The Cambridge Centre for Christianity Worldwide (CCCW) is a study, teaching and research centre in Cambridge, England and a member of the Cambridge Theological Federation which is affiliated with the University of Cambridge.
The Cambridge Centre for Christianity Worldwide (CCCW) is a study, teaching and research centre in Cambridge, England and a member of the Cambridge Theological Federation which is affiliated with the University of Cambridge.
The centre was established in 1881 by a trust created in memory of Henry Martyn (1781-1812), a Fellow of St John’s College, Cambridge, who served as a missionary to India and Persia with the British East India Company. [1] The trust was initially created for the purpose of constructing the Henry Martyn Memorial Hall, which was built in 1886-7 on Market Street next to Holy Trinity Church. The hall served as a place for lectures on Christian missions for members of the university and the general public as well as a gathering place for mission societies and student groups like the Cambridge Missionary Church Union (CMCU), the Cambridge Inter-Collegiate Christian Union (CICCU), the Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA), and the Young Women’s Christian Association (YWCA). [2] Faculty members and students of the university had direct ties to these bodies, as well as the Church Missionary Society (1799), the Universities’ Mission to Central Africa (1860), the China Inland Mission (1865), the Cambridge Seven (1885) and the Student Volunteer Movement (1886). During the nineteenth and twentieth centuries several hundred graduates from the University of Cambridge served in overseas mission as educators, physicians, linguists, and clergymen. [3] [4]
During the 1990s the Henry Martyn Memorial Hall transitioned from a lecture hall, with a library, to a formal academic centre for research and study in history and World Christianity as a member of the Cambridge Theological Federation. In 1992, the mission theologian Graham Kings, who later became Bishop of Sherborne, was appointed as the inaugural lecturer in missiology in the Federation. Under Kings' leadership the Henry Martyn Hall relocated its library to Westminster College, changed its name to the Henry Martyn Centre (HMC), and became formally affiliated with the Cambridge Theological Federation and the Cambridge University Faculty of Divinity. [5] Following the Centre's initiative, the archives and library of the Society for the Promotion of Christian Knowledge (SPCK) moved from its offices in London to the Cambridge University Library in 1998. [6] In 2014 the HMC became the Cambridge Centre for Christianity Worldwide to reflect academic trends in the study of Christianity as a worldwide phenomenon. [7] The CCCW library contains more than 10,000 books and over 100 journals related to the study of history and World Christianity. The library is associated with the Cambridge University Library (referred to as the University Library, or simply the UL). The holdings of the CCCW are registered with the National Archives of the United Kingdom [8] and comprise materials related to the history of missions in Africa, Asia and Latin America. The collection includes the papers of John Edward Church (1899-1989), a graduate of Emmanuel College, Cambridge, and a leader in the East African Revival. [9] [10] [11]
Graham Kings, who was appointed by the Henry Martyn Trust as missiology lecturer in 1992, served as the founding director of the Henry Martyn Centre from 1996 to 2000. From 2000 to 2001, the Korean theologian Sebastian C H Kim, now Assistant Provost for the Korean Studies Centre and Professor of Theology and Public Life at the Fuller Theological Seminary, Pasadena, California, was the interim director. The British historian Brian Stanley served as its director from 2001 to 2008, [12] before becoming the Professor of World Christianity and Director of the Centre for the Study of World Christianity at the University of Edinburgh in 2009. [13]
Emma Wild-Wood was the director of the Centre from 2009 to 2018. From 2015 to 2017, Wild-Wood was seconded to the Divinity Faculty of Cambridge University and Jesse Zink was the interim director. Muthuraj Swamy, the current director of the Centre, moved in 2018 from South India. Specialists in history and World Christianity serve as research associates at the centre, including the British historian Ian Randall, known for his works on the history of evangelicalism. [12]
CCCW has facilitated inter-university scholarship from Western and non-Western academics, linking together the universities of Cambridge, Edinburgh and London with the University of Wisconsin, Boston College and Fuller Theological Seminary. [14] Scholars affiliated with the centre produce work on interfaith dialogue, social justice, missions history, the history of Evangelicalism, and World Christianity.
Missiology is the academic study of the Christian mission history and methodology. It began to be developed as an academic discipline in the 19th century.
Henry Martyn was an Anglican priest and missionary to the peoples of India and Persia. Born in Truro, Cornwall, he was educated at Truro Grammar School and St John's College, Cambridge. A chance encounter with Charles Simeon led him to become a missionary. He was ordained a priest in the Church of England and became a chaplain for the British East India Company.
Roland Allen was an English missionary to China sent by the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel (SPG).
