• Title/Summary/Keyword: God's Grace

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The Practice of 'Liberated-ness': An Education Model for Protestant Spiritual Practice (개신교 '자유케 됨'의 영성에 기초한 기독교 영성교육 모형: '자유케 됨'의 실천)

  • Hwang, In-Hae
    • Journal of Christian Education in Korea
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    • v.68
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    • pp.375-415
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    • 2021
  • Although the interest in Christian education of spirituality has increased recently, the practice of the education of spirituality in the Korean Church has been fragmented in the contents and methods without any clear educational purpose of the Protestant tradition. This requires a creative study to seek out the contents and method best suited to realizing the educational purpose of the Protestant tradition, through a rigorous academic methodology. This study proposes just such a creative model for the education of spirituality with an educational purpose based on the core ethos of the Protestant spirituality, integrating the long tradition of spiritual practices of Christianity. First, I survey the teachings on 'the life of faith' of the main leaders of the Protestant church, including Martin Luther, John Calvin, and John Wesley. Through this process, I reveal 'liberated-ness' to be the common purpose of the Protestant leaders, and the core of the practices for that purpose are 'the means of grace,' which has a different meaning from that of the Roman Catholic tradition. I construct the meaning of 'liberated-ness' in a dynamic manner, which begins with the 'liberating will' of God, and is followed by the 'self-giving will' of the believer as the response to the 'grace' of the 'liberating will.' The contact point of these two 'wills' is what I call 'the living membrane of faith.' As a creative synthesis of the above discussions, I propose a model of 'the practice of liberated-ness' for an education in spiritual practice. The purpose of this education is for the learner to become a person who continuously experiences ever-increasing 'liberated-ness' through continuous personal 'encounters' with God, and to become ever more faithful in carrying out practices for the 'liberated-ness' of her or his neighbors. The relationship between the teacher and the learner is that of personal 'encounter' as put forth by Sherrill, and also incorporates elements of 'co-authorship' as conceptualized by Kim. I transform and rename major practices of spiritual discipline according to a principle of 'liberated-ness' based on the Protestant tradition, and these comprise the main content of my spirituality education model. They include: 'lectio divina of encounter,' 'prayer facing the Lord,' 'service in liberation,' 'reflection of liberated-ness,' and 'mutual spiritual direction.' The teaching and learning process draws on Dykstra's methods of coaching and mentoring. The key environment is that of a 'sacramental community' as defined by Moore. Evaluation can be performed only by the learner her/himself. The significance of this model is that it creatively inherits and succeeds the tradition of Christian spiritual discipline from the early church onwards by transforming it through a Protestant spirituality of 'liberated-ness.'

Study on the Application of Christian Education by Zeraim, Jewish Talmud (유대교 탈무드 제라임(Zeraim)의 기독교교육 적용방안에 대한 연구)

  • Ok, Jang-Heum
    • Journal of Christian Education in Korea
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    • v.64
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    • pp.109-144
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    • 2020
  • In the 21st century, Our Korean churches should be reborn and truly restored in the situation korean churches have been criticized socially and adversely affected Christian missions. In this situation, the researcher analyzed the Zeraim(Agriculture) of the Jewish scripture Talmud as an alternative to solving the problems of the Korean church. In order to achieve the purpose of this research, the background of the emergence of Talmud, the main contents of Talmud Zeraim, and the application of Talmud Zeraim's Christian education were divided and analyzed. Through the Jewish Talmud Zeraim, five possibilities of application were suggested to solve the problems of Korean churches. First, it is a Christian education for a blessed life. Second, it is a Christian education that pursues social justice, life, and integrity of creation. Third, it is Christian education for a life that appreciates God's grace. Fourth, it is a Christian education for realizing the commandments and practicing the teachings. Fifth, it is a Christian education that pursues conventional spirituality. Researchers believe that the mission and direction of Christian education without losing their identity and faith under the numerous hardships in history should be found in the faith and life of Jews who have regained their traditional spirituality centered on the law (Torah) and Talmud which are the God's words. From now on, the Korean church should boldly clear up its mistakes and move on to education that humbly accepts the sounds of social criticism and can make a fresh recovery.

Parish Nursing : A New Challenge for Primary Health Care (지역교회간호(Parish Nursing) - 일차건강간호를 위한 새로운 도약)

