{"id":401,"date":"2024-06-25T15:34:24","date_gmt":"2024-06-25T15:34:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/avmw.ats-test.co.uk\/?page_id=401"},"modified":"2026-03-10T10:37:21","modified_gmt":"2026-03-10T10:37:21","slug":"about-us","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/vulnerablemission.org\/de\/about\/about-us\/","title":{"rendered":"\u00dcber uns"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

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About Us<\/h1>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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Who we are<\/h1>\n\n\n\n

The Alliance for Vulnerable Mission (AVM) is an international network of Christ-followers engaged in mission and development. Most of us are from Western Protestant backgrounds. As practitioners, teachers, coaches, and researchers, we share a concern for intercultural mission today that is culturally sensitive and reflects critically existing power imbalances. Obstacles to that are at least partially rooted in insufficient understanding of cultural and contextual differences. The necessary learning here arises not simply from a willingness to listen. We see great need for and potential in \u201cvulnerably\u201d sharing life together by using, as far as possible, local languages and locally available resources in ministry.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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What we do<\/a><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Together, we reflect on historical and contemporary mission practices. We aim to engage in constructive critique and point out alternatives. On the one hand, we equip mission practitioners. On the other hand, we contribute to missiological discourses. […]<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Our convictions<\/a><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

The principle of deliberate, vulnerable weakness, modelled by Jesus Christ (see e.g. Philippians 2) or the Apostle Paul (1 Corinthians 9:19-23), is applicable in poorer and wealthier societies, in places far away and around the corner. […]<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Our concern<\/a><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

We deeply regret where Christians in the past have failed to bear good witness to the gospel of Jesus. What pains us as well, though, is that outside domination and unhealthy dependency often continue until this day \u2013 in mission, development, education, politics, research, and other areas. […]<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Our vision<\/a><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

It is our great hope that Vulnerable Mission would make a sound contribution to the broader efforts of transforming, \u2018decolonising\u2019 ministry models, church partnerships, development and research practices. The AVM strives for a wider use of locally available resources and local languages. […]<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Our history<\/h1>\n\n\n\n

The Alliance for Vulnerable Mission arose out of the ministry of Jim Harries. First working in Zambia as an agriculturalist-missionary from 1988 onwards, he noticed that his supposedly transformative methods did not take hold. Gaining fluency in Kikaonde allowed him to see that local and foreign ways of reasoning often didn\u2019t align \u2013 and that \u2018development\u2019 needs to engage people\u2019s minds on a world view and theological level. After further theological and missions training in the UK and later a PhD in Linguistically engaged Theology, Jim Harries continued to serve in Kenya among Luo people. He limited his ministry to what he was able to do in the local languages Swahili and Luo as well as to the resources available of the rural poor whose life he shared intimately. Realising the efficacy of this mission approach in terms of developing a deep understanding of local contextual realities, Jim and others established the Alliance for Vulnerable Mission in 2007. A series of conferences on Vulnerable Mission between 2007 and 2019 in the US, the UK and Germany broadened the network and familiarised many with the concept of Vulnerable Mission. The Covid pandemic and technological advancement allowed for more virtual events in recent years, connecting people across the globe. Since 2024, the Alliance for Vulnerable Mission is registered as a charity in Germany but continues to work internationally, now under the leadership of an Executive Board.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/section>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/section>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":151,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"give_campaign_id":0,"_themeisle_gutenberg_block_has_review":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-401","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"aioseo_notices":[],"campaignId":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vulnerablemission.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/401","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vulnerablemission.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vulnerablemission.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vulnerablemission.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vulnerablemission.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=401"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/vulnerablemission.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/401\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3097,"href":"https:\/\/vulnerablemission.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/401\/revisions\/3097"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vulnerablemission.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/151"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vulnerablemission.org\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=401"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}