History of Missions

A la lumière des carnets d'inventaire des objets récoltés, des fiches d'inventaire des instruments de musique et du contenu des enregistrements sonores réalisés pendant la mission Dakar-Djibouti (1931-1933), cet article évoque le travail de collecte fait par André Schaeffner durant la mission.

This article analyzes the organization of the Jesuit missions in Asia in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries through the case of the relationship between the Indian mission and the Japanese mission, which was subordinate to it. It highlights the management and control methods which were specific to the Asian missions. It thus demonstrates the growing autonomy of the Japanese mission, which was trying to free itself from Indian administrative and financial supervision. In doing so, the deep-seated nature of the rivalries and tensions between missions within a single Jesuit province are brought into focus, despite Roman arbitration. The article is thus an invitation to reassess the regional dimension to Jesuit governance, which is sometimes ignored in favor of the global aspect.

The Greek term mártyras carries the double meaning of witness and martyr. This paper invites an exploration of the relationship between these two concepts in the contexts of first century and contemporary Africa using the life of St Mark as a historical lens. The paper suggests that many Western authored histories of the Christian movement are distorted by a lack of attention to the Eastern and African expansion of the Church in the early centuries and that contemporary African Christians have erroneously bought into this emaciated history and the theology to which it has given rise. Through an examination of various themes in the life, witness and death of St Mark, and the relationship between martyrdom and witness in African Christian history, the paper encourages a reappraisal of the African roots of Christianity as a rich source for contemporary discipleship in Africa and the universal Church.

Galen Poor and Joshua Tan interview Joseph Ho about his intersecting interests in the modern history of Christianity in China and the history of photography. Learn about cultural encounters between Americans and China in the early twentieth century, the unique position of American missionaries in early twentieth century China, the history of photography and film-making in China, and how photographs and other visual materials are a rich and unique archival source to do history.

Au Canada, les Oblats de Marie-Immaculée ont participé intensivement à l’évangélisation des populations autochtones. Historiens et anthropologues ont analysé cette histoire complexe et mis l’accent sur les stratégies de ces missionnaires pour la plupart issus de France, de Belgique et d’autres pays européens. Ils ont cependant laissé de côté l’étude des vocations féminines et masculines autochtones. Cet article examine deux trajectoires masculines, celle d’Anthony Manernaluk et celle de Nick Sikkuaq, tout deux frères de sang et frères coadjuteurs. L’auteur montre que le célibat comme les exigences sociales des Oblats étaient difficilement acceptables et des obstacles pour le sacerdoce, les Inuits demeurant attachés à d’autres sociabilités.

This article comparatively analyzes the characteristics of the communication of information of the religious orders between their missionary provinces and their Roman headquarters. We study the unexplored interregional similarities in the functioning of the different provinces of a same order and we establish similarities, differences and nuances in the treatment different religious orders gave to their internal communication. The first section deals with the debate on the limitations of written documentation and the growing need to send informants that would transmit the situation of the provinces directly. The second delves into the mechanisms of selection of informants, the "procurors", and the way in which they were expected to transmit the information. The third and fourth sections study the role of these figures in the face of frequent irregularities in the provinces and how they were expected to express diversity of opinions at the local level. The last section proposes a comparison of the Jesuit communication practices with the Franciscans and Mercedarians.

O processo de constituição das fronteiras ibéricas no sul da América meridional ao longo do período colonial impactou de forma significativa na história das populações indígenas habitantes desses espaços. Os índios participaram de forma ativa na construção destes territórios, integrando a nova realidade que era articulada a partir das instituições políticas, religiosas e formas de organização do trabalho empregadas pelos espanhóis na América: a encomienda e, concomitantemente, a atividade missionária. Nessa direção, pretende-se problematizar a situação de fronteira, considerando seu complexo dinamismo social, enfatizando a análise de situações concretas vivenciadas pelos índios no Paraguai colonial.
Palavras-chave: Fronteira - Índios - Paraguai colonial

In: Duve, Thomas / Otto Danwerth (eds.): Knowledge of the Pragmatici: Legal and Moral Theological Literature and the Formation of Early Modern Ibero-America (Max Planck Studies in Global Legal History of the Iberian Worlds, 1) Leiden / Boston 2020, 89-130.
Open Access: https://brill.com/view/title/56781

Abstract:

The circulation of pragmatic normative texts – particularly religious ones – contributed to the establishment of knowledge regimes in early modern Spanish America. Handbooks of moral theology, catechisms, manuals for confession, and other genres applied especially in missionary contexts were central media for the diffusion of normative orders in an emerging empire. The analysis of a multidisciplinary historiography on the production, possession and circulation of books speaks to their dispersion in different regions of the New World during the 16th and 17th centuries. Expanding on that knowledge, and drawing on archival sources, this chapter assesses comparatively the role played by the transatlantic trade, the controls on importation of books from Seville, and the relatively minor contribution of American printing presses. Finally, the chapter highlights case studies drawn from library catalogues and personal book inventories in colonial Mexico and Peru to illustrate that pragmatic books (and manuscripts) for practitioners were not only present in urban settings but reached rural users and mission zones as well, providing resources of normativity.

