A Christian mission of glocal culture within riven societies in God’s world

Abstract

Globalisation today seems to be an implacable force at work trying to homogenise world cultures into the same format. Huntington’s well-known thesis sees a clash coming between Christian Western civilisation and the rest of the world.

This article argues against Huntington that civilised cultures with different identities have comparable structural features. Because contrary cultures are all human constructs with good and bad mixed in, they can, like human relatives, learn from and correct one another rather than demonise others.

It is posited that the deepest antagonism disturbing the world is not a Christian West versus the rest, but is largely the struggle between two tyrannical ideologies: a post-Christian capitalistic secularism and a theocratic fundamentalism. A biblical Christian mission of glocal culture formation (global awareness and local action) is offered as an alternative vision for our worsening dilemma.

This biblically-rooted diaconal way to be redemptively busy in salvaging cultural activity proffers concrete hope. The life work of Bennie van der Walt is cited as an example, and a few illustrations of glocal artistry provide evidence that such a Christian mission can be deed as well as talk.