‘A pretty decent sort of bloke’ : towards the quest for an Australian Jesus

From many Aboriginal elders, such as Tjangika Napaltjani, Bob Williams and Djiniyini Gondarra, to painters, such as Arthur Boyd, Pro Hart and John Forrester-Clack, from historians, such as Manning Clark, and poets, such as Maureen Watson, Francis Webb and Henry Lawson, to celebrated novelists, such as Joseph Furphy, Patrick White and Tim Winton, the figure of Jesus has occupied an endearing and idiosyncratic place in the Australian imagination. It is evidence enough that ‘Australians have been anticlerical and antichurch, but rarely antiJesus’ (Piggin 2000:163). But which Jesus? In what follows, I seek to listen to what some Australians make of Jesus, and to consider some theological implications of their contributions for the enduring quest for an Australian JesusDr Goroncy is participating in the research project, ‘Gender Studies and Practical Theology Theory Formation’, directed by Prof. Dr Yolanda Dreyer, Department of Practical Theology, Faculty of Theology, University of Pretoria.HTS 75th Anniversary Maake Masango Dedication.http://www.hts.org.zaam2020Practical Theolog

Social identity, ethnicity and the gospel of reconciliation

Rev. Dr Jason Goroncy is participating as research fellow with Prof. Dr Yolanda Dreyer, Faculty of Theology, University of Pretoria, South Africa.This article attends to the relationship between our ethnic, social and cultural identities, and the creation of the new communal identity embodied in the Christian community. Drawing upon six New Testament texts – Ephesians 2:11–22; Galatians 3:27–28, 1 Corinthians 7:17–24 and 10:17, 1 Peter 2:9–11 and Revelation 21:24–26 – it is argued that the creation of a new and prime identity in Christ does not abrogate other creaturely identities, even as it calls for the removal of such as boundary markers. Catholicity, in other words, is intrinsically related to the most radical particularity, and demands an ongoing work of discernment and of judgement vis-à-vis the gospel itself. Those baptised into Christ are now to live in the reality of Christ who is both the boundary and centre of their existence, a boundary which includes all humanity in its cultural, ethnic, gendered, social and historical particularities.http://www.hts.org.zaam2013mn201