1.The exclusivity of theology
Several meetings held by the Lausanne Movement emphasize the absolute authority and infallibility of the Bible. In other words, evangelical Christians should take the Bible as the supreme principle in their social life. The only criterion of salvation is conversion to Christianity. Those who abide by social morality still cannot be save if they do not accept the Christian faith, and no other religion can provide salvation of Jesus Christ to them.
The exclusive theology of the Lausanne Movement is the basis or consensus on which they carry out other work, and is also the main reason for the conservative, exclusive characteristics and separatist tendency of the Lausanne Movement. Christian liberals, however, do not share this view, arguing that these features prevent Christianity from developing into a universal church.
2.Blind missions
The Lausanne Movement emphasizes that the nature of preaching and mission is pure evangelism, converting people to Christianity, and thus saving them. Guided by this conservative dogma, missionaries travel the world at all costs, and they even preach in other religious communities, thus creating fierce cultural conflicts.
The most prominent representative is the “10/40” mission window emphasized by the Lausanne Conference. They believe that there are a large number of people who have no access to Christian faith between 10- and 40-degrees north latitude. These people are the focus of missionary work. In this area, people have their own religious faith, such as Islam, Buddhism, folk beliefs and so on. But in the view of evangelical missionaries, people with these religious beliefs cannot be saved, and only by converting to Christianity can they be truly saved. Under the guidance of this dogma, eager evangelists come into intense conflicts with local religious groups, resulting in highly influential religious conflicts, such as the kidnapping of Korean Christians in the Middle East, the prosecution of some Chinese Christians who take part in missionary work in Pakistan under the influence of the Korean church, etc.
3.Conflicts caused by the ignorance of local cultures
Because of the Lausanne Movement’s emphasis on the absolute authority of the Bible, when missions in other areas clash with local cultures, missionaries firmly believe that only biblical standards are absolutely and uniquely correct. Such bigotry is a serious impediment to the resolution of conflicts. Meanwhile, missionaries tend to believe that Christianity is of the highest rank, often examining, criticizing, and even despising local religious cultures in a condescending manner, instead of learning and understanding local cultures in a humble manner, and then supplementing or integrating local cultures with the characteristics of the Christian faith.
4.An instrument for religious infiltration
The Lausanne Movement, in order to spread its missions around the world, urgently needs to remove all obstacles in its way. Therefore, they use human rights and religious freedom as weapons, disregarding the historical and cultural background of missionary sites, and accusing local religious policies of violating human rights and religious freedom internationally. The Lausanne Movement takes advantage of its international network to closely monitor religious and state conflicts in order to support local evangelical missionaries.
To extend its influence and establish its moral authority, the Lausanne Movement closely cooperates with American human rights diplomacy and provides examples for the US to accuse other countries. The Lausanne Movement tries to force local governments to adjust their religious policies through diplomacy and pressure of international public opinion, which undoubtedly provides an opportunity for the US to intervene in other countries’ internal affairs. Evangelical mission groups at missionary sites have also become an instrument of religious infiltration in other countries.
5.Division of Christianity at missionary sites
The evangelicals represented by the Lausanne Movement have a persistent and urgent desire to preach, so that they cause the division of local Christian churches after their arrival at missionary sites. Such actions disrupt the stable local religious management policies and religious order. During the missionary process, it is difficult for them to recruit new Christians, so they turn to recruit Christians from other churches into their churches to beautify the mission data. They often claim that their own faith is the most orthodox and attack other churches for their impurity. In fact, these selfish actions cause chaos in local Christian churches.
In addition, in some multi-ethnic and multi-faith areas, missionaries leave the area after successful missions. However, those who accept the Christian faith are faced with a great survival dilemma. Since Christianity is a local minority, accepting another faith means “betraying” the local family or culture. In this way, the Christian faith brings crisis to their lives and also plants the seeds of conflict.
6.Anti-intellectual and separatist tendencies
Because of the fanatical missions of the Lausanne Movement, some extreme evangelical Christians believe that the miracles described in the Bible, such as prayer for healing, prophecy and other supernatural phenomena, are still present today. As a result, some believers neither take medicine nor go to the hospital. At the same time, some churches deliberately perform miracles and wonders to establish their religious authority.
In view of their fanatical tendencies, which are not accepted by other Christians, they themselves become increasingly radical and conservative, and show separatist tendencies.
In short, the evangelical Lausanne Movement should advocate active Christian missions. However, given their exclusive, conservative and narrow theological thinking, which gives rise to many problems during the missionary process, our constant attention is needed.
