Received: 1 February 2021Revised: 24 March 2021Accepted: 13 April 2021DOI: 10.1111/dial.12666THEME ARTICLECreation and relations—A sami perspective onScandinavian creation theologyTorbjørn Brox WebberVID specialized University, NorwayCorrespondenceTorbjørnBroxWebber,VIDspecializedUniversity,Norway.Email:Torbjorn.brox.webber@vid.noAbstractFrom a Sami perspective, this article discusses how Scandinavian creation theol-ogy can support a stronger resilience against that which threatens the creation inall its variations. Sápmi is the land of the Indigenous Sami people in the north-ernpartofScandinaviaandKolapenisiluaniainRussia.Duringthe19thand20thcentury the Norwegian part of Sápmi was colonized in the so-called Norwegian-ization project. Today we see an increasing battle around natural resources. Thearticle briefly depicts Sami indigenous theology, which emphasizes the circle oflife, creation, and humanity’s relationship within the creation and its Creator. Itthen presents several basic features of Scandinavian creation theology that high-light the egalitarianism surrounding the creation and how all people stand inrelation to this with an ethical obligation to defend life where it is threatened.KEYWORDSGrundtvig, indigenous theology, Løgstrup, Sapmi, Scandinavian creation theology1INTRODUCTIONIn the High North at my hometown in Pasvik, in the Nor-wegian part of the multicultural border valley betweenRussia in the east and Finland in the west, a portrait hang-ing in the school’s main classroom sticks out. The portraitis of Nikolai Frederik Severin Grundtvig, a Danish hymnwriter, priest, and a founding figure of Scandinavian cre-ation theology. Some may argue that it is strange to see theportrait of a dead Danish hymn writer at a relatively newpublic school in an area where the Sami and Finnish lan-guagesandcultureshaveenjoyedgreaterprominencethanDanish hymn singing. Nevertheless, there is perhaps anindirect connection between Grundtvigian theology andthe Sami relational view of the link between the Creatorand the creation that possibly explains why the portrait ofGrundtvig has a prominent place in the school, despite thestrong secularization of the Norwegian education system.This is an open access article under the terms of theCreative Commons AttributionLicense, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided theoriginal work is properly cited.© 2021 The Authors.Dialogpublished by Dialog, Inc. and Wiley Periodicals LLCThis article first briefly depicts the Sami Indigenous the-ology, which emphasizes the circle of life, creation, andhumanity’s relationship within the creation and its Cre-ator. It then presents several basic features of Scandina-vian creation theology that highlight the egalitarianismsurrounding creation and how all people stand in relationto this with an ethical obligation to defend life whenever itis threatened. Relying on the Sami perspective on creationand relations, this article discusses how Scandinavian cre-ation theology can develop resilience against factors thatthreaten creation in all its variations.Sápmi,thelandoftheSamipeople,comprisesthenorth-ernmost areas of Norway, Sweden, Finland, and the KolaPeninsula in northwest Russia. By its Constitution, Nor-way is a country of two peoples: the Norwegians and theIndigenous Sami people. The State of Norway was builtand continues to exist on the land of the Sami peoplethrough an extensive colonialization project, also calledDialog.2021;60:155–160.wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/dial155
156WEBBERNorwegianization, which includes changes in industrialroads, forced language transition into Norwegian, andrequirements for Sami people and the Finnish immigrantpopulations (called Kven people) to change their names inorder to own land.1Today, the Kven people are considerednational minorities in Norway, whereas the Sami peopleare considered both national minorities and Indigenouspeople protected by national and international humanrights laws.The borders of the modern national states have split ourland and made demands for strong national loyalty in theexposed border areas in the North. The Norwegian StateChurch has played an active role on behalf of the oppres-sors and through its previous supervision of, for example,schools, has done its part to eradicate the Sami languageand culture from large sections of Sami communities. Car-oline Serck-Hansen pointed out how the Skolt Sami areasaround the Pasvik river developed a practical ChristianOrthodox faith.2This