  • No, Yu-Ja;Baek, Yeong-Mi
    • The Korean Nurse
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    • v.37 no.2
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    • pp.53-62
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    • 1998
  • ursing as a profession is characterized by its holistic, mind-body-spirit approach to the patient. Also, nurses have historically been the leaders in health education and promotion. Parish nursing has a great potential for providing primary preventive health care. services as well as assisting people to access the health care system. While working in the community, parish nurses see the church as the new arena for delivering health care services. The parish nurse program was introduced by Granger Westberg in 1984. The concept of parish nursing is based on several beliefs; health is multidimensional and affects all aspects of an individual-physical, psychological, social, and spiritaul being. Parish nursing is one model in which churches can cooperatively work with health care institutions to address the needs of their parishioners. The role of the parish nurse is emphasized in four basic area: a) health education, b) health counseling, c) referal services, and d) facilitation and organization of support groups within the congregation. The parish nurse programs work chiefly in congregation or commuity where a certain language of faith is ready at hand. This means that the parish nurse works in an ecology of meanings and care which encourages the drawing on the message of God's grace, the practices and habits it encourages. The parish nurse may be involved in the church's health ministries and may work on either paid or volunteer basis; however, one of the most important qualification of the parish nurse is to have the nursing knowledge and skills to practice within the standards of Nursing Practice Act. The completion of standards of practice for professional nurses practicing as parish nurses had been identified as a priority by the HMA Executive Board (1996, HMA). In conclusion, parish nursing promotes health and healing by empowering the faith community, family, or individual to incorporate health and healing practices. There are several preconditions that should proceed to establish the foundation for successful development of the parish nursing program in Korea. First, reciprocal relationship with home health nursing should be considered. Second, correct terms and concepts of parish nursing should be studied and understood. Third, systematic study and investigation should be followed for further development of parish nursing. Fourth, strengths and weaknesses of different models should be studied to develop proper model of parish nursing for Korean situation. Finally, consensus of standardized education program and corporation with various religious communities as well as health institutions should be established. When these preconditions are met, the role of parish nursing as a new program for the promotion of holistic health will be established.

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Is corporate rebranding a double-edged sword? Consumers' ambivalence towards corporate rebranding of familiar brands

  • Phang, Grace Ing
    • Asia Marketing Journal
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    • v.15 no.4
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    • pp.131-159
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    • 2014
  • Corporate rebranding has been evident in the qualitative corporate rebranding studies as an imposed organizational change that induces mixed reactions and ambivalent attitudes among consumers. Corporate rebranding for the established and familiar corporate brands leads to more ambivalent attitudes as these companies represent larger targets for disparaging information. Consumers are found to hold both positive and negative reactions toward companies and brands that they are familiar with. Nevertheless, the imposed change assumption and ambivalent attitude, in particular corporate rebranding, have never been widely explored in the quantitative corporate rebranding studies. This paper aims to provide a comprehensive empirical examination of the ambivalence towards rebrandingrebranded brand attitude-purchase intention relationships. The author proposes that corporate rebranding for familiar corporate brands is a double-edged sword that not only raises the expectation for better performance, but also induces conflicted and ambivalent attitudes among consumers. These consumers' ambivalent attitudes are influenced by both the parent brands-related and general attitude factors which further affect their rebranded brand attitude and purchase intention. A total of 156 useable questionnaires were collected from Malaysian working adults; and two established Malaysian airfreight operators were utilized as the focal parent brands. The study found a significant impact of prior parent brand attitudes on ambivalence towards rebranding (ATR). The parent brand attitudes served as anchors in influencing how new information was processed (Mazaheri et al., 2011; Sherif & Hovland, 1961) and closely related to behavioral intention (Prislin & Quellete, 1996). The ambivalent attitudes experienced were higher when individuals held both positive and negative reactions toward the parent brands. Consumers also held higher ambivalent attitudes when they preferred one of the parent brands; while disliked the other brand. The study also found significant relationships between the lead brand and the rebranded brand attitude; and between the partner brands and ATR. The familiar but controversial partner brand contributed significantly to the ambivalent attitudes experienced; while the more established lead brand had significant impact on the rebranded brand attitude. The lead and partner brands, though both familiar, represented different meanings to consumers. The author attributed these results to the prior parent brand attitudes, the skepticism and their general ambivalence toward the corporate rebranding. Both general attitude factors (i.e. skepticism and general ambivalence towards rebranding) were found to have significant positive impacts on ATR. Skeptical individuals questioned the possibility of a successful rebranding (Chang, 2011) and were more careful with their evaluations toward 'too god to be true' or 'made in heaven' pair of companies. The embedded general ambivalent attitudes that people held toward rebranding could be triggered from the associative network by the ambiguous situation (Prislin & Quellete, 1996). In addition, the ambivalent rebranded brand attitude was found to lower down purchase intention, supporting Hanze (2001), Lavine (2001) and van Harreveld et al. (2009)'s studies. Ambivalent individuals were found to prefer delay decision making by choosing around the mid-ranged points in 'willingness to buy' scale. The study provides several marketing implications. Ambivalence management is proven to be important to corporate rebranding to minimize the ambivalent attitudes experienced. This could be done by carefully controlling the parent brands-related and general attitude factors. The high ambivalent individuals are less confident with their own conflicted attitudes and are motivated to get rid of the psychological discomfort caused by these conflicted attitudes (Bell & Esses, 2002; Lau-Gesk, 2005; van Harreveld et al., 2009). They tend to process information more deeply (Jonas et al., 1997; Maio et al., 2000; Wood et al., 1985) and pay more attention to message that provides convincible arguments. Providing strong, favorable and convincible message is hence effective in alleviating consumers' ambivalent attitudes. In addition, brand name heuristic could be utilized because the rebranding strategy sends important signal to consumers about the changes that happen or going to happen. The ambivalent individuals will pay attention to both brand name heuristic and rebranding message in their effort to alleviate the psychological discomfort caused by ambivalent attitudes. The findings also provide insights to Malaysian and airline operators for a better planning and implementation of corporate rebranding exercise.

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