There are those who believe that Europe now stands at the very cutting edge of all that is best for the future of humanity. Urbane, pacifistic, humanitarian, ecologically aware, and wealthy – the nations of Europe possess the keys for a global era of peace.
Cleansed of its imperial arrogance by two world wars, Europe is positioned for true international leadership. On the contrary, the United States as a superpower still engages the world with the dangerous, often violent, ego trips of a juvenile just learning to drive.
So goes the script. And as usual with such visions, there is truth in it.
Yet that’s not the whole picture. Europe is also a tortured, uncertain mix of ancient tribes facing the possibility of virtual extinction. In the face of demographic decline, nation states are paying handsome sums to encourage women to have babies. Children’s playgrounds in some places are empty, or the benches occupied by seniors sunning themselves.
The great colonializing histories of Spain, Portugal, France, Holland, Italy, and Germany recede further and further into the past. Even England, heir to the Victorian “the-sun-never-sets-on-the-British-Empire,” begins to lose the aura of universal ombudsmanship. Is classical Western civilization fading like a song in the night?
The truth lies somewhere between the two caricatures. The Europe which once sent its “missionaries” – political, economic, and religious – into every part of the world still exists. Europeans are still immensely wealthy and numerous. Yet the old missions have radically changed.
In short, though Western civilization, and Europe in particular, has set the stage for globalization, yet there is a deep-down angst in its soul. The old certainties no longer hold. Simultaneously, the peoples of the erstwhile colonial world are streaming into the mono-cultural enclaves (read nation states), and their sometimes shrill voices are increasingly piercing the political and social ante-rooms of European privilege. Living rooms across the continent ring with the resultant debates.
Into this immensely proud and anxious world, we go as Christian witnesses, convinced that the re-birth or revitalization of the European church, after many decades of decline, could be an incredible source of life not only for Europe but for the rest of the world as well. We do not go alone, but we link arms with European brothers and sisters wherever we can. Increasingly, though, we hear them say, “Please come. Here we are almost overwhelmed. Walk with us.”
No missionary task to which we have been called is more difficult, yet none more potentially rewarding.
Richard Showalter is EMM president.
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Eastern Mennonite Missions is an Anabaptist mission agency supported primarily by approximately 200 congregations in Lancaster Conference of the Mennonite Church. Other churches, conferences, and agencies in North America also participate in the mission, including approximately 100 other churches from Global Community Network, Good News Fellowship, and Atlantic Coast, Franklin, and New York Mennonite conferences.
EMM partners with an international network of Anabaptist-oriented churches and regional mission centers on six continents. EMM is also one of the four founding members of the International Missions Association (IMA), a group of Anabaptist mission agencies/churches from Asia, Africa, North America, and Latin America
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