The American Baptist International Ministries has sponsored partners to attend the BWA organized Baptist International Conference on Theological Education in Prague, Czech Republic which was held from July 26 to 29, 2008. Among the partner representatives are Rev. Anuparthi John Prabhakar and Dr. Ezamo Murry. Rev. Prabhakar is a faculty of Andhra Christian Theological College in South India, and Dr. Murry is the Principal of the Eastern Theological College in Northeast India. Both schools produce quality pastors, Christian leaders and theological educators.
Rev. Prabhakar is currently pursuing a doctoral degree at the South Asia Theological Research Institute (Senate of Serampore) under the sponsorship of International Ministries. His research area is the “Content Analysis of Sermons Preached among Rural Dalit Telugu Baptist Congregations: Towards A Dalit Homiletics”.
Rev. Prabhakar shares with us a brief report on the conference in Prague (see the appendix) and related pictures (click to view http://www.flickr.com/photos/benslchan/sets/72157606726996944/
Appendix
Baptist International Conference on Theological Education
(BICTE- VII)
Prague, Czech Republic, July 26-29, 2008
Rev. Anuparthi John Prabhakar
It is an immense experience in participating ‘Baptist International Conference on Theological Educators- VII’ which was held at Prague. This important conference focused on the theme, “Probing the Theological Boundaries: The Baptist Story from Amsterdam to Tomorrow”. This was enriched with the partaking of Baptist Theological Educators from around the globe. The presence of few pastors and leaders added blessings to the conference.
This conference began with the presentation of Dr. Ian M. Randall titled, ‘A Review of Baptist genealogy and look beyond the horizon: Tracing Baptist theological footprints over the past four hundred years’. Even this paper was written from Europe perspective; it gave helpful orientation to the Baptist tradition for the past four centuries.
The second day of the conference focused upon the implications involved in theological curriculum in ministerial training. This was extensively discussed even in regional groups proposing valuable models for theological education. The third day’s presentations filled participants’ hearts and minds with many necessary insights over urging contemporary issues such as ecology, women and children, issues related to worship and the influence of media.
Concluding sessions were challenging through provoking the participants hearts to look for new methodologies those which are compatible to the new emerging situations in the world. This participant (Rev. A. John Prabhakar) could respond from South India context especially Dalit Christian context that which was appreciated by the participants for the valuable inputs.
God has blessed the efforts rendered by Baptist World Alliance for this successful event.
