Conference at Regent marks unusual collaboration

VIRGINIA BEACH

A scholarly colloquium on missiology next week at Regent University represents an unusual collaboration between mainline Protestants and evangelicals often perceived as at-odds with one another.

The May 27-29 conference is being convened by the National Council of Churches, the Virginia Council of Churches and Regent’s divinity school. Both councils are often seen as theologically liberal, while Regent’s founder, chancellor and president is conservative Christian broadcaster Pat Robertson.

The colloquium’s theme is “The Missiology of Jamestown 1607 and Its Implications for 2007 and Beyond.” Missiology refers to church mission work, including the propagation of Christianity and evangelization of non-Christians.

The Virginia Council of Churches proposed the topic following Virginia’s observance of the 400th anniversary of the Jamestown settlement in 1607. The council also works with Virginia’s Indian communities.

Cultures collided in 1607 as colonizers from Christian societies competed with and evangelized native peoples in North America, said the Rev. Jonathan Barton , general minister of the Virginia church council.

Colloquium scholars from a spectrum of schools and denominational backgrounds will analyze different aspects of the colonial period. Liberal and conservative Christians often have little to do with one another because of differences in Biblical interpretation and religious priorities.

But both sides try to spread the gospel.

Barton and Amos Yong , a Regent theology professor, are both part of the Interfaith Relations Commission of the National Council of Churches.

The commission is promoting dialogue between evangelicals and mainline Protestants. In 2006, the commission met with faculty at Fuller

Theological Seminary, an evangelical school in California.

Barton said the commission backed the missiology conference as something that would appeal equally to evangelicals and mainline Protestants. “It’s a recognition that we’re all part of the same church and telling the same story, but not necessarily telling it in the same way or manner,” Barton said. Yong said that Regent’s hosting of the colloquium fit the school’s desire to “posture itself as a broadly evangelical institution.”

Steven G. Vegh, (757) 446-2417, steven.vegh@pilotonline.com