theologically informed descriptive and normative public discourse about public issues, institutions, and interactions, addressed to the church or other religious body as well as the larger public or publics, and argued in ways that can be evaluated and judged by publicly available warrants and criteria.10

Breitenberg further argues that even though the term public theology was frst used by Martin Marty, it was Max Stackhouse who with an expansive understanding of publics, explicitly and extensively used the term beyond the confnes of any nation-state or religious tradition. Not all scholars agree with this argument, but there is a consensus that Stackhouse popularized the term in our times. Following this, we need to explore the origin of the term populism and how it is defned in academia.

The words populism and popularity seem to have similar meanings, but the Cambridge dictionary defnes populism as “political ideas and activities that are promoted to gain the

9 Ibid., 54–59.

10 E. Harold Breitenberg Jr., “What is Public Theology?” in Public Theology for a Global Society: Essays in Honor of Max L. Stackhouse, edited by Max L. Stackhouse, Deirdre King Hainsworth, and Scott Paeth, eds., (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2010), 4–6.

80 | John A. Karunakaran support of the common people by providing what they demand” and popularity as “someone or something that is liked by many people.”11 However, the etymology of the word populism traces its origin in America during the year 1892 from its Latin version populus, meaning “people.”12 It was frst used by a political party called the US Populist Party, as it raised various issues related to the common people. Later the word in the 1920s came to have a more general meaning as “representing the views of the masses” and in the 1950s as “anti-establishment.”13

The defnition of the term populism since then has been widely discussed in academia. The London School of Economics held the frst academic conference that discussed the concept and arrived at a defnition.14 In May 1967, the conference “To Defne Populism” convened, with more than forty scholars participating by, presenting their views on three main questions: What is and what is not populist ideology? Why is populism a political movement and yet it does not always form into political parties? And what are the diferences between the populism before and after the two world wars in the twentieth century?15 The conference sub-divided itself into four groups, discussing the ideological, political, historical, and general aspects of the defnition with the recognition that there will be overlaps in their discussions. Summarizing these discussions for the academic paper, Isaiah Berlin and others propose a synoptical order that can lead to a conclusion

11 Cambridge Dictionary, s.v. “Populism,” “Popularity,” https://dictionary. cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/.

12 Online Etymology Dictionary, s.v., “Populism,” https://www.etymonline.com/ word/populist of a comprehensive defnition of populism as a concept. They propose fve main types of populism from Russia, North America, Latin America, Africa, and Asia. The discussions attempt to represent the historic evolution and the uniqueness of populism in these diferent continents and some of the individual countries. John Saul one of the participants in the conference discussing the African literature on populism, points out thay one of the dangers of using the term populism is oversimplifying and making movements monolithic.16 He adds that the interaction between the leaders and people of the mass movements is important and that using the term populism may limit understanding of a complex situation. W. H. Morris Jones, in his discussion on Asian populism suggests that it is not right to look at a series of national populisms, since multiple populist movements can emerge in one country at the same time.17 There can be localized populist movements which have no interactions with movements that embrace larger worldviews, seeking to transform whole societies.

13 Ibid.

14 Isaiah Berlin et al., “To Defne Populism,” Government and Opposition 3, no. 2 (1968): 137.

15 Donald MacRae, Leonard Schapiro, F. W., Deakin, Hugh Seton-Watson, Peter Worsley, Ernest Gellner, and Isaiah Berlin, (1967) Conference on populism: Verbatim Report (London: London School of Economics and Political Science, 1967), 3–4.

Moving on to identifying the essential elements of populism, S. L. Andreski summarizes six diferent meanings:18 The frst was a movement aimed at the redistribution of wealth; the second, a social protest movement from the lower classes; the third is a protest movement particularly arising from a rural area; the fourth a peasant’s movement according to the traditional pattern; ffth, to preserve the rural way of life; and sixth, was the idolization of the rural peasant’s way of life. Peter Worsley emphasizes that one of the essential elements is that populism is a rural development ideology that focuses on people’s transition from rural to modern society, although populist governments have never been able to achieve these

16 Berlin et al., “To Defne Populism,” 150.

17 Ibid., 152.

18 Ibid., 155.

| John A. Karunakaran

goals.19 Worsley laments that this type of populism has never become the ideology of the masses but appears to be a transition to a more institutionalized revolution. Peter Wiles proposes that populism is a more anti-establishment ideology and describes Russian populism as socialist, the United States as capitalist, and Britain as a compromise concluding that populism cannot exist without religious beliefs.20 We must note that while populist movements argue for their legitimacy by being for the people and against the establishment, they end up being a more onerous form of the establishment using strong coercive power. Kenneth Minogue remarks that secularization is an ideology where religion, that earlier infltrated all areas of life, was removed, making it a presupposition for populism.21

Finally bringing the conference discussions towards a consensus in defning populism Peter Worsley identifes fve common elements: 1) reactions to capitalism and 2) externality, 3) mass movement, 4) looking back to look forward, and 5) an ideology used by the intelligentsia and elite for or on behalf of the masses.22 Ghita Ionescu, one of the key speakers of the conference, points out that there was a controversial issue to decide whether populism was primarily an ideology or a movement but expresses that the majority viewed populism as an ideology.23 He suggests that populism recurs in diferent historical and geographical social contexts. He further adds that populism is characterized by political persecution-mania, branding unidentifable conspiracy theories against people, and a unique kind of negativism leading to xenophobio and blind hatred of the other. When there are threats to national security, populist governments increase the threat narrative, taking advantage to assume greater coercive power. Ionescu also said that populism worships people, especially peasants, leading to socialism, nationalism, or peasantism. The conference fnally agreed on this defnition of populist movements:

19 Ibid., 157.

20 Ibid., 159.

21 Ibid., 164.

22 Berlin et al., “To Defne Populism,” 168.

23 “Ideologies are by defnition idealist systems. They generate pictures and images which, far from refecting social reality, seek to create and maintain illusions which further the interest of those who beneft from the ideology” Alistair Kee, “Blessed Are the Excluded,” in Storrar and Morton, Public Theology, (359). Quoted by Gregg Okesson, Public Missiology, 62.