The Cambridge Theological Federation (CTF) is an association of theological colleges, courses and houses based in Cambridge, England and founded in 1972. The federation offers several joint theological programmes of study open to students in member institutions; these programmes are either validated by or are taught on behalf either the University of Cambridge or Anglia Ruskin University. It also offers courses as part of the Common Award validated by Durham University.
The Cambridge Seven were six students from Cambridge University and one from the Royal Military Academy, who in 1885, decided to become missionaries to China through the China Inland Mission. The seven were:
Selly Oak Colleges was a federation of educational facilities which in the 1970s and 1980s was at the forefront of debates about ecumenism - the coming together of Christian churches and the creation of new united churches such as the Church of South India; the relationships between Christianity and other religions, especially Islam and Judaism; child-centred teacher training; and the theology of Christian mission. It was located on a substantial campus in Selly Oak, a suburb in the south-west of Birmingham, England, about a mile from the University of Birmingham. In 2001 the largest college, Westhill College, whose main work was the training of teachers, passed into the hands of the University of Birmingham, and most of the remaining colleges closed, leaving Woodbrooke College, a study and conference centre for the Society of Friends, and Fircroft College, a small adult education college with residential provision, which continue today.
Karl Graul was a leader of Leipzig Lutheran mission and a Tamil scholar. He was born in a poor weaver family in Germany. He moved to India as the director of the Lutheran Leipzig Mission in 1849 and there he mastered Tamil.
Graham Kings is an English Church of England bishop, theologian and poet. In retirement in Cambridge, having served as Bishop of Sherborne and then Mission Theologian in the Anglican Communion, he is an Honorary Assistant Bishop in the Diocese of Ely and Research Associate at the Cambridge Centre for Christianity Worldwide, which he founded in 1996. His latest books are: Nourishing Connections , Nourishing Mission: Theological Settings , Exchange of Gifts: The Vision of Simon Barrington-Ward , edited with Ian Randall.
Alan Richard Tippett was a Methodist missionary, missiologist, and anthropologist.
Darrell Likens Guder is a theologian and missiologist who is Professor of Missional and Ecumenical Theology Emeritus at Princeton Theological Seminary.
The International Association for Mission Studies (IAMS) is an international, inter-confessional, and interdisciplinary professional society for the scholarly study of the Christian mission and its impact in the world and the related field of intercultural theology. It is based in England and South Korea.
Roger E. Hedlund is an American pastor who has spent more than three decades in India as a theological teacher and researcher with major contributions to missiology with special reference to Indian ethos.
The Centre for the Study of World Christianity (CSWC) is a research centre based in New College, the School of Divinity at the University of Edinburgh. It was founded in the University of Aberdeen by Andrew F. Walls as the Centre for the Study of Christianity in the Non-Western World in 1982, but later moved by Walls to the University of Edinburgh in 1986. Its current name was adopted in 2009. The centre is currently directed by Alexander Chow and Emma Wild-Wood.
World Christianity or global Christianity has been defined both as a term that attempts to convey the global nature of the Christian religion and an academic field of study that encompasses analysis of the histories, practices, and discourses of Christianity as a world religion and its various forms as they are found on the six continents. However, the term often focuses on "non-Western Christianity" which "comprises instances of Christian faith in 'the global South', in Asia, Africa, and Latin America." It also includes Indigenous or diasporic forms of Christianity in the Caribbean, South America, Western Europe, and North America.
Brian Stanley is a British historian, best known for his works in the history of Christian missions and world Christianity.
Dana Lee Robert is a historian of Christianity and a missiologist. She is a professor at Boston University, where she has worked since 1984. She was the co-founder of the Center for Global Christianity and Mission in 2001, one of the first university-based Centers on World Christianity in North America. For years, Robert held the School of Theology's Truman Collins Professorship in World Christianity and History of Mission, but in 2022 she was installed in the William Fairfield Warren Distinguished Professorship, the highest distinction bestowed upon senior faculty members who remain actively involved in research, scholarship, teaching, and the University’s civic life.
Siga Arles was an Indian missiologist and founder of the Centre for Contemporary Christianity.
Kirsteen Kim is a British theologian and Professor of Theology and World Christianity at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, CA. Her research interests are Korean Christianity, Pneumatology, and world Christianity.
David B. Barrett was a British visiting professor at Columbia University, an Anglican priest, and research secretary for the Anglican Consultative Council.
Carlos F. Cardoza-Orlandi is a Puerto Rican theologian, historian, teacher, academic and author. He holds the Frederick E. Roach Chair in World Christianity at Baylor University.