Echoes of Paul: Principles from Contextual Discipleship for Africa’s Sustainability Teachers
摘要
This chapter explores how insights from Paul’s contextualized discipleship approach can inform pedagogies for empowering teachers as sustainability change agents across Africa. The study employs an interdisciplinary framework integrating environmental education theory with New Testament ethics. Four key dimensions of Pauline discipleship are examined for their implications: communal discipleship, exemplary discipleship, relational discipleship, and contextual discipleship. Findings indicate Paul’s emphasis on relationship-based, context-sensitive, intergenerational mentoring provides vital principles for teacher training and curriculum development in Africa’s diverse ecological and cultural settings. By entering students’ lived realities, facilitating participatory eco-projects, democratizing sustainability leadership across age groups, and courageously modelling integrated word and deed, teachers can follow Paul’s lead in nurturing new generations of sustainability disciples. This resonates with burgeoning priorities across Africa to equip youth as eco-stewards through applied learning grounded in Indigenous values. Further research should explore enacting Pauline discipleship in diverse contexts from villages to cities to inform sustainability education policies.