Corrie Manigold

May 2, 2008

Can the Christian Mission be Divorced from Imperialism?

In the final class of this semester, class discussion briefly touched on the topic of religious conversion in its relation to colonization. This is a subject that we have only covered with brevity, yet it is one that I find myself involuntarily drawn to. The subject has appeared in multiple places in our reading, such as Friday's Christian conversion in Robinson Crusoe and the proselytizing of the Ibo untouchables in Things Fall Apart. Anticolonial critics generally take the view that Christian missionary endeavors have historically presented a threat of apocalyptic proportions when evaluated in terms of the survival of tribal or native cultures. Coupled with the formidable force of imperialism, or at least of Western culture, cross-cultural encounters aimed at spiritual conversion have tended to leave in their wake dramatic cultural change. This leads me to ask the following and perhaps somewhat counterintuitive question: Is it possible for the work of Christian missionaries to be conceptually (and practically) divorced from imperialism?

Not knowing where to begin, on a whim I 'googled' the phrase, “anticolonial missionaries,” and to my surprise turned up a scholarly article titled, “Christian Missionaries as Anticolonial Militants.” Heartened that my chosen angle on the topic might yield something, I continued conducting searches in “Google Scholar” and found a number of books and articles that though not usually devoted to my topic of interest, at least addressed it in a meaningful way. Among these, the afore-mentioned piece by Karen Field most pertinently went to the heart of my query, offering a sensitive and nuanced analysis of the history of Christian missions and British colonization among the African tribes of Malawi and the British practice of 'indirect rule'.    

In conjunction to this, a 1980 book review Elliot Kendalls's End of An Era undertaken by Stanley Barret also proved helpful in shedding light on the subject of colonial Africa and the missionary. And a more recent work by Cati Coe dedicated to exploring the role of state sponsored schools in Ghana promoting ( and producing) local culture discusses the colonial history of a different African region, under a different regime, and stands as a reminder that the history of colonization (and Christianization) exists in a variety of transmutations. Finally, the Oxford History of Christianity, which I stumbled upon while searching for background information on two specific 'anticolonial' missionaries of note, is a widely cited, widely published resource on the history of the Christian religion from its inception. 

Once I'd gathered these resources, I realized that while I had a sense of what it was I wanted to know, that I needed still to clarify my understanding of the definition of imperialism. Consulting the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, I found imperialism defined as the following: “the policy, practice, or advocacy of extending power and dominion of a nation, especially by direct territorial acquisitions or by gaining direct control over the political and economic life of other areas; broadly, the extension or imposition of power, authority, or influence.” This definition leaves room for the notion of imperialism to be broadened to apply to not only political and economic dominion or influence, but also religious and cultural dominion and influence.

As with most things worth studying, the role of Christian missions in advancing the agenda of colonial power  hardly appears two-dimensional in nature once due scrutiny is applied. Frequently, the scholarship of “[a]nti-colonial thinkers consider[s] the missionaries the handmaidens of the colonial state...” but as Karen Field notes “missionary accommodation to colonial rule was far from straight forward,” proving even at times subversive to the chosen British colonial strategies of government (Coe 31, Field 106). Cati Coe observes in Dilemmas of Culture that recent scholarship on the subject  has begun to recognize the “tensions and contradictions within the imperial mission” in its relation missionary activity (Coe 31). Unconventional examples of mission work also appear, buttressing the notion that the work of religious men hailing from places of colonial power has  not always been so clearly cut imperialist. The cases of Verrier Elwin and C.F. Andrews are recorded in the Oxford History of  Christianity as Christian religious icons who supported local nationalist movements, at times to the extent of undercutting the political aims their colonial homeland.  While the general endeavor of Christian missionaries coincides with imperialist expansions and drew heavily on colonial relationships, provisions, and structures (most notably protection and financial support), a difference of agendas did at times result in conflict.

Based on my research  findings, and in the strictest interpretation of the terms of my research question, it could perhaps be successfully argued that Christian missionary endeavors in the third world can in some cases be divorced from the imperialism of their homeland (when imperialism is defined as strictly political and economical). Still, this is a difficult case to make and seems to work only in theory, as even such a divorce on the conceptual level is tenuous, at best, if only due to the argument that spiritually imperialist attitudes resided at the root of missionary deployment, in the first place). 

Although the work that missionaries did was not always intended to abet the economic and political agendas of British, Danish, or other imperial powers, the mere introduction of a new spiritual message, an emphasis on literacy, and the introduction of European culture frequently (though perhaps unintentionally) laid the groundwork for the future political and economic influence of formal imperialist power.

Cited Works:

Barret, Stanley R. Rev. of End of An Era: Africa and the Missionary, by Elliot Kendall. London: SPCK, 1978.

Coe, Cati. Dilemmas of Culture in African Schools: Youth, Nationalism, and the Transformation of Knowledge. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005.

Field, Karen E. “Christian Missionaries as Anticolonial Militants.” Theory and Society Vol. 11, No. 1; (January, 1982): 95-108.

McManners, John. The Oxford History of Christianity. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2002.

Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionary. Imperialism.  Accessed May 2, 2008.

 http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/imperialism