Populist movements are movements aimed at power for the beneft of the people as a whole which result from the reaction of those, usually intellectuals, alienated from the existing power structure to the stresses of rapid economic, social, cultural, or political change. These movements are characterized by a belief in return to, or adaptation of, more simple and traditional forms and values emanating from the people, particularly the more archaic sections of the people who are taken to be the repository of virtue.24

The conference participants recognize that this defnition is limited and hope that it will be the initiation for more insights into understanding the phenomenon.

In 2016, when Donald Trump surprised the world by being elected US president, scholars began to debate the comeback of populism into the political realm.25 In 2017, the annual conference of the Bavarian American Academy brought together political scientists, historians, and cultural studies scholars for a conversation. The outcome of this was the publication of The Comeback of Populism. In the introduction, Heike Paul surveys the various defnitions in the literature and

24 Berlin et al., “To Defne Populism,” 178–79.

25 Heike Paul, Ursula Prutsch, and Jürgen Gebhardt, eds., The Comeback of Populism: Transatlantic Perspectives, Publikationen der Bayerischen AmerikaAkademie volume 21 (Heidelberg: Universitätsverlag Winter, 2019), 2–3.

84 | John A. Karunakaran comments that populism remains a very ambiguous concept. Quoting various authors, she suggests that populism has been called a style of political communication, a language, logic, syndrome, thin ideology, polarizing political strategy and method, populist imaginary, authenticity, and a transposition of people’s will that satisfes a longing for simplicity in solutions.26 Paul posits that “the criterion for defning populism is form and not the content.”27 There are family resemblances among populisms in Europe and the Americas, and the focus is on the use and misuse of political language that creates a direct relationship between the masses and the leadership fgure at the cost of democratic institutions.28

Hans Vorländer, in the chapter “Populism and Modern Democracy—An Outline,” comments that there is no connection between populism and democracy, even though they may appear to have a similar reference to people.29 He argues for a descriptive defnition that is open to history and context, as populisms difer in substance, structures, and historical, cultural, and institutional frameworks, having the commonality of a specifc political mobilization strategy. He ofers fve characteristics of populisms: frst, an explicit reference to people or the common man by constructing a mechanism of inclusion and exclusion; second, constitute fundamental binaries with the rhetoric of “us” and “them,” “inside” and “outside;” third, construct a social and political entity of “the people”; fourth, claim the social, economic, cultural, and political homogeneity of the people erasing any diversity; and ffth, establish a mobilizing political structure for charismatic leaders and their followers.30

26 Ibid., 2–3.

27 Ibid., 3.

28 Paul Heike, “Authoritarian Populism, White Supremacy, and VolkskörperSentimentalism,” in The Comeback of Populism, 127–132.

29 Paul, Prutsch, and Gebhardt, The Comeback of Populism, 13–14.

Comparing the attempts to defne the term populism in the frst academic conference in 1967 and the most recent conference after fve decades in 2017, we can conclude that the term populism continues to be ambiguous. Both the conferences seem to have concluded that defning the term is challenging as it is a phenomenon and not a science. We can agree that populisms may share family resemblances, but they must be understood within each historical and cultural context. Even though populism emerged promoting the ideology and the interest of the masses, it has a nebulous relationship to the masses. Populism, as the recent defnition shows has become an issue of language and semantics and a political tool for mobilizing supporters for a leader.

Fifty years ago, scholars focused more on the mobilization of the masses through populist ideologies and eforts to remove the infuences of religion through secularization. However, now scholars are studying the infuence of communication strategies that creates a loyal fan base and the comeback of religious rhetoric that aids populist leaders. These stark negative developments are challenges for churches in formulating a theological response to this phenomenon. Now we move on to explore how populism is seen in the Indian context.

During the decade between 2010 to 2020, the Indian politics has signifcantly. Most commentators talked about the right-wing Hindutva movement led by Narendra Modi sweeping

30 Hans Vorländer, “Populism and Modern Democracy – An Outline,” in The Comeback of Populism, 16–17.

86 | John A. Karunakaran the national polls in 2014 and, against all odds, repeating in 2019 as an important milestone in Indian democracy. However, Ruhi Tiwari, a news editor of a leading online news channel writes:

Not Modi’s rise, not Rahul’s fall. Arvind Kejriwal is this decade’s biggest political story - With zero political base, no prior experience with elections, and no afliation to any established outft, Arvind Kejriwal’s performance has been a breakout.31

Arvind Kejriwal became the Chief Minister of the National Capital of India, New Delhi, and has since become a household name in India.32 He came to the limelight in 2011 as an anti-corruption crusader, joining hands with other non-political crusaders. Kejriwal, coming from a middle-class family, was a government ofcer in the revenue department who resigned from his position to become a civil activist. He had no political connections or experience in grassroots mobilization. Andrew Wyatt, in his article, rates his leadership positively, acknowledging Kejriwal’s entrepreneurial skills that drew the public’s attention to corruption and governance. But Wyatt points out that Kejriwal’s performance as a political party leader was not always consistent, and he seems to have geographical limitations in the but has been successful in electoral politics in the national capital against all odds.33

Populist leaders and movements are not new to India. The struggle for independence in the early twentieth century led by Mohandas Gandhi used non-violence as an ideological tool for populist political mobilization. Narendra Modi and Arvind

31 Ruhi Tewari, “Arwind Kejriwal is this decades biggest political story”, The Print, December 30, 2020, https://theprint.in/opinion/politricks/arvind-kejriwal-isthis-decades-biggest-political-story/576082/

32Andrew Wyatt (2015), “Arvind Kejriwal’s leadership of the Aam Aadmi Party”, Contemporary South Asia, 23:2, 167-180, DOI: 10.1080/09584935.2015.1025038

