This is a modern culture, strong and vibrant today, yet it has its roots deep in the past, going back hundreds, even thousands, of years into the beginnings of the movement of the Polynesian people into the Pacific, from South-East Asia. The living faith experiences on which I have based this theology are from communities of two or three people to communities of about a hundred people coming together for particular occasions. Usually they belong to different religious denominations, but they are mainly Maori and 'family'. Ultimately it is the Maori living faith community, the Maori Local Church, who will work out a Maori theology, not the Church in general. Part of the process is dialogue with other Local Churches, as equal partners and within the overall unity of the Church.
Some caution is needed on both sides.
We hear the church telling us that not everything in a culture is good. It is this Jesus who brings to perfection the 'seeds of the Word' planted in the Maori religion from the beginning. It can be truthfully said that what is inculturated isJesus Christ himself. He is the subject matter of inculturation, . . Inculturation is a further and definitive step by which Jesus Christ enters into a living relationship with a cultural tradition.