Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies

In traditional churches today, it appears that youths’ migration to Pentecostalism is already on-going and gradually attracting concern. On the other hand, church leaders in Pentecostal churches are progressively creating more flexible youth-driven frameworks. But much as this is the case, there is still disconnection between these efforts and understanding the adaptive capacity of the youth. Studying factors accounting for this attraction to Pentecostalism is necessary as the youth is one of the largest people groups today. This is a challenge, and one that has continually put church leaders on their toes over the years. However, the threat of a complete exodus of the youth from traditional churches is now being correctly addressed as not merely a denominational concern, but a contemporary issue that has tangible effects on youth, family and church life. This paper will realistically explore the strongest links to this attraction/migration and how we can maintain a successful youth ministry in our churches without necessarily losing the youth. While each church and each youth will make their own decisions, the strategy for youth ministry should remain biblical and requires close examination. This paper will present several serious considerations for the youth in Pentecostalism to determine their level of commitment.

The advancement of the technological culture, especially with the new web-based social media, presents a huge set of ethical and social challenges for the church and does more than simply change how we see things. Practicing the Christian mission in today’s media-rich world, where young people are not merely consumers, but also active creators of information can be very challenging. Cultural themes allow young people to process their uniqueness and engage the wider society in a creative bricolage, embracing certain aspects of their culture as fundamental features of their identity. These themes have brought issues of connectedness, relationality, and authenticity to the forefront. At core, quoting Newbigin, “the greatest intellectual and practical task facing the Church…is the development of a truly missionary encounter” (Newbigin 1993: 236) that will engage this very form of culture. More so, there is a need to redefine/understand the ontology the social media is creating and how this new technology creates new faith relationships and mission practice. I present a case of culture as a crisis and opportunity for the church.

One of the biggest news stories of the past decade is the awful fall in the number of domestic missionaries in Christianity’s center of gravity from first-generation mission countries in North America and Western Europe to the global south—particularly to Africa. An obvious and ironic consequence of this evolution in the Christian movement has been the result of an insufficient supply of domestic missionaries as compared to the 1800s towards the second-half of the 20th century. While this seems to be the case, church leaders in Africa on the other hand, are progressively creating more flexible, postmodern and auxiliary platforms to bring the gospel to these areas. These efforts have not yet been proven unsuccessful as against the traditional backdrop. But much as this is the case, there is still disconnection between these efforts and understanding the third millennium approach to missions in our society. Studying this dramatic change and what generated this evolution, is necessary as the African Church begins to shuffle out new ways to preach the gospel in the new millennium. This paper updates the reader with these changes and brings new light to the status quo. Ultimately, as each church and each Missions Agency makes their own decisions, the strategy for “missions” remains biblical and requires close examination.

The author looks at the God image experience as an attachment relationship experience with God. Hence, arguing that the God image experience is borne originally out of a parent–child attachment contagion, in such a way that God is often represented in either secure or insecure attachment patterns. The article points out that insecure God images often develop head-to-head with God concepts in a believer’s emotional experience of God. On the other hand, the author describes God concepts as indicators of a religious faith and metaphorical standards for regulating insecure attachment patterns. The goal of this article, however, is to highlight the relationship between God images and God concepts, and to provide a hermeneutical process for interpreting and surviving the God image experience.

The article is a qualitative study that focuses on the authenticity and self-constructions of Christian millennials in Africa. While exploring how 15 respondents manifested their authentic self-behaviours using a case study design, the hallmark of the study was to observe the common coping mechanism of self-regulation, adopted by respondents to deal with their internal crisis. This coping strategy was employed as they remained true to self by creating new “authentic” images of themselves in the forms of the borderline self, the promissory self, the hyphenated self, and the religious self. By implication, looking at the issue of authenticity from an African context has produced an African conceptualisation of authenticity. I argue that African authenticity can be understood by interpreting Africa’s voices of self-expression and images of self-definition, resonating within various African contexts in hope for some kind of cathartic and authentic living experience.

One of the biggest news stories in the past decade has been the increasing impact of the internet and information technology on young people, from first-generation mission countries in North America and Western Europe to the global south—particularly in Africa. This advancement has fueled the growth of a “connected” and “plugged in” cohort of young people known as millennials, who are utilizing this medium to improve their social status and create potential for economic and professional growth. However, while the Internet has created opportunities for growth and development on the continent, many online platforms and services continue to restrict full access to certain parts of the global south. Hence, in some African countries, for example, opportunities for scaling innovation and development can be very difficult to access. Consequently, as our daily activities sync with technology, concerns over access to the Internet economy and the undue restrictions over internet services persist. Using the storytelling research methodology, this paper seeks to highlight why geo-restrictions and regional lockouts over internet-related services seem to be a major challenge for millennials in Africa, who are actors in innovation by virtue of their contribution to the growth of the internet technology. We argue that this enforced regional lockout not only deflates the productivity and creativity of African millennials, but also points to a functionalist view of internet inequality constituted through the "divides" of accessibility, censored participation, and acceptability in the internet economy. Understanding the staggering nature of this problem would require telling the stories of young internet entrepreneurs and innovators in Africa, who continue to be marginalized while investing and contributing to the internet economy.