33 Ibid.

Kejriwal, who have seen electoral successes using populist strategies, are but a poor comparison to what Gandhi achieved in his days. Narendra Subramanian writes that populism was apparent in Gandhi’s anti-modernist rhetoric that mobilized peasants in rural areas into an anti-colonial movement against the British empire.34 He further states that populism came back under the leadership of Indira Gandhi in the late 1960 and 1970s. This was followed in subsequent decades by Jayaprakash Narayan and other socialists who mobilized the lowest castes: Dalits and tribals. Regional political outfts used language and social reform against existing caste dominance combining it with populist measures. The right-wing Hindutva movement, through its electoral success, shows how a nationalistic ideology along with creating an identity based on linguistics, ethnicity, race, and religion, has brought populism into the limelight. Similarly, Arvind Kejriwal, riding on the political success of his anti-corruption crusade, has gained a foothold in national mainstream politics. These events are reminiscent of Mohandas Gandhi’s experiments with truth or rather his experiments with Hindu spirituality, that was an integral part of his political activities in the form of fasting, prayer meetings, and ascetic lifestyle.

Subramanian argues that the term populism is used inconsistently in the public and academic circles. He proposes that any defnition should be broad enough to incorporate various roles economic ideologies and political regimes play. Subramanian defnes populism as follows:

The term “populism” is used to characterize movements, parties, and regimes which distinguish between the “people”, who are said to have limited access to spheres of infuence, and the elite, considered dominant in these spheres

34 Subramanian, “Populism in India,” 81–82.

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and culturally distinct from the masses. Populists claim to represent the will of the “people” to overcome their subordination.35

He points out that this understanding of populism is applicable to cases where people are being diferentiated to strategically mobilize mass movements. He adds that populists use categories like language, dialect, skin color, occupation, educational level, and patterns of worship to create distinct binary identities. Using this analysis, he points out how Indian politicians in the past fve decades have used anti-elite discourse to mobilize the masses pledging to end poverty, caste dominance, and corruption. While Indira Gandhi used her political ancestry to her advantage to provide populist leadership, others used their ethnicity and linguistic-cultural identities to mobilize the masses. In the 1960s and ‘70s, theater and movies became a communication tool to propagate populist ideologies to the extent that popular flm stars were able to win regional elections. In recent times, the Hindutva movement has taken advantage of social media and alternative media to propagate right-wing ideologies.

The rise of Hindu populism in the past two decades has redefned the political space India. Ideologically based populism has given way to identity-centered populism. The end of the twentieth century brought to the fore politicians using caste-based identities to mobilize the masses. A in the frst two decades of the twenty-frst century, the majority religion identity is being used. The caste system has religious sanctions but leads to socio-economic disparities that create a gulf of inequality between the haves and the have-nots.

Arvind Rajagopal writes that the public sphere in India refects diverse types of populism.36 It is a space where both identity and interests are used to mobilize the masses, and often an isolated confict between two individuals can transform into a communal dispute over caste, class, religion, or other issues, aided by mass media and social media. He argues that the nationalists built on the existing collective identities using the media along with public demonstrations to mobilize the masses to support their political causes. During the years leading up to Indian independence, there were eforts to provide for representation from diferent religions in government. This made religion a subcategory of political discourse until, toward the end of the political negotiations for independence, it resulted in a de facto partition of India along religious lines with Pakistan with a Muslim-majority population and India with a Hindu-majority population. The communal riots at that time and the need for harmony tended to keep religious identity from playing a major role in political discourse for some decades. In the frst few decades of independence, secularism in India, even though not fully understood by the masses, seemed to dominate media discussions without the need for it to be translated into local languages or cultural contexts.

Rajagopal further comments that in the 1980s the political narrative started to change as the governing party and the opposition used religious identity as a vote bank giving rise to Hindu populism.37 This coincided with the media becoming a major political actor and dominating national discourse. Television broadcasts, using satellite technology on the heels of US-sponsored globalization of communication technology, provided a platform for a teleserial on Ramayan, a Hindu

36 Arvind Rajagopal, “The Rise of Hindu Populism in India’s Public Sphere,” Current History 115, no. 780 (2016): 124.

37 Ibid., 126–128.

90 | John A. Karunakaran mythology by the national television channel, which captured the public imagination of an epic golden age of the Hindu regime. The past became present through communication technology and soon Hindu religious populism was adopted openly by the then right-wing opposition party, who reaped the benefts of appropriating it as their political manifesto. The landslide victory of Narendra Modi in the 2014 elections, which was repeated in 2019, showed clearly that a Hindu constituency and public exclusion of other religious identities was now the norm. Rajagopal posits that these changes show that “Indian society is democratizing, but in a Hindu way.”38 He concludes by observing that Hindu identity is more of an opportunistic language and not a core ideology for right-wing populism as it is about image and spectacle than rational debate and discussion. Hindu populism has been formally sanctifed by the democratic process whereby Hindu majoritarianism is here to stay for a while.

Prashanth Bhatt explores the anti-media populist views of the right-wing alternative news media in India, which seemingly owes its allegiance to the Hindutva movement.39 He states that the presence of Hindu populism loyalists is seen in the digital footsteps of news websites, television channels, and popular social media platforms. They consistently “troll” the mainstream media with criticisms using sarcasm and irony to counter the narrative of the traditional media outlets. Bhatt concludes that Hindu nationalists accuse the mainstream media of a liberal bias and express their distrust often in rhetoric that is not always based on facts but on populist narratives. They create an enemy of religious minorities, Muslims and Christianity, and any other political dissenters so that the majority Hindu identity can be mobilized for their political gains.

38 Ibid., 128.

39 Prashanth, Bhat, “Anti-Media Populism: Media Criticism by Right-Wing Alternative Media in India.” PhD dissertation, University of Maryland, College Park, 2020.

The above discussion shows how populism in India which once emerged as a nationalist ideology during the anticolonial struggle, has now become a populism that is based on Hindu religious identity. The rise of Hindu populism through the democratic process, with the aid of alternative media, is a challenge to other minority religions like Islam and Christianity. To summarize, populist leadership in India is closely linked to religious identity, leading to the mass mobilization of people for political power. This calls for a theological refection on populism that can help to create an adequate missional response by the Indian church.