Digital Access: https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004425736

Knowledge of the pragmatici sheds new light on pragmatic normative literature (mainly from the religious sphere), a genre crucial for the formation of normative orders in early modern Ibero-America. Long underrated by legal historical scholarship, these media – manuals for confessors, catechisms, and moral theological literature – selected and localised normative knowledge for the colonial worlds and thus shaped the language of normativity.

The eleven chapters of this book explore the circulation and the uses of pragmatic normative texts in the Iberian peninsula, in New Spain, Peru, New Granada and Brazil. The book reveals the functions and intellectual achievements of pragmatic literature, which condensed normative knowledge, drawing on medieval scholarly practices of ‘epitomisation’, and links the genre with early modern legal culture.

Contributors are: Manuela Bragagnolo, Agustín Casagrande, Otto Danwerth, Thomas Duve, José Luis Egío, Renzo Honores, Gustavo César Machado Cabral, Pilar Mejía, Christoph H. F. Meyer, Osvaldo Moutin, and David Rex Galindo.

In the mid-1930s Joy Ridderhof, a Quaker missionary, returned from her missionary work in Honduras a physically broken woman. In the process of recovering from malaria and the other illnesses that had not allowed her to remain on the mission field she began a new project that would transform how the gospel message was disseminated around the world. Ridderhof imagined the possibilities associated with proclaiming the message of Jesus through the use of phonograph records for Spanish listeners. The benefit of making sound recordings was quickly recognized by missionaries who were trying to reach largely illiterate and, in some cases, preliterate populations. Ridderhof was soon asked to expand from her initial foray into Spanish language records to make recordings in other North American indigenous languages and, eventually, languages from around the world. This article analyses how Ridderhof managed this endeavour while embracing new media technologies to bring the sound of the gospel to the people of the world in their native tongue.

The Assemblies of God (AOG) celebrates its centenary in 2017. The paper aims to show the
historical development of theological education and ministerial training and formation in this
denomination. It starts by showing how internationally AOG embraced the Bible Institute
movement as a way of evangelism, church planting and growth from the early decades of the
20th century after the birth of the Pentecostal Movement. Then there is a South African
scenario, lamenting the de-emphasis of the importance of theological education, though there
was emphasis on evangelism and missional endeavours on the grassroots. The research
unfolds the development of institutions from 1949 to the present. All in all, 10 institutions are
identified and briefly explained, some of them with their demise. The article concludes by
historical reflections on what was taught and identifies the gaps by suggesting that the
Pentecostal curriculum should be relevant to the context of Africa by embracing inclusivity:
Hidden Curriculum, Gender Studies, Inculturation and Liberation ideals and renaissance
of pneumatology.

The arrival of foreign missionaries played some significant roles in the formation of the Assemblies of God (AOG). The new Pentecostal denomination was originally a church of blacks, though under white control. In 1925, the Americans and Europe-ans in this church organised themselves as South African District of the Assemblies of God, and AOG in America recognised AOG of South Africa as a separate national church in 1932. This article traces how AOG evolved by entrenching a 'Group" system significantly divided along racial lines. This status quo has marked AOG as a racially divided church regardless of South African socio-cultural and theo-cultural realities in the changing demographics since 1994. This structure is the polity that reflects South African Apartheid legacy of separate development-the compromise between unity and mission.

The paper tackles the relationship between the Church and local cultures tracing the historical and conceptual evolution of the subject. It focuses on hermeneutical questions and ecclesiological perspectives at the time of the colonial mission, especially in the East Asian context. The analysis selects showcases from the history of the mission and specific notions able to provide some hints for a post-colonial interpretation of Church/local-cultures relationship. Furthermore, the paper draws from theories and approaches of social and cultural anthropology to define the concepts used and the processes ingrained within the analysed relationship.

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Il contributo traccia un itinerario storico e concettuale sul tema del rapporto tra Chiesa e culture, circoscritto ad alcune questioni ermeneutiche e prospettive ecclesiologiche (dominanti e di discontinuità) relative all’epoca della missione coloniale con particolare attenzione al contesto dell’Asia Orientale. L’indagine ricava dall’analisi di alcuni eventi esemplificativi della storia della missione e di specifiche nozioni delle indicazioni utili alla qualificazione della tematica del rapporto tra la Chiesa e le culture locali in chiave post-coloniale. Il contributo precisa, inoltre, il significato delle nozioni adoperate e dei processi implicati nell’argomento in oggetto, anche alla luce delle indicazioni provenienti dall’antropologia sociale e culturale.