TIME, (COM)PASSION, AND ETHICAL SELF-FORMATION IN EVANGELICAL HUMANITARIANISM

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

12-27-2020

Department

Department of Social Sciences

Abstract

This article examines narratives, images, and stories that give insight to everyday experimentation and ethical self-formation. I use the case of World Vision and its early leaders to unpack genealogies of American evangelical humanitarianism. Rather than seeking to identify American evangelicalism’s normative ethical stance, I aim to expand the discussion in anthropology of ethics on ethical self-formation through examining the tensions, reflections, and processes of becoming among evangelical humanitarians. In doing so, I examine two focal areas of ethical self-formation among early World Vision leaders. The first is oscillation between and mixing of passion and compassion frameworks in the American evangelical imagination. Second, I identify a range of temporal frames that evangelicals draw on to make sense of and formulate ethical responses to human needs encountered abroad.

Publisher's Statement

© 2020 Journal of Religious Ethics, Inc. Publisher’s version of record: https://doi.org/10.1111/jore.12334

Publication Title

Journal of Religious Ethics

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