Ahrens, ed. Michael Biehl and Amele A. Ekue (Frankfurt: Otto Lembeck, 2005), 29–44.
131. This accusation is expressed in several legends about Keysser who had allegedly removed sacred and powerful objects such as a cross, see Fugmann, “Geister,” 41–42.
132. Franco Zocca, “Religious Affiliation in Papua New Guinea According to the 2000 Census.” Catalyst 34 (2004): 41–56 and Zocca, “Religious Affiliation in Papua New Guinea According to the 2011 Census.” Catalyst 44 (2014): 107–16. There are however inconsistencies in the statistics, for example, the list of other churches changed over the year.
133. Figures obtained from the ELCPNG headquarter in Ambo, Lae in 2005.
134. James Barr, “A Survey of Ecstatic Phenomena and ‘Holy Spirit Movements’ in Melanesia.” Oceania 54 (1983): 109–32.
135. The following is based on the Final Report of the Office for Dialogue with the Lutheran Renewal Movement, Lae 2005.
The previous chapter has highlighted important steps in the mission history of Fiji and Papua New Guinea. It became clear that the present Melanesian Christianity is formed by both the traditional Melanesian religious worldviews and the Christian worldview the missionaries proclaimed. The relationship between the two appears in many different variations and forms, from syncretistic fusion to competition and rejection, and it is also influenced by the colonial and postcolonial history. Most interviews can only be understood if the implicit and explicit ways of experience are worked out. This chapter will try to summarize in typological manner these experiences of God so far as they appeared to be relevant to the interview partners in their view of conversion and renewal.
Blessings for This Life
For Melanesians, religion is experience. While most Christians would agree with that statement, fewer would agree that God must be experienced here and now in visible material signs and actions. As the pastor of a Lutheran congregation (mL) declared, “Papua New Guineans operate on the concrete level. They want to see God. God is an abstract concept. And that is why they want to see something in real life” (mL).
(Note that henceforth I will mark quotations from the interviews with the following abbreviations: m for male, f for female, p for male pastor; followed by L for member of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in PNG, M for member of the Methodist Church in Fiji, and P for member of the Pentecostal Church. Thus, pL means pastor of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in PNG. I have omitted repetitions and pruned the quotes, and if necessary, edited in brackets.)
God’s love is an abstract concept; its visible manifestation is material blessing. “They expect more material blessings rather than forgiveness from God. God’s love must come in a material form. If God really loves me, he will make my trade store be a good profit-making trade store” (pL).
Salvation is for Melanesians not transcendent but immanent, a total well-being or the state of liberation from hunger, fear, distress, and burdens and the restoration of the blessings believed to have been lost through some fatal mischief of the ancestors. The basis of this religious experience is the relationship to nature that provides what is necessary for life. “When you talk about creation you live it, you don’t just talk about it. You see the water fall, you see the corn seed; you put it in the soil and you see it grow. You see everything. The creation really comes to you, so the experiencing of God is not something remote, but it is something that is close to you” (pL).
Nature becomes an experience of grace, in Christian perspective provided by the Creator, in Melanesian perspective mediated through the ancestors and the spirits. Religion is “the belief in a cosmic order” with visible and invisible forces.1 According to Mantovani,
Melanesian religions, in general, are concerned with the acquisition, maintenance, increase, and celebration of “life.” The signs of life are health, wealth, prestige, success, security, abundance of what is needed, good relationships [. . .]. The main practical concern of this religion is to keep the channels of ‘life’ unclogged: to create, mend and strengthen relationship with everybody and everything; with the whole cosmos [. . .]. Religions are not concerned with the truth but with success, i.e. with the acquisition of “life.” True, in a way, is what is successful and untrue what fails [. . .]. Cosmic religions are not the answers to an intellectual quest for meaning but for the pragmatic quest for survival. “Life” is basically a gift and the only access to it is through blind obedience to the prescribed way, i.e. to the ritual [. . .]. Religions are not eschatological but immanent: the “life” must be experienced here and now, not in the life to come.2
For Christians this cosmic pattern, which is clearly recognizable in the search for a blessed life, is molded into the theistic pattern. It is God who provides everything, and the right relationship to God determines the success in life. However, the expectation remains that faith and the church brings practical material benefits. This explains much of the disappointment if the church fails to deliver these.
It is useful to summarize some basic principles of the Melanesian religion and briefly indicate how they contrasted the Christian teachings brought by the missionaries, although such a generalized abbreviation is always problematic.3 The present results of the consecutive encounters and transformations are one theme of this study.
(1) Melanesian religions did not separate transcendence and immanence. It aimed at good life in terms of material and spiritual well-being. The material and the spiritual realm were undivided. A good life was a life in harmony with the group, with abundance of food, children, strength, and success in wars and barter. A religion was useless if it did not offer access to better life. The afterlife was of little concern. Melanesian religions did not expect retributions such as reward and punishment in the afterlife, they reckoned however with reward and punishment in this life.4
Christianity introduced the quest for eternal salvation and the twofold expectation of heaven or hell. It cared also for a better life here and now with schools, health stations, and agricultural and industrial schemes.
(2) In Melanesia the natural and the supernatural worlds were intertwined with deities and spirits directly affecting the well-being or ill-being of the people. The forces of the spirits directly affected life, health, well-being, and death. A lot of energy was spent on relating to the spirits in order to access these powers of life. The question of their origin and the High God behind their power was less relevant. Christianity also knows about the power of spirits and demons and the biblical stories are full of them, but their power is broken by the transcendent God. The focus is on the direct relationship to God and the spirits are rather a subversion and danger to it.
(3) Life was experienced as relation between humans, spirits, and the cosmos. Salvation happened only in relation with the group, not individually. If the relations were in disorder, people experienced mischief and the reasons had to be established and removed. The mischief of one affected the others; therefore, the salvation of one depended on the others. Until today the basic social relationship has been reciprocal exchange. Giving and receiving establishes relationship, social boundaries, and status. This is not limited to singular transactions; it is a continuous flow over generations. This includes the spirits, who must be placated with gifts, but can also be manipulated like other humans. Reciprocal exchange is also part of the biblical view of relationship, especially in the Old Testament; gifts and manipulations of spirits are however forbidden, and a manipulation of God is impossible.
(4) The “logic of retribution” is, according to Trompf, the fundamental