Christianity never received muchrecognition from the Church and Protestant missionaries.Thomas von Westen (1682–1727), a Norwegian priest whois often described by the Norwegian majority church asthe Apostle to the Sámi, wondered whether the Skolt Samicould be described as Christians at all. Only by word, notin real life, could they be called Christians.3Disputes over natural resources have been on the rise inrecent times. Capital interests seek to take away grazingareas for reindeer and other Sami traditional industries,which are threatened by the construction of new wind tur-bines, a new mining industry, and a railway project thataims at connecting Asia and Europe through the so-calledNorthern Sea Route. A common argument in endorse-ment of many of these projects is that they are necessaryto implement the “green shift,” as though it is the Samitraditional way of living that has created the current cli-matecrisis.Similarly,thegeopoliticaltensionsintheNorthbetween East and West and the refugee situation in 2015,when 5000 refugees crossed the Norwegian–Russian bor-der on bicycles often set aside local demands for cross-border cooperation between East and West and a practicethat promote humanity and solidarity with refugees.Scandinavian creation theology was developed far awayfrom our Sami areas, but there are elements of this the-ology that can be helpful in developing more ethicaland societal aspects of international and interpersonalrelations.2SAMI PERSPECTIVES ONCREATION, RELATION, AND BLESSINGSFrom a Sami point of view, the relationship with creation(notonlythehumanaspect,butallofnature)isbothaspir-itual matter and a political issue as it is interwoven in ourlives in Sapmi.In the Norwegian context, the State Church has playedan important role in colonizing the Sami communities—culturally, religiously, and economically. Tore Johnsen,a Sami theologian and researcher has highlighted howIndigenous people rarely received support from theChurch regarding a spiritual defense of creation. Johnsendescribed how, among Indigenous peoples, the Church isperceived as part of the problem when the earth and cre-ation are threatened. He also explained how the Church,by way of a politically justified creation theology forms thebasis for the colonialization and exploitation of the earth.4As a response to this ecclesiastical and theological prac-tice, it is important, Johnsen argued, to develop a theologyand a theological practice that emphasizes the spiritual-ity and lives of indigenous peoples, both intellectually andpractically.5Johnsen found inspiration for this approachfrom liberation theology, which prioritizes the life of thepoor for theological interpretation. Using concepts like“God of the poor,” this theology develops that support andengages in a liberation struggle for justice through wordsandactions.Asthestartingpointofliberationtheologylieswith the poor, Johnsen advocated the creation of a theol-ogy from the circle of life6based on how Indigenous peo-ple understand the entire creation (people, animals, andnature) as a circle with God in the middle and the rest ofcreation standing in relation to each other. Placing God inthe middle suggests a divine presence in everything.The circle of life thus represents, according to Johnsen,an ideal situation. The different parts of creation are notseparate from one another; everything is connected, andGod is in everything.7The ideal state is threatened as aresultofhumansin.Likeinliberationtheology,sinisstruc-tural rather than individual. The consequence of sin is thatthe circle of life is broken by the disconnection of peoplefrom God.8The theological consequences also involve ashift in the starting point of the theological reflections, rec-ognizing that the circle of life is broken. The aim of bothpeople and theology is therefore to seek to restore this cir-cle. This recovery is thus perceived, in the Sami context,as part of the Christian reconciliation project, in whichthe kingdom of God and eschatology constitute a restoredcircle.9Leading to the final recovery of the broken circleinvolves people repairing their relationships, as Samiresearcher and former Associate Professor at NorthernNorway Educational Centre of Practical Theology JorunnJernsletten, pointed out.10People’s views on creation areclosely linked to their relationships with other people, ani-mals, and nature: “The whole of creation is God’s gift tous: every child that is born, every plant that grows out ofthe soil, every mountain that rises from the earth. Every