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 The worldwide spread of Christianity is one of the top ten religious stories of the millennium, according to Ecumenical News International, Geneva. ENI reports that the public television series, “Religion and Ethics Newsweekly” ranked missionary movements--particularly those from the 16th through the 19th centuries-- as number seven, after Martin Luther’s 95 theses of 1517 and before the Puritans’ journey to America in search of religious liberty. For more information contact Ecumenical News International at eni@eni.ch.Read More About . . . Missionary Movements |
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| As the book publishing arm of the Maryknoll Fathers and Brothers, Orbis publishes a great many books on mission, its history and development, as well as its theory and practice. Here’s a small selection: click on each for an excerpt. |
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 A History of Christianity in AsiaBy Samuel Hugh Moffett "Makes available immense amounts of research on the story of the spread of Christianity eastward. “A highly recommended book that refocuses our attention on a subject too long neglected in church and mission history.”—Theology Today 560pp. Notes, bibliography, index. ISBN 1-57075-162-5 |
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| From Chapter 2: The First Missions to India "One of the oldest and strongest traditions in church history is that Thomas the apostle carried the gospel to India not long after the resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ. It traces as far back as about the year 200 when a Christian in Edessa, on the great bend of the Euphrates River between Roman Asia and Persia, wrote a lively account of how the apostle had been sent out from Jerusalem protesting bitterly, a reluctant missionary, but one who preached fearlessly before kings and founded the Indian church. That early Christian romance, called the Acts of Thomas, became the most popular of a number of similar apocryphal Acts that appeared in the third century, perhaps in answer to an insistent demand from a growing number of believers for more information about the original Twelve than is given in the canonical New Testament. "The Asian roots of the church, of course, lie deeper than such traditions and they do not begin with Thomas or with India. They begin with Jesus, for Bethlehem is in Asia and so also is Golgotha. But when Jesus was born the little town of Bethlehem was ruled by Rome, and Rome was Western, so that part of Asia was drawn into Western history. Paul’s mission to the Gentiles moved the gospel still more decisively west in the histories, for there was a historian, Luke, accompanying Paul. No such contemporary historian recorded the gospel’s eastward march, but there is no doubt that the gospel did move east even while Paul was opening a beachhead in Europe at Philippi. And, however Western scholars may write their histories of the church, from time immemorial Asia has linked the church’s expansion east to the missionary travels of the Apostle Thomas. "The evidence for that link is traditional, of course, and only peripherally historical. But the tradition is so ancient and the support so strong even in the normally skeptical twentieth century that is may be wise to admit that underlying some of the most improbably legends there often lies a foundation of fact. So let us being at the beginning, with the legend itself . . ." A History of Christianity in Asia By Samuel Hugh Moffett 560pp. Notes, bibliography, index. ISBN 1-57075-162-5 |
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 Maryknoll in ChinaA History, 1918-1955 Jean-Paul Wiest “A masterful and definitive overview of a major and multifaceted encounter between two great nations and two great religious systems. . . “—Jeffrey C. Kinkley, St. John’s University 615pp. Photos, notes, glossary, bibliography, index. ISBN 1-57075-142-0 Paperback $26.00 |
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| From Chapter 1: The Coming of Age of American Foreign Missions "Until the early 1900s the American Catholic Church showed little awareness of a need to participate in world missions. Classified as a mission Church under the authority of Propaganda Fide until 1908, the Church in the United States focused on home missions. These missions encompassed not only Native Americans and Blacks, but also immigrants and poor dioceses of the South and West with only a few Catholics scattered over a vast territory. Under these circumstances, recalled James A. Walsh, the topic of foreign missions was rarely mentioned . . . "While visiting friends in the summer of 1896, James Cardinal Gibbons renewed contact with an old acquaintance, Sulpician Father Gabriel Andre, who had served many years on the faculties of St. Mary’s Seminary in Baltimore and St. John’s Seminary in Brighton, Massachusetts. Andre spoke to him of the project nearest his heart—the establishment in America of an well-organized Society for the Propagation of the Faith. When Gibbons heard Andrea’s proposal . . . he strongly encouraged the idea. His approval led to acceptance by the Central Council of the Society in Paris, and finally its ratification in October 1897 by the Assembly of the American Archbishops. The Assembly also appointed a national director to help diocesan directors organize