The concept of culture in adventism and its implications

Abstract

The relationship between culture, ethics and Christian mission is clearly important, after all, the perception of the theme affects the practice of the churches and their relationship with the world. In the search for answers to questions related to Adventist cross-cultural evangelism, some preliminary questions must be answered: what is culture really? How should the Christian behave in this regard? How does the Seventh-day Adventist Church understand the theme? The purpose of this study is to contribute with elements that bring further clarification to such questions. Therefore, a literature review and document analysis research were carried out here, seeking to analyze, through official publications of the church and its theologians, the ways of understanding the concept. An analysis is made of the uses of the IASD concept of “culture” in the publications of its pioneers, in its official publications and in the writings of contemporary theologians. Thus, it was possible to observe that IASD understands the concept of culture as the knowledge / identity of a people; an identity that is developed through acquired assumptions, that is, by fundamental elements that make up the basis of the cultural paradigm of each people, thus not adopting a perception of neutral culture.