Amos Yong confesses that as a Pentecostal Christian he assumed that being political contradicted his beliefs.40 Moreover, as a theological lecturer he did not give any attention to political matters or was aware of the developing feld of political theology. Yong’s honest confession is an illustration of not just theologians but Christians from diverse backgrounds who have naively bought into the perspective that politics and theology are not related to each other. This dichotomy goes back to the sacred-secular divide of the Enlightenment, which Yong attempts to rectify by defning politics as referring to “human life in the public square, where the various dimensions of religion, culture, society, economics, and government converge and interface.”41

40 Amos Yong, In the Days of Caesar: Pentecostalism and Political Theology, The Cadbury lectures 2009 (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2010), prologue.

41 Ibid.

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Okesson takes this further with a missiological perspective and proposes that public theology assists in contexts where solutions to problems cannot be found by individuals.42 He classifes public theologies into diferent types based on how some scholars focus on theological writings, others on activities, and yet others on function within public life. He further adds that they all share common characteristics “rooted in specifc contexts; sensitive to justice issues; and speaking in a language accessible to the public realm.”43

Through these theologians and missiologists, we can regard on populism as a sub-category of political theology. In defning populism, we examined how populism is specifc to local contexts,takes advantage of justice issues, and often speaks the common language of the masses. Yong, summarizing the issues and challenges of theologizing in public spaces, observes that the Bible presents multiple political postures, structures, and models, resulting in diverse beliefs and practices in church history.44 Second, he observes that politics in Israel and during the time of Jesus were strongly linked to economic concerns. Finally, he notes that there have been nearly seventeen hundred years of debate on the relationship between theology and politics from church fathers like Augustine to reformers like Luther and others although they may not have used the term political theology. These facts help us to know that our theologizing follows biblical history and that of the early church and reformers.

Hungarian scholar Andrew Arato, in an article discussing how populism is being theologized in contemporary academia, writes that Carl Schmitt is acknowledged as the father of political theology using sovereignty and the constituent power as political theological concepts.45 Arato argues that some political concepts are secularized theological terms and major religiouspolitical concepts are theologized as profane. He illustrates how concepts like territory and people can be theologized as “sacred land” and “the people.”46 Yong critiques Schmitt’s claim that all political concepts are theological and not practical. He states that politicians cannot become theologians and follows it up by questioning the role of the political in theology, answering that there is both independence in each of the spheres and interdependence in certain respects.47 Populism attempts to coopt religion and often uses religious symbolism to communicate that the populist leader or ideology is on God’s side. In the context of these conversations, Arato points out that “religion in politics can play diferent and even contrary roles” to the extent that theology can serve and disguise authoritarian politics.48 He cautions that populism endows human actors with sacredness and divinity which then constructs the dehumanization of all dissenters as enemies leading to authoritarian suppression.

42 Okesson, A Public Missiology, 99.

43 Ibid.

44 Yong, In the Days of Caesar, 82.

Mohandas Gandhi was never apologetic in using religion as a populist measure in the political struggle against colonialism. His “experiments with truth” were his way of practicing his Hindu spirituality in the public space. The nonviolent satyagraha movement included peace marches, public and private fasting, prayer meetings, the practice of silence, voluntarily accepting sufering, and choosing an ascetic lifestyle that had religious overtones. The tragic history of India’s partition in 1947 based on religious identity scarred the psyche of a young nation attempting to identify itself as secular and

45 Andrew Arato, “Political Theology and Populism,” Social Research 80, no. 1 (2013): 143.

46 Ibid.

47 Yong, In the Days of Caesar Location 999-1005.

48 Arato, “Political Theology and Populism,” 166–67.

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keeping religion out of politics. This dream was never realized as politicians in the following generations continued to use religion as a populist measure especially in protecting religious minority rights and restricting religious conversions in certain regions. In contemporary politics, we have seen that populism is closely related to the majority religion. The theological task is to formulate a response from the standpoint of a minority religion that needs to hold on to its freedom to worship but at the same time witness a political reality that brings our faith convictions into the public realm of debate and discussion. The Indian church’s response to Hindu populism has often been critiqued as the response of a minority group seeking to secure its freedom rather than prophetically engaging with the powers to be.

There are two aspects of populism that emerge in the preceding discussions that are relevant for our theological refection. The frst is political leadership and the second is to transform economics for the common good. Politics is a complex reality that struggles with issues of exercising power and authority over others. Okesson summarizing other scholars, positing that power in humans refects the image of a God who is all-powerful.49 Yet this mandate given to humans is characterized by stewardship and must be used as God would want us to use it for the common good. It is the power to be creative in fnding solutions to the complex problems we face. This requires further theological refection on what power is and how it relates to God and is subsequently shared with humans.

Max Weber, in his seminal lecture on “Politics as a Vocation,” proposes three basic legitimations of “domination,” or power exercised over others: the traditional patron-client 49 Okesson, A Public Missiology, 80–82.

(patriarch and patrimonial), the charismatic domination, and legality and rational.50 Weber comments that domination is not always exercised with pure motives and then describes charisma as the gift of grace as a calling in its highest expression.

Populist leadership is closely related to charisma but not in the sense it is used in scripture or for that matter used by Weber as a vocation. In today’s context, many other factors contribute to charismatic leadership, including heroism, achievements, image, or persona created by mass media that expects from followers’ unconditional loyalty, devotion, and submission. Whatever forms populism takes, the patron-client relationships undergirds the context.

Populist leaders believe that sovereign power comes from the people’s will, but at the same time they claim divine status as representing God himself. Loren Rotner discusses how American political leadership was once popular but has now become populist. In this interesting analysis of the history of popular presidents, the author argues that often presidents claimed popular sovereignty through the democratic process, but the presidency has become corrupted.51 Rotner argues that the term populism is a useful concept to describe a bad form of politics in modern democracies as politicians seek authoritarianism and lack accountability but are encouraged by fattery. Populist leaders want to give the appearance of being of the people but often are very authoritarian, which then calls us to refect deeper into how power is understood, exercised, and shared. Consequently, Rotner posits that a

50 Max Weber and John Dreijmanis, Max Weber’s Complete Writings on Academic and Political Vocations (New York: Algora, 2008), 157–58.

