Missions Resources - Bibliography
Warfare by Honor: The Restoration of Honor: A Protocol Handbook
Authors: Qaumaniq and Suuqiina
ISBN: 096737913X
Publisher: Healing the Land Publishing
Number of pages: 272
Type of cover: Soft Cover
Summary:
What do you do when you visit an important person’s home for the first time? How do you behave, as compared to times at your best friend’s home? How do you greet your host? A lot depends on the context, the situation.
Just as different homes require different degrees of formality, so do different cultures. You can’t enter a new culture without changing your behavior—unless you’re willing to offend people, break trust (possibly for years), and worse.
It should be so simple: Guests should be respectful of their hosts. No contemporary mission agency would dare to send people overseas with a hardened attitude of supremacy.
But, of course, it has happened plenty, and unfortunately, continues to happen in most cross-cultural encounters between Christians. Westerners, especially North Americans, especially those from the United States, live in very casual worlds. We like to imagine ourselves as friendly and outgoing. So we shake hands without considering whether it’s our right to do so; we don’t mind our body language; we try to smooth over difficulties with charm.
Not everyone sees it that way. Our cheery informality comes off to many others as an imposition of presence on a delicate social environment. The unwritten rules governing people’s ways of being, from the basics (looking others in the eye, or not) up to complex dances around social rank.
As Inuit authors Qaumaniq and Suuqiina demonstrate in this book, protocol is not just a way of avoiding mistakes: it is a universal tool for honoring one another. It’s deeply biblical, and can open doors for the gospel if used properly.
When protocol is ignored or broken, so is trust. Protocol, then, is not just a cross-cultural skill – it is basic to the proclamation of Christ and his kingdom. Showing honor to ones hosts demonstrates an appreciation of them as fellow humans, worthy of respect in their own right. It is our duty as Christians to honor those to whom honor is due, and this book is a bible-based introduction to this most elementary social skill.
Conversationally written yet serious, balanced between amazing and sometimes tragic stories, and solid Biblical teaching, Warfare by Honor is a pleasant and important book. These Native American theologians share insight with the North American church that can open our minds and hearts for how we love our neighbor.
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