This paper is an attempt to answer the question: what lies behind the paucity of church workers’ engagement in inculturation among baptized indigenous peoples, known as Lumads in Mindanao? The author using the descriptive-interpretive method and tapping into both anthropological and theological discourses – put together archival documents and records along with contemporary publications to be able to write this paper. One major lacuna is the lack of literature on concrete experiences of inculturation among the Lumads. The paper posits that one way out of this impasse is a collaborative effort that would bring together church people with training in philosophy, anthropology,theology, religious and cultural studies to reflect on the lessons that need to be articulated in this field and come up with approaches that are practical for those   in the field.

Therefore, in discovering the revolutionary power of Jesus’ parabolic language-events with a formal structure that has been largely buried beneath the ossified institutional dogma that was erected in the historical unfolding of the Christian Church, we can conclude that the radical paradoxes disclosed... can create new thought and re-configure out-dated forms of religious life by re-activating the dangerous memory of.. (the) first century Jewish sage and re-capture the authenticity of the gospel message with a language that has been almost completely lost in the historical development of Christianity.¹