1 of 3
Donald E. Miller is Firestone Professor of Religion at the University of Southern California and executive director of the Center for Religion and Civic Culture, which launched the Pentecostal and Charismatic Research Initiative in 2009. He is the author, co-author, or editor of nine books, including Finding Faith: The Spiritual Quest of the Post-Boomer Generation, with Richard Flory (2008); Global Pentecostalism: The New Face of Christian Social Engagement, with Ted Yamamori (2007); Armenia: Portraits of Survival and Hope (2003); and Reinventing American Protestantism (1997).
In the November/December 2002 issue of Books & Culture, Timothy Sato interviewed Don Miller about his ongoing study of Global Pentecostalism. Much work has been done since then, and it seemed liked a good time to take up the conversation again. (For more information about the Pentecostal and Charismatic Research Initiative, visit usc.edu/pcri.)
How has your understanding of Pentecostalism changed over time as you have been engaged in research around the world?
At some point early on in the project, I felt that I made a turn in my own interpretation of what I was witnessing, from potentially writing a book that could have been debunking, maybe even cynical at points, to wanting to try to explain why Pentecostalism is the fastest growing religious movement in the world. That was based on what I felt were extremely authentic individuals that we were encountering—not just clergy, but hundreds of lay persons as well. And seeing how the lives of individuals were being transformed, not just religiously, but economically, physically. I think that one thing that continually impressed me was the vision of Pentecostals—and that they were often able to go against all odds to realize these visions. To see that this was not hype; these were people who were putting their own lives on the line, who were getting their hands dirty in the slums of Cairo or in the townships of South Africa.
At a purely personal, spiritual level, it had a profound effect on me. My worldview actually changed in the process of the project, and I became much more open to the possibility that there are dimensions of reality that we normally exclude from a Western, scientific, Enlightenment perspective.
Obviously, there were times when I felt there was manipulation going on, particularly in some of the "prosperity gospel" churches that we visited, even though we didn't actually study them. There were other instances where one could have a purely naturalistic explanation of something. But in the last chapter of Global Pentecostalism, picking up a hint from the opening chapter, Ted Yamamori and I write about something called "the S factor," the Spirit with a capital S. We make the argument that if you exclude the Spirit from religion, and particularly Pentecostal religion, it may be difficult to explain many of the things that occur, or at least you have to go through mental gymnastics to explain certain phenomena. This is not to exclude the role of social class, the role of race and ethnicity, the role of culture more generally, because these are factors that shape every experience. But there is this other dimension that needs to be considered.
Are Pentecostal congregations participating in development work in their communities?
These congregations are starting to understand that you need to address issues in a more systemic manner, inspired, perhaps, by their contact with various NGOs. I believe that there is another possible factor. In the last decade or so, many non-Pentecostal evangelicals have developed a much stronger consciousness of the Christian's obligation to be a transformative agent in the world, and not just focus on conversion. There is a very permeable boundary between Pentecostals and evangelicals, who are oftentimes in conversation with each other, who meet each other at conferences and the like. Pentecostals may have been somewhat slower to develop an awareness of the holistic gospel than evangelicals, at least evangelicals in the United States. But when you look globally, Pentecostals in the developing world are actually practicing the holistic gospel more fully than their counterparts in the United States. So it will be intriguing to see what results from this shift in the locus of Christianity to the southern hemisphere; perhaps there will be a reverse missionary movement, with the developing world being the laboratory in which new forms of social ministry are created, and then exported back to the "developed" world.
share this page
RSS Feed
