The Synekism of Catholic Faith and Citizenship in Peninsular Malaysia

In this paper, I focus on the influence of the Société des Missions étrangères de Paris (MEP) on the performative poetics of Christian faith and citizenship among Malaysian Catholics. Using the central trope of the house, both in its general context of home and dwelling, and its Christian context of the church as a house of worship, I specifically show how cross-border movements, through intersections of individual, material, and cultural mobility stretching across centuries have led to synekistic practices of subject formation in the religious sphere. In this way the paper interjects into discourses on conflict between Christianity and the state and highlights alternative notes of interdependencies and creative synergies.