Keywords
Evangelical Churches
mission methodology
Bible
laity
voluntarism
spontaneity
How to Cite
Number of views: 428
Number of downloads: 626
Abstract
The present study attempts to describe one of the most interesting phenomena in the history of missions: the birth and development of the Missionary Societies, which arose between the end of the 18th and the beginning of the 19th century. The beginning was linked to the humble story of a simple shoemaker, turned Baptist pastor and a missionary in India but it soon developed within all main Churches of the Reformation. Characteristic of the phenomenon was the spontaneity of giving life to societies aiming at preaching the Gospel overseas. It was a novelty in the Reformation world as the missionary venture had found a difficult ground to develop in the first two centuries after Luther and Calvin. These societies were capable in reasonably short time to develop their own pastoral guide-lines and policy and their members in the overseas missions committed themselves to social issues and educational projects as part of the evangelising project. The article examines these elements and other aspects trying to highlight also unavoidable limitation encountered in the process.
References
Aughton P., Endeavour: The Story of Captain Cook’s First Great Epic Voyage, London: Cassell & Co., 2002.
Baptist Confession of Faith, ed. W.L. Lumpkin, Valley Forge, PA: Judson Press, 1969.
Bevans S.B., Schroeder R.P., Constant in Context. A Theology of Mission for Today, Quezon City and Bangalore: Claretian Publications, 2004.
Bosch D.J., Transforming Mission. Paradigm Shifts in Theology of Mission, Maryknoll: Orbis Book, 2011 [1st edition 1991].
Carey W., An Enquiry, into the Obligations of Christians, to Use Means for the Conversion of the Heathens, London: The Carey Kingsgate Press Limited (new facsimile edition), 1961.
Cook J., The Journals, ed. P. Edwards, London: Penguin Books, 2003.
Cook J., A Voyage Round the World, ed. G. Forster, vol. 1-2, University of Hawaii Press, 2000 (published first 1777 as: A Voyage round the World in His Britannic Majesty’s Sloop Resolution, Commanded by Capt. James Cook, during the Years, 1772, 3, 4, and 5).
George T., Faithful Witness: The Life of William Carey, Birmingham: New Hope Publishers 1991 (2nd ed. Christian History Institute, 1998).
Glenn Hinson E., William Carey and Ecumenical Pragmatism, “Journal of Ecumenical Studies” 17.2 (1980), p. 73-83.
Hough R., Captain James Cook: A Biography, London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1994.
Kopf D., British Orientalism and the Bengal Renaissance, Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1969.
Kumar Chatterjee S., Hannah Marshman, The first woman missionary in India, Hooghly 2006.
Neil S., A History of Christian Missions, New York: Viking Press, 1994.
Payne E.A., Introduction, in: W. Carey, An Enquiry, into the Obligations of Christians, to Use Means for the Conversion of the Heathens, London: The Carey Kingsgate Press Limited (new facsimile edition), 1961, p. I-XX.
Pennington B.K., Was Hinduism Invented? Britons, Indians, and the Colonial Construction of Religion, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005.
Pennington E., The SPG Anniversary Sermons 1702-1783, n.p., n.d.
Porter A., Religion Versus Empire? British Protestant Missionaries and Overseas Expansion, 1700-1914, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2004.
Potts E.D., British Baptist Missionaries in India 1793-1837, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1967.
Robert D., American Women in Mission: A Social History of Their Thought and Practice, Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 1996.
Robson J., The Captain Cook Encyclopedia, Random House Australia, 2004.
Rouse R., William Carey’s ‘Pleasing Dream’, “The International Review of Missions” 38(1949), p. 181-192.
Singh B., The First Protestant Missionary to India: Bartholomaeus Ziegenbalg (1683-1710), New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1999.
Smith A.C., The Serampore Mission Enterprise, Bangalore: Centre for Contemporary Christianity, 2006.
Stanley B., The History of the Baptist Missionary Society 1792-1992, Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1992.
Stewart K.J., Restoring the Reformation. British Evangelicals and the Francophone ‘Réveil’ 1816-1849, [Studies in Evangelical History and Thought], Carlisle: Paternoster, 2007.
The Church Mission Society and World Christianity 1799-1999, ed. K. Ward and B. Stanley, Grand Rapids MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2000.
Thomas N., The Extraordinary Voyages of Captain James Cook, New York: Walker & Co., 2003.
To Advance the Gospel: Selections from the writings of Rufus Anderson, ed. R. Pierce Beaver, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1967.
Walls A.F., The Cross-cultural Process in Christian History, Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 2002.
Walls A.F., The Missionary Movement in Christian History. Studies in the Transmission of Faith, Maryknoll: Orbis Book, 1996.
License
Copyright (c) 2014 Roberto Catalano
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
PUBLISHED WORK ARE LICENSED UNDER A CREATIVE COMMONS:
From 2021: 
From 2006: 
Before 2006 all published texts are copyrighted.
Authors
Authors of texts accepted for publication in the journal Annales Missiologici Posnanienses are required to complete, sign and return to the editorial address an agreement to grant free license to works, with an obligation to grant CC sublicense.
According to the agreement, the authors of the texts published in the journal Annales Missiologici Posnanienses grant to Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznan a non-exclusive and royalty-free licencji Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) license and allow sublicensing under the same conditions.
The authors retain the rights to further freely dispose of the work.
Users
Interested internet users are entitled to use works published from 2021 onwards in Annales Missiologici Posnanienses under the following conditions:
- Attribution - the obligation to provide with the distributed work, information, about the authorship, title, source (links to the original work, DOI) and the license itself;
- Non-commercial use - you should not use the work for commercial purposes;
- Without creating derivative works - the work must be preserved in its original form, e.g. translations, adaptations may not be distributed without the author's permission.
Interested Internet users are entitled to use works published between 2006 and 2020 in Annales Missiologici Posnanienses under the following conditions:
- acknowledgment of authorship - the obligation to provide with the distributed work, information, about the authorship, title, source (links to the original work, DOI) and the license itself;
- without creating derivative works - the work must be preserved in its original form, e.g. translations, adaptations cannot be distributed without the author's consent.
Other
Adam Mickiewicz University of Poznan retains the right to the journal as a whole (layout, graphic form, title, cover design, logo, etc.).