51 Loren Justin Rotner, “Popular Leadership without Populism? A View from the Founding,” PhD dissertation (Claremont University, 2017), 2.

96 | John A. Karunakaran popular leader may enjoy de facto legitimacy according to his institutional position, but his real legitimacy comes from holding the correct opinions about the real fountain of power, the moral imagination of the sovereign people.52

Rotner further examines John Quincy Adams’s treatise, Lectures on Rhetoric and Oratory, to show how in America the doctrine of responsible popular leadership is the dream but that it failed to consider dangerous extra-institutional popular leadership.53

A leader who follows Jesus Christ draws his legitimacy from receiving God’s call which makes him a responsible leader whose strength is derived from being accountable to the people of God. Henri Nouwen writes that the way of a Christian leader is not the way of upward mobility but the way of downward mobility ending on the cross.54 It is not about relevance, popularity, power, or spectacular achievements but a gift of grace, a charisma, to be a humble servant who shares his power with others as Jesus modeled for the disciples (John 13:12–16; 21:18–19). It is counter-cultural leadership that comes with God’s call to use power and authority for the common good of all people.

The second issue for our refection is how populism and populist leaders seek to transform economics, which has often become the bandwagon for many populist movements. In defning populism, we observed how the origin of the term is traced to revolutionary peasant movements in Russia and the emergence of a political party in the US that raised issues representing the views of the masses related to the demand for socio-economic justice. Our scripture teaches us that the economy is a moral system established by God. Justice holds together the moral system of economics established upon God’s character: integration (shalom). It involves the Sabbath (cease labor; trust God), land ownership (all should own land; God ultimately owns all land), jubilee (guarding money or land against being an absolute value; giving people a fresh start on life), tithes, oferings, taxes (re-orienting or re-valuing wealth: we can worship through wealth), gleaning practices (leave extra for others, don’t hoard) and justice for the vulnerable: orphans, widows, strangers, and the poor (Deut. 14:29).55

52 Ibid., 5.

53 Ibid., 19–20.

54 Henri J. M. Nouwen, In the Name of Jesus: Refections on Christian Leadership (Mumbai: St. Paul’s, 1997), 58.

The prophets of the Old Testament repeatedly communicated God’s condemnation of economic injustice among his own chosen people. Jesus’ public ministry was defned through his reading of the prophet Isaiah, the “Nazareth Manifesto” that imagined socio-economic justice for the people (Luke 4:16–30).

Unlike many populist movements that catch the popular imagination of the masses, culminating in protests, revolutions, electoral victory, or defeat, Jesus was rejected as a populist leader. An interesting incident that many ignore in above mentioned Lukan narrative is the conversation that goes on after Jesus reads the scripture. Jesus is rejected and not recognized as a prophet in his hometown and ends up being driven out of the town and almost thrown of of a clif.

As we noted, populism rides on the socio-economic justice bandwagon for popular leaders to assume power. Populist movements attribute their momentum to the grass- root aspiration of the poor, and oppressed. The leaders of these movements claim to represent voices from below and promise to be a catalyst for changing the systems for the common good. It is a diferent story but important to note that many of the successful populist movements advocating for transformation have only been able to bring incremental changes and then fade away. Sajjan Kumar, an Indian political analyst, comments that post-independence India witnessed a sequence of populist governments from the 1970s when the Garibi Hatao (Remove Poverty) slogan was popularized to win elections that devolved into various kinds of populism without achieving signifcant changes.56 He succinctly states that “a charismatic leader mesmerizes the electorate, strikes an emotional chord, and blurs the distinction between the leader and the led.”57 A leader who follows Jesus Christ cares for the vulnerable, oppressed, and marginalized, responding in holistic witness that challenges the structures and systems that cause distress. The theological response for Christian leaders is not to be carried away by populist movements but to bring transformation within the society through the holistic ministry of the community of faith.

55 Gregg Okesson, “Holistic Mission – How do we approach economics/business,” Powerpoint presentation, MS655, Asbury Theological Seminary, n.d.

The established denominational leadership in India have become administrators of institutions, property, and people rather than shepherding the congregations to face spiritual and socio-economic challenges. Gnana Robinson, a renowned theological educator who served as the head of two leading seminaries in India, shares his impressions and refections on the “Silver Jubilee Session of the Synod of the

56 Sajjan Kumar, “The Limits of Populism,” The Hindu, (India), April 18, 2019, https://www.thehindu.com/opinion/lead/the-limits-of-populism/ article26867609.ece.

57 Ibid.

Church of South India” (the largest protestant denomination in India) held in January 1996, by asking a pertinent question: What does the church have to share with others?58 He quotes the Synod moderator’s address in which the realities of the leadership were described. The moderator had pointed out that casteism, regionalism, and languages caused painful divisions in the life of the church along with group conficts based on power, position, and money that resulted in litigations against one another becoming the norm. This shows how the church’s leadership was being infuenced by the political culture rather than the culture being infuenced by the Church.

The emerging charismatic church leaders in India are entrepreneurs who are focused on growth and expansion at the expense of discipling their congregations to be witnesses in the public sphere. These leaders often resemble business entrepreneurs rather than the leadership modeled by the apostles of Jesus Christ. The Indian mission movement’s leadership also seems to be mirroring the church leadership in their institutional contexts. It is not a surprise that wherever populist leaders emerge within the church and mission context we see more negative impacts than positive. Populist leadership and movements do not always bring efective transformation to society. Churches and missions are God-inspired institutions that survive through several generations amidst persecution and other challenges. Andy Crouch argues that if power is a gift, then institutions are also a gift and can create an environment where image-bearers fourish as God intended.59 He points out that the danger is that institutional leadership can be the cause of injustice and oppression rather than human fourishing.

