Call for Papers on Short-Term Missions
The STM movement is transforming the ways in which global ministry is being done. According to Robert Wuthnow, 1.6 million US church members traveled abroad in 2005 on STM trips. Billions of dollars go into such trips. A majority of these trips last between 7 and 14 days.
This is a grassroots, populist movement - without close links historically to theological or missiological studies, or indeed to any academic field of study. We would like to invite scholars who've researched the phenomenon, or practitioner-scholars with extensive first-hand experience working with STM, or simply leading practitioners of STM to prepare papers for presentation at our conference.
We would like papers which are grounded in research and/or extensive experience, which are informed by wise and practically oriented missiological insights, which cover a wide range of topics and issues in short-term missions, and which will be of value to mission pastors, youth pastors, medical practitioners, adult leaders of STM trips, and to students and professors of mission. That is, we want papers which bridge the divide between academics and practitioners.
Although publication plans are still under development, it is expected that publishing opportunities will emerge for many of the papers presented at the conference.
Possible topics to explore:
- Short-Term Missions as a Part of Youth Ministry: Leading an annual short-term mission trip is now part of the job description of many youth pastor. A wide range of possible papers could explore this phenomenon and attempt to provide help to the youth pastors who are expected to supervise such ministry trips.
- Mission Pastors and the Sending Church: Many larger churches now organize their own mission initiatives, often under the supervision of a mission pastor. Again a wide array of possible papers which explore these new ministry patterns and the role of mission pastors would be appropriate.
- Medical Missions: Medical short-term mission teams represent a sizeable proportion of all short-term activity, and merit careful attention, both in terms of medical and spiritual practices and outcomes.
- Other common activities in STM: Teaching English as a Second Language, construction, drama, etc. could all receive careful attention.
- Legal issues: What is the legal context in which STM is being carried out? Lawyers have now discovered short-term missions. What are the issues of liability, screening of leadership, criminal background checks, etc. that churches and other organizations might wish to attend to?
- The monied dimensions of STM. Travel is expensive, and a majority of STM involves travel from areas where churches have material resources to areas where there are churches and believers experiencing comparative lack of material resources. In what ways does and should short-term missions involve resource sharing? How do these differences of economic resources, and the ways they are or are not shared, affect issues of decision making and power? Etc.
- Partnership and receiving communities: Although short-term missions is carried out with the goal of benefiting others, and typically in partnership with local Christians, interestingly most research has focused on outcomes/benefits in the lives of the STM missionary and almost no research has focused carefully on recipients, hosts, and local partners of short-term mission groups. A high priority for our conference and any subsequent publication will be an attention to partnership relations with host Christians, and surrounding people-and outcomes for receiving groups.
- How short-term missionaries themselves are changed? Research findings showing changes in the lives of those who do STM will be appreciated. If research shows lack of changes, then if the research can also point to factors which might improve the outcomes it will be especially appreciated. That is, presenters are encouraged not merely to treat all short-term missions as equivalent and to assess whether STM is good or bad, but rather to explore the varying ways in which short-term missions is carried out and the differential results of various ways of doing short-term, or of doing prefield, on-field, or post-field training of various sorts.
- STM as practiced by diverse Christian communities. Studies on what is happening with short-term missions in Singapore or Korea or Australia, or among Korean American or Hispanic churches, will be particularly valued. STM is not only a North American phenomenon - and we would like our conference to reflect this.
Who should be a presenter?
Missiologists, youth ministries specialists, mission administrators and mission pastors with missiological training, anthropologists, sociologists, and top leaders of short-term missions who have a scholarly and/or missiological bent. Anyone who has done research on any aspect of short-term missions, or who-through extensive experience-is able to provide insight and understanding to some aspect of STM which has not yet been explored. We would particularly like to hear from African Americans, Hispanics, Asian Americans, and Christian leaders from other parts of the world (Africa, India, Latin America, etc.).
What other considerations are involved?
Papers which appropriately build on some body of literature will be especially appreciated. This may involve scholarly writings on short-term missions (see below). But this may also involve anthropology of tourism literature, literature on social capital, on service learning, on study abroad, on adventure education, on volunteerism, on youth and religion, on teaching English as a second language, on medical anthropology, on intercultural competencies, etc.
Anyone wishing to explore a possible paper/presentation is invited to correspond with Robert Priest, or to simply submit a title, abstract, and brief bio or vita, to: stm@teds.edu
Finally, presenters are strongly encouraged to read, interact with, and build on the growing body of writing by scholars on short-term missions. See, for example, the attached bibliography.