This study examines the role of the Christian God as an attachment figure, using the attachment language criteria of a strong and enduring affectionate bond. Respondents were 15 anxiously attached Christian youths, purposefully selected for in-depth interviews to explore their God attachment language and God concepts. The results show how the respondents saw God as a target for their proximity-seeking behaviors, albeit conflicted in their relationship experience. They also used some form of metaphorical theology that represented God to them as either stronger or wiser, as a safe haven for security, or as a response to their internal conflict.

The intention of this paper is to interpret the ontological conditions of youth identity crisis missionally. This is first done by conceptualising identity crisis as a psychological phenomenon using frameworks of authenticity and attachment to explain the impact of early attachment abuse, abandonment depression, insecure attachment anxiety with God, and self-regulation on the identity formation of the youth. Secondly, the paper introduces a missional hermeneutic that provides an interpretative framework for coping with the crises of identity amongst young people. A missional hermeneutic of care for coping with the crisis of identity formation, therefore, elaborates on the missional basis of biblical interpretation as a powerful framework within which to interpret a skewed, conflicted identity. The author herewith proposes a missional opportunity that can activate the missional consciousness of young people in their time of crisis and identity formation. Furthermore, the author insists that this missional methodology can be a very useful strategy for producing therapeutic change in young people and can help youth ministry workers and pastoral caregivers to reframe the crisis of youth identity from the perspective of 'missio Dei'.

The article is an attempt to make sense of the different interdisciplinary perspectives associated with people’s attachment to places with a view to construct a holistic template for understanding people-place relationships and experiences. The author took note of the theoretical contributions of Jorgensen & Stedman (2001), Scannell & Gifford (2010), and Seamon (2012, 2014) to construct an integrative framework for understanding emotional links to places and people’s perception and experience of places. This was done with the intention of illuminating the meaning of place and the different “places” people get attached to. The paper concludes by incorporating different place frameworks with the intention of establishing a holistic model for understanding the various attributes and perceptions of people-place relationships and experiences.

Spirituality and well-being are explored through frameworks of attachment and authenticity respectively. Spirituality was defined as an attachment to God experience, while conceptualizing well-being as the pursuit of authenticity and ability to stay true to one's self. 100 South African youths were recruited to participate in the study using the Attachment to God Inventory and Authenticity Scale to assess how dimensions of spirituality and well-being relate to each other. Results show significant correlations, proving that an insecure attachment to God experience can be a threat to maintaining psychological well-being, whereas having a secure relationship with God would naturally dispense a sense of authenticity and well-being.

The study explores the individual differences in the experience of faith formation using the framework of attachment theory, as it looks at what inspires attachment behaviours toward God. The experience of faith formation is herewith conceptualised in this study as a care-giving experience, watered by reciprocity of proximity with a divine attachment figure. The findings suggest four individual pathways in which the faith of young people was formed. These pathways were seen as remedies for previous insecure attachment experience with unavailable human attachment figures, and as a means of enhancing an already positive attachment with human relational partners. In-depth interviews were conducted with fifteen Christian youths of various racial backgrounds who were active members of different church denominations in Stellenbosch, Western Cape, South Africa. The data collected from the respondents position youth faith formation as an attachment phenomenon.

Attachment and authenticity experiences were discussed as the building blocks of youth identity crisis. It was proposed that recognizing these central themes as the two greatest needs of young people would be the first practical step towards advocating for the youth in crisis.

A presentation that conceptualizes a hermeneutical approach that privileges the missio Dei, or the mission of God, as the key to interpreting the stories of identity crisis and experiences of anxiety. The original notion of a missional hermeneutic stems from Wright and Hensbuger's works, and have thus been used to understand what is meant by a missional hermeneutic of care for Christian counselors.

The paper explores the relationship between attachment to God (AG) and authenticity/inauthenticity among Christian youths in relation to a range of socio-demographic variables. Cross-sectional data were collected from 100 South African Christian youths using measures of AG and authenticity/inauthenticity. The correlation results reveal that feelings of insecurity in terms of having anxiety in a relationship with God is positively related to self-alienation (feeling out of touch with oneself) and accepting external influences (conforming to the standards and expectations of others), but negatively correlated to authentic living (being in tune with one’s self). Feelings of insecurity in terms of avoidant God-attachment was also related to self-alienation. In addition, demographic differences were observed for gender and church denomination. These results suggest that insecurity with God may either be linked to feelings of authenticity or self-estrangement among Christian youths and have broad implications, both for clinical usage and further cross-cultural research.

This paper explores the ways in which attachment disruptions might increase the risk of adult religious psychopathology by drawing parallels between the possible symbolisms lying behind religious violence and the concept of attachment. It is first argued that the relationship between a religious believer and a religious figure can be explained as an attachment experience. Secondly, it is proposed that when a religious attachment figure becomes a target of slander, or an action is perpetrated to disrupt the bond with such a figure, the religious believer may be predisposed to defensive, adaptive reactions, in the form of protest, despair, or detachment, to protect their attachment bond and resolve the disruptions that threaten their religious attachment identity. Support for this theoretical proposition was obtained through discourse analyses of three case examples (Charlie Hebdo vs al-Qaeda, Boko Haram vs the Nigerian government, and Pastor Terry Jones vs Islamic radicalisation), which position attachment theory as an alternative explanatory framework for conceptualising religious violence as a form of religious attachment-psychopathology—aimed at safeguarding the affectional bond with a religious figure from whom one may have developed a sense of identity and safe haven.