58 Gnana Robinson, A Voice in the Wilderness (Chennai: Christian Literature Society, 2000), 89–90.

59 Andy Crouch, Playing God: Redeeming the Gift of Power (Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 2013), 169–70.

100 | John A. Karunakaran

Gary Yukl and William L. Gardner, discuss the implications for organizations, concluding that charismatic leadership is risky and implies radical changes in the strategy and culture.60 They further posit that giving too much power to individual leaders results in misuse of power and empty dreams, and historical accounts suggest charismatic leaders fail in implementing their radical vision ending in their exit to birth a new organization. Bryant Myers writes that transformational development in the context of Christian witness results in changed people and changed relationships that impact socioeconomic contexts signifcantly.61 This is where we see the critical diference between populist charismatic leadership and leadership with a Christian character. The preceding discussions on defning populist leadership and the theological refection show that as Christians we are called to witness counter-culturally. It is the local congregations who bring social changes if they are envisioned through intentional discipleship that results in action.

In Advocacing for Justice, the authors write that historical avoidance of political institutions and the public realm by evangelicals has revealed that some of our theologies follow political ideologies instead of the church giving its agenda to those exercising political power.62 They add that the lack of unity among Christians has led to inefective witnesses. In response, they frst argue that the Triune God is the foundation for our theological refection on public spaces.63 Second, they call on the church to recognize the corporate and structural form of sin that has invaded the institutions that were created for common good. We need to redeem these institutions to bring them under the lordship of Jesus. Third, we are called to be God’s witnesses to those in power, advocating for justice. The church has been given the stewardship to be God’s instrument of bringing transformation in this world and not populist leaders or movements. As the church realizes its calling, we can fulfll the vision of Newbigin to become the “basic unit of [a] new society” under the reign of God, as echoed by Okesson.64 In summary, leadership is a calling and a gift from God for the common good of the people and not for any individuals.

60 Gary Yukl and William L. Gardner, Leadership in Organizations, 9th ed. (London: Pearson, 2020), 234.

61 Bryant L. Myers, Walking with the Poor: Principles and Practices of Transformational Development, rev. (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2011), 316.

62 Stephen Ofutt, F. David Bronkema, Krisanne Vaillancourt Murphy, Robb Davis, and Gregg Okesson, Advocating for Justice: An Evangelical Vision for Transforming Systems and Structures (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2016), 174.

63 Ibid., 175–177.

During the last decade of the twentieth century, there was a furry of what I would call populist mission and church growth programs like “AD 2000” and “10/40 Window,” promoted by Western nations in India with an eschatological paradigm of preaching the gospel before the end of the world. There were hundreds of consultations, conferences, and networking activities across the country organized to fulfll this vision. Although there was signifcant mobilization of a prayer movement, mission feld research, and networking the dream of fulflling the Great Commission before the end of the millennium was unsuccessful. Robert Coote attributes this to the misplaced understanding of the theory of biblical interpretation.65 This is an example of how populist programs and leadership in churches and missions do not always usher in the kingdom of God, but rather it is the witness of the

64 Okesson, A Public Missiology, 256.

65 Robert Coote, “‘AD 2000’ and the ‘10/40 Window’: A Preliminary Assessment.”

In International Bulletin of Missionary Research 24:4, (October 2000), 160–166.

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community of faith living out the Great Commission among their neighbors that will make a diference.

This essay refected theologically on the culture of populism in political leadership. Populism does not always contribute to the common good, and therefore the response of the missional church should be to model a Christ-centered leadership. Second, it described what populism looks like in India and how Indians understand it. Third, theological refection on populist leadership that seeks to transform economics was discussed to draw out the missiological implications for missional churches in India. The call for faithful witness to the Gospel of Jesus Christ by the community of faith among their neighbors is the antidote for populist leadership.

Arato, Andrew. “Political Theology and Populism.” Social Research 80, no. 1 (2013): 143–172.

Berlin, Isaiah, Richard Hofstadter, Donald MacRae, Leonard Schapiro, Hugh Seton-Watson, Alain Touraine, F. Venturi, Andrzej Walicki, and Peter Worsley. “To Defne Populism.” Government and Opposition 3, no. 2 (1968): 137–179.

Crouch, Andy. Playing God: Redeeming the Gift of Power. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2013.

Coote, Robert. “‘AD 2000’ and the ‘10/40 Window’: A Preliminary Assessment.” In International Bulletin of Missionary Research 24:4. (October 2000): 160-166.

Dhiman, Satinder. “Gandhi: ‘A One-Man Boundary Force!’” In Gandhi and Leadership: New Horizons in Exemplary Leadership, edited by Satinder Dhiman, 1–14. New York: Palgrave Macmillan US, 2015. https://doi. org/10.1057/9781137492357_1.

Myers, Bryant L. Walking with the Poor: Principles and Practices of Transformational Development. Revised edition. Maryknoll, N.Y: Orbis Books, 2011.

Nouwen, Henri J. M. In the Name of Jesus: Refections on Christian Leadership. Mumbai, India: St. Pauls, 1997.

Ofutt, Stephen, Bronkema, F. David, Vaillancourt Murphy, Krisanne, Davis, Robb, and Okesson, Gregg. Advocating

104 | John A. Karunakaran for Justice: An Evangelical Vision for Transforming Systems and Structures. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2016.

Okesson, Gregg A. A Public Missiology: How Local Churches Witness to a Complex World. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2020.

Paul, Heike, Ursula Prutsch, and Jürgen Gebhardt, editons. The Comeback of Populism: Transatlantic Perspectives. Publikationen der Bayerischen Amerika-Akademie volume 21. Heidelberg: Universitätsverlag Winter, 2019.

Rajagopal, Arvind. “The Rise of Hindu Populism in India’s Public Sphere.” Current History 115, no. 780 (2016): 123–129.

Robinson, Gnana. A Voice in the Wilderness. Chennai: Christian Literature Society, 2000.

Rotner, Loren Justin. “Popular Leadership without Populism? A View from the Founding.” PhD Dissertations, The Claremont Graduate University, 2017.

