Asians in Diaspora and Diasporas in Asia

Kirsteen Kim has a PhD in theology from the University of Birmingham, UK. She is Paul E. Pierson chair of world Christianity at Fuller Theological Seminary, California, USA. She has lived at worked in her native UK and in her husband's home country of South Korea. She and Dr. Sebastian C. H. Kim were sent as missionaries of the Presbyterian Church of Korea to Union Biblical Seminary in India and, more recently, called to serve together in the USA. Kim writes out of this migratory experience and has also consulted with many international bodies including the Lausanne Movement and the World Council of Churches.

Rev. Dr. Francis Tam (譚文鈞牧師博士) has over forty years of experience serving the Chinese Christian community in Canada in various capacities. He is the executive director of the Chinese Coordination Centre of World Evangelism, Canada, and the interim principal of the Canadian Chinese School of Theology, Calgary.

Prof. Prabhu Guptara was a distinguished professor of global business, management and public policy at William Carey University, Shillong, India. For fifteen years, he was in Switzerland working for the then largest bank in the world and now lives in Cambridge, UK. He has several business publications and has written for The Times, Guardian, and others on issues related to culture, society, politics, technology and economics. Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Prabhu entered the world of publishing for the first time in 2020 at the age of seventy-one – with an imprint that focuses on India and Indians, Pippa Rann Books in memory of his wife. He launched a second imprint in 2022, Resilience Publishing that focuses on global challenges like climate change, international financial system, global governance, ethics of technology, etc.

Tereso C. Casiño, ThD, PhD, is a professor of missiology at the school of divinity of Gardner-Webb University in North Carolina, USA. He is the author of numerous journal articles and editor of the Asia-Pacific Journal of Intercultural Studies. Earlier, he served as professor of systematic theology and intercultural studies at Torch Trinity Graduate School of Theology in Seoul, South Korea. A native of the Philippines, he has resided in South Korea and the USA while traveling widely across the world. He is married to Dr. Cecilia J. Casiño, who teaches in the area of pastoral care, and they have two adult children.

YOON JONG YOO, PhD, serves as dean and professor of the Old Testament at Pierson School of Theology, Pyeongtaek University, South Korea. He studied BTh at Yonsei University, MDiv at Yale Divinity School and completed his PhD at Cornell University in Hebrew Bible.

HANNA HYUN, PhD, is an assistant professor at Presbyterian University and Theological Seminary. Her dissertation focuses on comparative religious studies and migrant Ahmadiyyat Muslims in the US. She served as the director of the Centre for Islamic Studies in Sydney since 2016, working with believers from Muslim backgrounds and Messianic Jews in Sydney, in addition serving an Arabic church. She taught at Kosin University (2013–2015), Sydney College of Divinity (2016–2019), and Juan International University (2020–2021).Research interests are Islamic studies, migration, refugee and home theology, multicultural church planting, and platform churches.

PROF. DATUK DR. DENISON JAYASOORIA is head of the secretariat for the All Party Parliamentary Group Malaysia on Sustainable Development Goals since October 2019 and a fellow of the Institute of International Harmony and Sustainable Development, Hong Kong, China. He holds a PhD in sociology from Oxford Brookes University, United Kingdom, while his first degree is a Bachelor of Divinity from Union Biblical Seminary, Yeotmal, India. Previously he was a principal research fellow at the Institute of Ethnic Studies, National University of Malaysia (UKM) and is now an honorary professor. He served as a member of the Human Rights Commission of Malaysia and the Royal Police Commission. He and his wife Rose Cheng Jayasooria worship at the DUMC Methodist Church in Petaling Jaya, Malaysia and they have three children and two grandchildren.

KANGMUG GHIL, PhD, is the senior deputy director of the Presidential Committee of National Cohesion and the chief of Immigration Detention Agencyof the Ministry of Justice of South Korea. Earlier he served as director of general affairs of the Incheon Airport Immigration Agency and as councillor Chief Consul) of the Korean Embassy to Mongolia, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Korea (2017–2020) as well as director of immigration policy of the Ministry of Justice, South Korea (2016–2017). He serves as an adjunct professor at Sungkyui University and chairman of the Vision Committee of Namboo Presbyterian Church.

DR> NG OI LENG, is the present executive and education director of ElShaddai Centre Berhad, a registered NGO with a vision to disciple nations at our doorsteps committed to catalyze disciple-making movements and build sustainable holistic care systems among the marginalized diaspora communities in Malaysia. She is also the founding core committee member of the Malaysia Diaspora Network and the steering committee member of 2015, 2017, 2019 and 2023 National Diaspora Symposium, Malaysia. Former associate pastorof Mustard Seed Company and a Dental Surgeon by profession.

Bishop Noel A. Pantoja is the national director of the Philippine Council of Evangelical Churches (PCEC), the umbrella organization of seventy-eight evangelical denominations, more than 40,000 evangelical local churches, and 268 missions and para church organizations in the Philippines. He is concurrently serving as the president of Philippine Relief and Development Services (Philrads), the Relief and Development arm of PCEC. He also serves as the president of the Philippines Bible Society.

