A Phenomenological Understanding of Church Growth of Korea
In this paper, I describe a major religious reason for the church growth of Korea on the basis of my field research and from the point of view of beliefs and practices in the field of phenomenology of religion. To do this project,I prefer to use the categories of phenonomenology of Christianity as described by Peter McKenzie who has adapted the methodology from Friedrich Heiler’ s categories of pheno menology of religion. Before doing this project, however, for better understanding of many forms of contemporary Korean Christianity, a brief historical background of Korean Christianity is needed. Although the methodology of phenomenology of religion I use is largely ahistorical, its application does not deny or reject relevant historical facts for inter pretation. Thus, I intend to develop a preliminary understanding of two contextual aspects that have led to the different kinds of forms within contemporary Christianity in Korea: the socio-political aspect and the religious aspect. The socio-political aspect influenced Koreans to follow Westem Christendom, but the religious aspect led Koreans to make their own indigenous or syncretistic folk Christianity.