Dialogue and Syncretism

Book excerpt: A new series emerging from discussions within an interdisciplinary research group at the Free University of Amsterdam, CURRENTS OF ENCOUNTER will deal with specific concerns of theology of religion, philosophy of religion, and comparative religion. In addition, the series will explore the relation between the Christian faith and contemporary culture as well as the encounter between Asian, African, Latin American, and Western contextualizations of Christianity. The aim of CURRENTS OF ENCOUNTER is to stimulate discussion and reflection on its theme from various presuppositional and methodological points of view. The underlying assumption of this aim is that the interdisciplinary avenue—neither an exclusively positivist nor a purely normative theological approach—provides the best means of access to a better understanding of the problems and potentialities inherent in the encounter between Christianity and the world of which it is a part -- Book cover.