Stackhouse, Max L., Deirdre King Hainsworth, and Scott Paeth, editions. Public Theology for a Global Society: Essays in Honor of Max L. Stackhouse. Grand Rapids: WB Eerdmans, 2010.

Subramanian, Narendra. “Populism in India.” The SAIS Review of International Afairs 27, no. 1 (2007): 81–91.

Vanhoozer, Kevin J., Charles A. Anderson, and Michael J. Sleasman, editions. Everyday Theology: How to Read

Cultural Texts and Interpret Trends. Cultural exegesis. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007.

Weber, Max, and John Dreijmanis. Max Weber’s Complete Writings on Academic and Political Vocations. New York: Algora, 2008.

Yong, Amos. In the Days of Caesar: Pentecostalism and Political Theology. The Cadbury Lectures 2009. Grand Rapids: WB Eerdmans, 2010.

Yukl, Gary, and William L. Gardner. Leadership in Organizations. Ninth edition.London: Pearson, 2020.

Alexandra Swink

Abstract

In today’s Western culture, religion is continuously put under a microscope for analysis and critique. Many Western Millennial and Generation Z individuals have stepped away from traditional Christianity to reexamine and deconstruct the religion they grew up knowing. The Western Church has left many youths with a bad taste in their mouths as they dissociate from a religion that claims love but has demonstrated hate, according to their experiences. These

Alexandra Swink was born and raised in Holland, MI. She graduated from Indiana Wesleyan University in 2019 with a Bachelor of Arts in Elementary Education. She then pursued higher education receiving a Master of Arts in Intercultural Studies at Asbury Theological Seminary in 2022. Alex continuously looks for unifying factors among people while also celebrating uniqueness in diversity. She now works at a refugee resettlement agency providing case management for immigrant children under fve years old and running three after school clubs in Chicagoland, Illinois.

108 | Alexandra Swink experiences have left a large population classifed as religious “nones,” but the name does not forsake their spiritual identity. Though a large number of Western Millennial and Gen Z individuals do not claim a religion, around 36% according to one study, they still experience spirituality through other means (Religious Landscape Study, 2014). A shift away from specifc religiosity towards general spirituality has begun to take place. One sphere where the religious “nones” experience spirituality is through secular concerts. Through secular concerts, the largely religious “nones” youth population experience spirituality, community, connection, forgiveness, and belonging. Since there is a strong opinion to push religion out of the public sphere, Christians must thoughtfully consider how to engage religious “nones” concertgoers to carefully demonstrate the power of a spiritual life aligned with Christ. Therefore, this paper seeks to frst provide context to the socio-cultural meaning behind spirituality and concerts in the Global West. Then it will analyze the theological concepts witnessed in concert culture that could potentially provide avenues to witness to others. This paper will fnish by suggesting ways for Christians to thoughtfully engage with concert culture. The hope is this paper will be used as a resource to educate and produce meaningful relationships with a generation that is spiritually starving.

In 1966, John Lennon, lead singer of the Beatles, once said, “Christianity will go. It will vanish and shrink. I needn’t argue about that; I’m right and I will be proved right. We’re more popular than Jesus now. I don’t know which will go frst, rock ‘n’ roll or Christianity.” At the height of his popularity, Lennon said something that shocked the nations. He claimed infamy that surpassed Jesus Christ. His opinion that rock and roll may outlast Christianity sparked a conversation over the efects of music and religion. Music, in a sense, became a new religion. Music seemed to captivate the young masses more than any religion could. Those fortunate enough to make it to the spotlight became the idols of a unique form of worship: loyalty, desire, and the need to see the magic for themselves. As time progressed, technology spread the reach of all genres of music to every corner of the world. Instead of turning to the Church, more and more youth of today are turning to music as well as musicians for answers, community, and as a means to shape their lives.

Western Millennials and Gen Z individuals are more skeptical of the Church than previous generations. Many grew up in the church and have since come to distrust a religion that claims to promote love and instead tends to demonstrate hate. Their distrust of the truth claims of the Church has thus propelled them on a journey toward deconstruction and discovery of the truth. Today, more and more individuals hope to push religion, especially Christianity, out of the public sphere. Whether this is from historical or personal burns, Christianity is avoided and often viewed as hostile, traditionalist, or unaccepting. In fact, only 56% of younger millennials consider themselves Christians, 8% practice non-Christian faiths, and

36% are unafliated or religious “nones.”1 Religious “nones” refers to those who are self-identifed atheists, agnostics, or involved in a religion of “nothing in particular,” which “now make up roughly 23% of the US adult population, a 7% increase from the Religious Landscape Study population in 2007.”2 The percentage of millennial religious “nones” continues to increase as the years advance. And “nearly one-in-fve Americans (18%) have moved in the other direction, saying that they were raised as Christians or members of another faith but that they now have no religious afliation.”3

Religion has since lost its signifcance to the youths of today. According to a Religious Landscape Study in 2014, of the thirty-fve thousand younger Millennial participants, 38% said religion was very important in their lives with 17% said it was not too important, and 16% claimed it was not important at all.4 Also, 46% of the younger Millennial population said they were guided on right or wrong by common sense versus the 23% who claimed they were guided by religion.5 In other words, the role of religion in the lives of Millennials and Gen Z individuals has little importance in their lives, little impact on their decision-making, and little impact on their sense of right and wrong. Although this population may not embrace spirituality through religion, they are highly spiritual and give spiritual meaning to other aspects of public life, including secular music and concerts. This begs the question: If Millennials and Gen Z

1 Religious Landscape Study, “Younger Millennials: Religious Composition of Younger Millennials,” Pew Research Center, 2014, https://www.pewforum.org/ religious-landscape-study/generational-cohort/younger-millennial/.

2 Michael Lipka, “A Closer Look at America’s Rapidly Growing Religious ‘Nones’,” Pew Research Center, May 13, 2015, https://www.pewresearch.org/facttank/2015/05/13/a-closer-look-at-americas-rapidly-growing-religious-nones/.

