Mission at the Roundtable of diversity in God’s Mission

“Asia” has been known as the icon and expression of “Variety”, “Diversity” and “Cultural richness”. Asia – as a continent – forms the largest piece of soil on earth and is home to almost 4 billion people. Economically, Asia is a continent that reflects the most paradox phenomena: While certain countries are regarded as the most affluent ones in the world, the Asian continent also shows in some of its parts, the lowest income and hence, the poorest among the poor. Following their economical standards the gap between different technically equipped and non- or less equipped is evident: While some of the countries in Asia are praised to be equipped with one of the most sophisticated technical achievements in the human history, some regions in Asia show serious ‘underdevelopment’ in these respective terms. And historically, Asia is a wound-driven continent where most of the countries in Asia bear dark memories of being exploited in the past, and still many are still getting exploited. The term “cultural richness”, expresses itself in a huge variety of diverse forms of cultures; different languages (probably the most languages in numbers in the world) and different religions and religious practices. We may witness the oldest forms of human settlements (or civilization) up to the youngest developed industrial powers in Asia. In Asia we witness a wide spectrum from politically stable democratic countries to unstable, almost fragile countries; peaceful regions but also frequently or even constantly conflict driven places; regions that never have been affected by calamities or disasters, but also regions where calamities or disasters are almost like on the ‘daily agenda’.