DR. JACOB BLOEMBERG, moved with his family to Hanoi, Vietnam in 1997 and became the lead pastor of Hanoi International Fellowship in 2005. HIF launched the Love Hanoi campaign in 2012, which has become a citywide movement, inspiring Christian leaders across the world to start their ownLove [Your City] campaign. Jacob published his book Love Your City: 5 Steps to Citywide Movements (Westbow Press, 2020). He holds a doctorate in transformational leadership from Bakke Graduate University, and an MA in organizational leadership from Regent University.

Leiton Edward Chinn has been mobilizing the church for International Student Ministry (ISM) since 1977 in leadership roles with various ministries and networks, including serving as the first Lausanne Catalyst for ISM for ten years.

Lisa Espineli Chinn has served in campus ministry for five decades with both Intervarsity Philippines and Intervarsity USA including fourteen years as the director for International Student Ministry. Lisa currently mentors younger leaders and is a spiritual director and a cross-cultural ministry consultant.

TESSA TUBBS (MAR, Gordon Conwell Theological Seminary) works for Teach-Beyond, a nonprofit specializing in using education transformationally to help build God’s kingdom. Tessa taught at the Black Forest Academy, a school specializing in the needs of children of missionaries in Germany. In 2021 she joined TeachBeyond’s member care team, and now supports other teachers at international boarding schools around the world. Her passion is for the global community to understand the ways God uses the hybridity and movement ofchildren of missionaries to contribute to God’s kingdom.

GRACE EUN-SUN LEE, MDiv, serves as the ministry coordinator for Discipleship, Group Life, and Women’s Groups at Grace Chapel, a nondenominational, multicultural church with five campuses in the Greater Boston Area. Grace has contributed an article on worship and spirituality for the North America volume of the Edinburgh Companions published in June 2023. Grace’s passions are in ethnodoxology, cross-cultural communications, wholistic and integrative approach toward health and spirituality under the umbrella of world Christianity.

REV. DR. J. N. MANOKARAN, is a Civil Engineer, called to serve as a cross-cultural missionary in North India for eleven years. Since 1997 he has been involved in teaching, training and writing. He has authored over twenty books and traveled widely to many nations. Currently, he serves as regional director for South Asia of Community Bible Study International. He is married to Rosia Selvi,their daughter Hosanna who was a student missionary in Belarus went to be with the Lord in 2011. Their son Thambos and his wife Sayali are pioneering churches among elite urban youth in major cities in India.

CHRISTA FOSTER CRAWFORD, JD, is an international expert in human trafficking and sexual exploitation with more than 25 years of grassroots and policy experience in Thailand and around the globe. As founder of Freedom Resource International, she spends her time teaching, training, writing and speaking about ending all forms of exploitation more ethically and effectively. She is editor of the Stopping the Traffick book series, including the most recent volume Stepping Out of the Traffick: Pausing for Theological Reflection on Christian Response to Sexual Exploitation and Trafficking (Regnum, 2024), along with other publications. She has also founded and led international and local antitrafficking organizations and taught graduate courses for Fuller Seminary and other institutions. An ordained minister, Christa holds a Juris Doctorate from Harvard Law School and a BA in Philosophy & Public Affairs from Claremont McKenna College.

JASMINE KWONG serves as a Lausanne catalyst for Creation Care. She is a creation care advocate with OMF International and based in the Philippines. With a background in conservation biology and community development, she often works in the intersections between people and the natural world. Her interests are in food security and marine conservation. She also serves on the board of Christians in Conservation in the Philippines, which is an affiliated project of A Rocha International.

ELIZABETH MBURU was the first woman to gain a PhD from Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, North Carolina, USA. She is an associate professor of New Testament and Greek at International Leadership University, Africa International University and Pan-Africa Christian University in Nairobi, Kenya. Dr Mburu is on the board of the Africa Bible Commentary and is the editorial coordinator and New Testament editor for its revision, as well as the Anglophone Africa Regional Coordinator for Langham Literature. Professor Mburu is also the author of Qumran and the Origins of Johannine Language and Symbolism (T&T Clark, 2010).

Narry F. Santos holds a PhD in New Testament from Dallas Theological Seminary, Texas, USA, and a PhD in Philippine studies from the University of the Philippines. He is an assistant professor of Christian ministry and intercultural leadership at Tyndale University, Toronto, Canada. He also serves part-time as senior [astor of Greenhills Christian Fellowship (GCF) Peel and GCF York, as church-based church planting catalyst with the Canadian National Baptist Convention, and as vice president of the Evangelical Missiological Society, Canada.

YOON HEE KIM, PhD, is the president of Torch Trinity Graduate University (TTGU) and president of Faith and Work Institute Asia. She also serves as the vice president of Korea Evangelical Fellowship and vice president of Asia Theological Association Korea. She is also an adjunct faculty of Trinity Evangelical Divinity School (TEDS) Korea DMin program. She completed her PhD in Old Testament at TEDS. Earlier she served as professor of Old Testament Studies and dean of student affairs at East Asia School of Theology in Singapore

SAMSON L. UYTANLET has a PhD in New Testament from London School of Theology, UK and he is an associate professor of New Testament and chair of the biblical studies department at the Asian Theological Seminary, Philippines. He is the author of the commentaries on Matthew and 2 Peter & Jude for the Asia Bible Commentary Series by Langham Publishing, in partnership with the ATA.