Podcast with Rafael Malpica-Padilla on religious collaboration and Lutheran Church

What happens when a global religious organization operating in 90 countries tries to practice genuine collaboration instead of top-down mission work? Rafael Malpica-Padilla, executive director of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America's global mission, reveals how theology, power dynamics, and neighbor love reshape what partnership means across cultures. Subscribe for more episodes on collaboration in practice. Rafael Malpica-Padilla brings a perspective rarely heard in discussions of organizational collaboration: that of a religious leader managing partnerships across 90 countries while navigating the tension between institutional power and authentic mutuality. Born and raised Lutheran in Puerto Rico, ordained as a pastor, elected bishop of the Caribbean synod, and now leading the ELCA's global Service and Justice division, his trajectory spans local parish work to international diplomacy. His definition of collaboration rests on three pillars: differentiation (understanding what each partner uniquely brings), complementarity (identifying where skills and competencies intersect), and capacity for implementation. But the conversation quickly moves beyond frameworks into the messy reality of practicing these principles across vast cultural and economic divides. The central tension Malpica-Padilla describes is the shift from a mission model , where Western churches send resources and expertise to "receiving" countries , to a companionship model built on mutual respect and shared learning. This transformation required the ELCA to confront its own institutional power honestly. When you control the funding, genuine partnership demands constant vigilance against the subtle ways money distorts relationships. The conversation explores how religious belief both enables and complicates collaboration. Shared faith provides a powerful foundation for trust and common purpose, but theological differences, even within the same denomination, can fracture partnerships. Malpica-Padilla describes navigating disagreements over social issues where companion churches in different countries hold fundamentally different positions, requiring the organization to maintain relationship without demanding uniformity. On the role of technology and social media, Malpica-Padilla raises a concern that connects directly to collaboration: the way platforms profit from hate and misinformation undermines the social fabric that makes cooperation possible. From a theological perspective, he frames this as a question about what Jesus of Nazareth , not the institutional Christ constructed by sociopolitical ideologies , would say about these dynamics. His assessment of humanity's collaborative capacity is honest: trapped between Luther's negative anthropology (humans as "a bag full of worms") and Marx's positive anthropology (which failed because it could not account for sin). The answer lies not in optimism or pessimism but in work , holding governments accountable, building resilient communities, and recognizing that sufficient resources exist for everyone. If he could change one thing, it would be to give every human being neighbor love , the capacity to displace attention from your own needs and concentrate on serving others. Not conversion, but the fundamental reorientation that makes collaboration possible. Part of the Ernst Strüngmann Forum series on Collaboration, produced with the Convergent Science Network.