American Methodist Episcopal Mission (AMEM; also known as Board of Foreign Missions of the Methodist Episcopal Church [MEFB] [1] ) was the missionary society of the Methodist Episcopal Church that was involved in sending workers to countries such as Africa, South America, India, Australia and China during the late Qing dynasty.
In 1847, the American Methodist Episcopal Society (North) entered the field of China, and soon surpassed all others in the number of its agents and members. Its pioneer was Rev. Judson Dwight Collins, who passionately asked the society to enter China. When he was told that no money was available for the purpose, he wrote:
Engage me a passage before the mast in the first vessel going to China. My own strong arm can pull me to China and can support me when I arrive there.[ citation needed ]
Such enthusiasm was irresistible, and Collins was sent to Fuzhou, where, after ten years weary preparation, a work broke out, which spread itself over six large districts, and comprised sixty stations. A printing press was kept busily employed, which, in the year 1888 alone, issued 14,000 pages of Christian literature. A large college was in use through the generosity of a natives. The mission also wound along the banks of the Yangtze for three hundred miles, and had stations in Jiujiang and other large cities. Northwards it has churches in Beijing, Tianjin and Isunhua, with full accompaniments of schools and hospitals, and it extended westward to Chongqing, 1,400 miles from the sea. In 1890 it had thirty-two missionaries, seventeen lady agents, forty-three native ordained pastors, ninety-one unordained native helpers, and over four thousand communicants. [2]
This timeline of Christian missions chronicles the global expansion of Christianity through a listing of the most significant missionary outreach events.
A Christian mission is an organized effort to carry on evangelism or other activities, such as educational or hospital work, in the name of the Christian faith. Missions involve sending individuals and groups across boundaries, most commonly geographical boundaries. Sometimes individuals are sent and are called missionaries, and historically may have been based in mission stations. When groups are sent, they are often called mission teams and they undertake mission trips. There are a few different kinds of mission trips: short-term, long-term, relational and those that simply help people in need. Some people choose to dedicate their whole lives to mission.
Protestant Christianity entered China in the early 19th century, taking root in a significant way during the Qing dynasty. Some historians consider the Taiping Rebellion to have been influenced by Protestant teachings. Since the mid-20th century, there has been an increase in the number of Christian practitioners in China. According to a survey published in 2010 there are approximately 40 million Protestants in China. As of 2019, Fenggang Yang, a sociologist of religion at Purdue University, estimated that there are around 100 million Protestant Christians in China. Other estimates place the number of Protestant Christians at around 40–60 million
The Methodist New Connexion, also known as Kilhamite Methodism, was a Protestant nonconformist church. It was formed in 1797 by secession from the Wesleyan Methodists, and merged in 1907 with the Bible Christian Church and the United Methodist Free Churches to form the United Methodist Church. In Australia, it joined with those, along with the Wesleyan Methodist Church and Primitive Methodist Church as the Methodist Church of Australasia in 1902.
In the early 19th century, Western colonial expansion occurred at the same time as an evangelical revival – the Second Great Awakening – throughout the English-speaking world, leading to more overseas missionary activity. The nineteenth century became known as the Great Century of modern religious missions.
The Protestant Episcopal Church Mission was a Christian missionary initiative of the Episcopal Church that was involved in sending and providing financial support to lay and ordained mission workers in growing population centers in the west of the United States as well as overseas in China, Liberia and Japan during the second half of the 19th Century.
Presbyterian Mission Agency is the ministry and mission agency of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). Founded as the Western Foreign Missionary Society by the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America in 1837, it was involved in sending workers to countries such as China during the late Qing dynasty and to India in the nineteenth century. Also known as the Foreign Missions Board in China, its name was changed by the Old School body during the Old School–New School Controversy to the Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions.
The Berlin Missionary Society (BMS) or Society for the Advancement of evangelistic Missions amongst the Heathen was a German Protestant (Lutheran) Christian missionary society that was constituted on 29 February 1824 by a group of pious laymen from the Prussian nobility.
The Church of England Zenana Missionary Society, also known as the Church of England Zenana Mission, was a British Anglican missionary society established to spread Christianity in India. It would later expand its Christian missionary work into Japan and Qing Dynasty China. In 1957 it was absorbed into the Church Missionary Society (CMS).
English Presbyterian Mission was a British Presbyterian missionary society that was involved in sending workers to countries such as China during the late Qing Dynasty.
The English Wesleyan Mission was a British Methodist missionary society that was involved in sending workers to countries such as New Zealand and China in the 19th century.
Scottish United Presbyterian Mission was a Scottish Presbyterian missionary society that was involved in sending workers to countries such as China during the late Qing dynasty.
The Diocese of Shanghai was an American Anglican bishopric that was involved in missionary work in China during the late Qing dynasty.
Characteristic of Christianity in the 19th century were evangelical revivals in some largely Protestant countries and later the effects of modern biblical scholarship on the churches. Liberal or modernist theology was one consequence of this. In Europe, the Roman Catholic Church strongly opposed liberalism and culture wars launched in Germany, Italy, Belgium and France. It strongly emphasized personal piety. In Europe there was a general move away from religious observance and belief in Christian teachings and a move towards secularism. In Protestantism, pietistic revivals were common.
Methodist Church in India is a Protestant Christian denomination of India.
The Protestant mission began in the southwestern Chinese province of Sichuan in 1877, when premises were rented by the China Inland Mission in Chungking. However, compared with Catholicism, which had been spread throughout the province for over two centuries at the time, it grew rather slowly, it was not until the late 1980s that Protestantism experienced rapid growth. The two largest denominations in the province before 1950 were Anglicanism and Methodism.
The history of Methodism in Sichuan began in 1882 when missionaries began to arrive from the United States. Methodists founded or helped found several colleges, schools, and hospitals to aid in modernization and conversion efforts. Later, American Methodists were joined by missionaries from Canada. Methodism grew to become one of the two largest denominations of Protestant Christianity in the province by 1922, along with Anglicanism.
The history of Baptist Christianity in Sichuan began in 1890 when missionaries began arriving from the United States. Baptist missionaries in Sichuan were organized under the American Baptist Missionary Union, later renamed American Baptist Foreign Mission Society. Missionary activity in China generated controversy among many native Chinese and faced armed opposition during both the Boxer Rebellion and the later Communist movement in China. Although the former did not affect Sichuan so much as some other parts of China, the province was one of the hotbeds of anti-missionary riots throughout its ecclesiastical history.
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