3 Michael Lipka, “A Closer Look.”

4 Religious Landscape Study, “Younger Millennials: Religious Composition.” individuals do not connect with Christianity, what is it about secular music or concerts that draw this population nearer? Christianity has lost its favor with the youth of today, leaving them lost and searching for new avenues of knowledge, truth, community, and self-discovery. It is through secular music and concerts that they fnd answers to life’s most difcult questions.

5 Ibid.

Unlike Christianity, individuals connect to themselves and others in unexplainable ways at secular concerts or music festivals. To the spiritual non-religious individual, concerts are a way to experience spirituality and phenomena outside of themselves. At concerts, people fnd community, thick connection, deep forgiveness, and an overwhelming sense of belonging. The challenge for Christians today is to understand this experience and fgure out how to witness to the people within this context. As religion is distanced from the public sphere, Christians must think of how to critically engage concert-goers and build connections to witness the Good News of Jesus unobtrusively and intentionally. This paper will provide a socio-cultural analysis of spirituality and secular concerts to then argue, given this meaning, that there is a dire need for Christians to engage with concert culture to present the gospel and convey the theological truths of Christianity.

To begin, this frst section will address and examine the socio-cultural meanings behind spirituality and secular concerts, which will later provide insight into the necessity of Christian engagement. Specifcally, it will answer a few questions: What draws Millennials and Gen Z individuals to secular concert experiences over religion, specifcally Christianity? What is the culture behind secular concerts? What do secular concerts, artists, and music ofer this population that Christianity does not? This section will begin by analyzing the key characteristics of secular concert culture. Then it will distinguish between the defnitions of religion and spirituality. Following the defnition of spirituality is an analysis of secular concerts as a spiritual experience, looking into the deifcation of band members and their hand in discipleship.

One of life’s biggest quests is self-discovery, looking to answer the question; Who am I and how do I ft into society? During this time of self-discovery, everyone is searching for meaning and how they connect to their fellow humans. Individuals begin to shape their identity around criteria like gender, sexual orientation, religion, and occupation. These identity markers can also be unifers. Shared characteristics, hobbies, or experiences bring people together, unifying humanity. One such experience that unites people under one identity is the concert experience. After considering the information gathered from a variety of sources, one common theme emerged as a key contributor to concert culture: unity in community. Those gathered at concerts felt seen, free, and part of a community unlike any other. They describe in great detail the beauty of diverse communities united under one love of music. The experience of unity in community at concerts leaves people wanting more. From this desire derives a newfound motivation to seek additional opportunities to encounter those with a similar devotion to music, including places like the Experience Music Project in Seattle, Washington.

The Experience Music Project is a museum and concert hall devoted to music. At its center is the Sky Church, an area designed by Paul Allen and inspired by the famous guitarist,

Jimi Hendrix, “who envisioned that one day there would be a place where people from all diferent backgrounds could gather and talk about, listen to, and celebrate music.”

6 The Sky Church was to be a place where people from all walks of life could gather and enjoy music in fellowship. However, for those who understand, it does not take a building like the Sky Church to “remind music fans that attending a concert is very much a spiritual experience,” where people gather together to “hear and experience music in a close, intimate, and often spiritual way.”7 Though the Sky Church is the vessel to a rich experience, it is not the location that matters, but the intimate, spiritual experience of music alongside people who understand its power. To these people, music is unifying. One individual puts it this way: “We were all lost in the moment, lost in ourselves, and joined together in our love and excitement of being in the same room as [the] band.”

8 The culture of secular concerts is defned by community and unity.

Leigh Robshaw, a once Catholic and now atheist writer and journalist, discusses the topic of rock concerts as a spiritual experience in a blog post “When rock concerts are a spiritual experience.” She described how she used to fnd comfort in the gathering of believers in the Catholic church, but as she grew older, she began to challenge the beliefs of the Church. Therefore, instead of fnding a connection with the people at her church, she found a more authentic community among concert-goers like herself. She wrote that concerts were a place where “the audience becomes united with the musicians

6 Beth Winegarner, “The Mystic in the Arena: The Concert as a Spiritual Journey,” Medium, March 10, 2020, https://bethwinegarner.medium.com/the-mystic-inthe-arena-the-concert-as-a-spiritual-journey-fdc935ce5768.

7 Beth Winegarner, “The Mystic in the Arena.”

8 Erin Bisesti, “The Spirituality in Concerts: What I discovered at a Florence and The Machine concert,” The Odyssey Online, May 24, 2016, https://www. theodysseyonline.com/the-spirituality-in-concerts.

114 | Alexandra Swink and you can feel a palpable sense of connection to the entire universe—or at least something greater than yourself—through the music.”9 Here, Robshaw illustrates her understanding of community as a concert culture marker in her description of the connection and purpose found under a united audience. Robshaw, as with many others, places value and meaning on her identity as a concert-goer. Again, Robshaw’s perception of concerts further proves the theory that Millennials and Gen Z individuals encounter the spiritual world without practicing a certain religious tradition.

Not only does this population understand one another in indescribable ways while attending a concert, but there is also a spiritual element. A rather large population of those who attend secular concerts and view them as a spiritual experience are those who grew up in the Church and have since left. Although this population does not classify themselves as religious, they still have a high regard for spirituality and often continue their relationship with the spiritual world after leaving the Church. One author describes her separation from the Church but not spirituality as follows: “Admittedly, like many adults who grew up spending more days than not in church, I would defne myself as more spiritual than religious on the grand spectrum of beliefs.”10 Now, Millennials and Gen Z individuals are classifying themselves as spiritual but not religious. This begs the question, what is the diference between religion and spirituality?

9 Leigh Robshaw, “When Rock Concerts Are a Spiritual Experience,” blog, March 18, 2013, https://www.leighrobshaw.net/when-rock-concerts-are-a-spiritualexperience/.

10 Erica Hawkins, “Losing my Religion and Finding Music: After I stopped going to church, concerts became my religious ritual,” Nylon Magazine, January 4, 2019, https://www.nylon.com/religion-music-concerts.