When the military under Commander Bainimarama overthrew the Qarase government in December 2006, the Methodist Church leadership took sides for the ousted government. The so-called People’s Charter, which was supported by Archbishop Mataca from the Roman Catholic Church—to rebuild Fiji into a nonracial, pluralist democracy—was rejected by the leadership of the Methodist Church. This positioned the Methodist Church at the side of the political opposition in a time when other political parties and the Great Council of Chiefs were suspended. This course created a lot of tensions with the government which reacted by suspending Methodist regional church gatherings, including their annual conferences. These conferences played an indispensable role in appointing ministers and strengthening Methodist unity and also their financial power. Recent figures indicate that the loss of membership continued, for instance in the year before the conference of 2012 a loss of 4,656 members or almost 5 percent was recorded, attributed mainly to the youth who were attracted by Pentecostal services.88 Whether this drop in membership is also the result of the tensions between the government and the church cannot be asserted, but it seems likely that this conflict and its negative repercussions had at least some impact on the membership.
Conversion in the Lutheran Mission in New Guinea
The Lutheran mission in PNG began with missionary Johann Flierl from the Bavarian town of Neuendettelsau. He landed in Simbang at the Huon Peninsula in 1886, while the United Rhenish Mission set up a station in Bogadjim (Astrolabe Bay) in the area of the colonial German New Guinea Company in 1887. The beginnings proved to be difficult because of tropical diseases and unrest against the colonial administration in the area of the Rhenish Mission. The missionaries were not prepared to understand the animistic religion and the society of the people they wished to convert.89 Their attitude was marked by the firm conviction that the “heathen” had to be saved through the proclamation of salvation and the slow advancement of civilization. The Lutheran missionaries shared the same belief as the Methodists about the “heathen” living in darkness or being like children who had to be reprimanded and educated, because they seemed to lack conscience and the sense of right and wrong. The missionaries were convinced that not force but only the love of Christ motivated conversion, and they were devoted to suffer whatever God would put on them in order to achieve this aim.
As an example for this approach we can take the Rhenish missionary Georg Kunze on Karkar (at that time Dampier) Islands on the north coast of New Guinea from 1890 to 1894. He reports in his German mission memorial about the many difficulties of the early mission. The point of contact with the locals was the exchange of goods (for instance fruits) and work for iron, pearls, and tobacco. Thefts were common and provided the opportunity for evangelism.
Kunze tried to instill two basic messages into the people. First, “Jesus” people are loved by Jesus and do not steal. Second, Jesus sees everything and writes everything into his book, even if no other human has seen it. When you die, you will meet Jesus and he will read from his book what you have done in your life. Many will perish in the fire, but the friends of Jesus will be saved.90 Other Rhenish missionaries confirmed this approach: the law is the preparation for the gospel. First, the conscience must be awakened, and then the gospel can offer forgiveness.
We told the people that Jesus will return and raise the dead. This is the point of departure for our proclamation of repentance. We have to tell the people that only the good ones will receive the resurrection to life, while the evil ones will suffer pain and punishment. Thus we have to explain to them the difference between good and evil, going over the commandments time and again. . . . Once they get to know their true being in this mirror of their heart, they will understand why Christ died.91
Due to lack of staff and resources, the unfavorable proximity to competing ways of “new life” in the Catholic Mission and land alienations through the commercial New Guinea Company, the Rhenish mission was less successful than the mission from Neuendettelsau further south. Neither mission succeeded in their early attempts of individual conversion for several reasons: the Christian way contradicted the Melanesian way of life. Individuals could not be convinced that they were sinners and needed to change their lives. They had no need to become friends of Jesus because they were satisfied with the religion of their ancestors. The Christian God had no status in the community.
Only the change advocated by the Neuendettelsau missionary Christian Keysser from 1903 onwards proved to be successful. Keysser learnt to know the customs, myths, and stories of the local Kate people very well. He went hunting with them and befriended the local chief or “big man,” Zake. Even sorcerers trusted him and introduced him to their secrets.
Keysser’s familiarity with the worldview of the tribe convinced him that mission should not begin with the preaching of salvation through Christ. The people had no sense for it. The stories about creation and the heroes of the Old Testament were much closer to them.92 God was already there before the missionaries arrived. Missionaries needed to have a thorough knowledge of the language and customs of the people. Two key elements of this knowledge were the community of the tribe and the dualism between good and evil powers from birth to death. Thus the mission had to confront the people in their own living conditions and not try to convert them to the Western civilization.
This mission method was approved by the Missionary Field Conference in 1915 under the leadership of inspector Steck, who declared that the form of the mission and church should be Melanesian, not European. Missionaries needed to rethink their mission methods, suiting them to the Melanesian situation.93 Keysser was the first to view the converts as part of the clan. Their actions and their conscience were formed by the tribe. Instead of seeking individual conversion, the whole tribe had to be converted. Due to his extraordinary familiarity with the local Kate customs, Keysser organized traditional feasts during which he confronted the clan with its sorcery and posed the alternative to continue with sorcery and payback killings or to accept Anutu, the Christian God, as new God of the clan by becoming His vassals. When the tribe decided to leave their gods and sorcery and seek the protection of the Christian God, Keysser knew well that the initial conversion needed continuous encouragement.
A congregation is not a single individual, therefore it can only be awakened through years and decades of care. . . . The NEW in itself cannot produce life, but it is apparent that it provides a favorable opportunity for the life. . . . The simple, preached Word usually takes too much for granted as far as our primitive New Guinean is concerned. . . . The acted out Word, however, was not only better understood but it captivated the will and provoked decisive action.94
The way to secure the victory of Anutu was to base it on a new order of life for the community. Preaching God’s grace too soon would quench the new seriousness of faith. Baptism should happen only after approval of the clan or as part of the clan’s baptism. Together with local elders Keysser developed a Christian tribal order replacing the traditional clan orders. It introduced a new settlement policy in villages and regulated community obligations, property and succession laws, marriage rules (prohibition of bride-price and prohibition of corporal punishment of wives), and judicial power. These reforms were inspired by Christian ethics, but Keysser safeguarded the continuity with the pre-Christian order, since the new order was protected by the ancestors.95 Everyone knew that if the laws are obeyed, the community will benefit in food and well-being; if not, the community will be punished.
This