Publisher's Synopsis
Past uncritical views of "face", furtively attaching to the theology of the Thai church have been detrimental for its life and mission and may account for the persistent Thai perception of Christianity as a foreign, Western religion, but this study gives hope that a self-conscious engagement of face can create a reversal. The "about face" proposal of this study intends to legitimate face as an issue of explicit theological reflection in the Thai context and to seek ways of assessing face from a Christian perspective in a contextualized soteriology that can be put to use in the Thai Christian community. To engage Thai face as Christian believers is to discern how the honor/glory of God in the face of Christ transforms our faces. To bring issues of face to the center of discipleship in the Thai context must surely mean understanding the shape of the prevalent Thai cultural model of face, the specific logic of face, and the specific dynami