the Society throughout the country and recruit members who would help foreign missions with funds and prayers. "The Boston branch grew quickly under the leadership of Father Joseph V. Tracy . . . When James A. Walsh took over from Tracy in 1903, he realized that however substantial the sums, it still amounted to less than five cents per Catholic per year. He was even more dismayed to find out that the 12 million American Catholics who gave millions to charitable works and other local and national needs did not contribute even $100,000 or one cent per capita to foreign missions. "Walsh was convinced that the lack of support was not a sign of selfishness, but of ignorance. He thought if Catholics in the United States knew more about the needs of foreign missions, they would respond generously. Missionary education, in turn, would result in better financial backing and also generate vocations. . . "Walsh launched a well-planned campaign of missionary education. He developed an extensive correspondence with missioners all over the world . . . He channeled their information and requests into several hundred letters a year which he sent to pastors in Boston and to benefactors and members of the Society for the Propagation of the Faith. He also went wherever invited to talk on the missions. Besides addressing congregations at Sunday masses, he frequently gave lectures in churches and halls, school auditoriums, convents, and missionary conferences. He even went to jails to speak with prisoners. Years later, reflecting on this period of his life, Walsh confided to Mother Mary Joseph that for long periods of time he had not slept in the same bed on two successive nights . . . " Maryknoll in China A History, 1918-1955 Jean-Paul Wiest |
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 The Frontiers and American Catholic IdentityEdited by Anne M. Butler (Utah State University), Michael E. Engh, S.J. (Loyola Marymount), and Thomas W. Spalding, C.F.X. (Spalding University) From the American Catholic Identities Series |
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| “This splendid anthology of nearly a hundred original documents shows how Catholics—clergy, women religious, and lay people; French, Anglo, Latino, and Indian—took part in America’s frontiers, from Kentucky all the way to Hawaii and Alaska. The editors’ introductions alone provide a capsule history of Catholics as they moved across our successive Wests. Many selections are rare and photographs are rare and unusual, even to specialists.”—Walter Nugent, University of Notre Dame Included are sections on the Backwoods Frontier; The Fur-Gathering Frontier; Sacred Contests in the West; Migrant Lives; the Pacific Slope; and the Southwest. Documents include “Bishop Flaget’s Report to the Pope” (1816); Gabriel Richard’s Account of the Church in the Michigan Territory (1826); Bishop Rosati’s Report on the Church in St. Louis (1830); An Interrupted Migration by Irish Catholics (ca. 1840); The Daughters of Charity Arrive in Los Angeles (1856); Father Damien Describes the Life of a Missionary in Hawai’i (1869); A New Mexican Layman Explains the Role of Catholicism for Hispanics (1878); A Report to Europeans about the Progress of Catholicism in Utah (1882); Yuma Indians Bury Their Dead (1894); A morada of Penitentes as Described by a Sister of the Blessed Sacrament (1906); many more. The Frontiers and American Catholic Identity |
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From the American Society of Missiology Series The Missionary Movement in American Catholic Historyby Angelyn Dries, O.S.F. 400pp. Notes, bibliographies, index. ISBN 1-57075-167-6 Paperback $20.00 |
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| From Chapter 5 “America’s Hour” for Missions Overseas 1918-1935 "While several seminaries and convents had been sending their members overseas by war’s end, virtually no specific training for mission was offered in their education program. The curriculum for the men remained the standard seminary courses. While seminarians and novices absorbed the “feel” for missions from missionary letters sent home or from returned missionaries, two seminarians sought to study more carefully the mission situation and to aid those abroad by establishing a nationwide student mission organization. Aware of the success of John Mott’s Student Volunteer Movement for Foreign Missions and hearing articles from The Field Afar read in the dining room at St. Mary’s Mission House, Techny, Illinois, Clifford J. King and Robert B. Clark resolved to start a similar organization . . . From 27 to 30 July, 1918, one hundred clergy, laity, and a few bishops assembled at Techny, outside Chicago, for the conference that launched the Catholic Students Mission Crusade. . . . . "The movement grew rapidly, with units springing up all across the country in men’s and women’s colleges, seminaries and high schools. Support was provided by many bishops and magazine editorials, including several in America. Professor and rectors were alerted to the movement’s importance through the 1919 Catholic Education Association conference . . . Almost from its foundation, SCMC saw two parts to the movement: the support and promotion of home and foreign missions through prayer and study, and the development of leadership skills for young Catholics in America. . . . The Missionary Movement in American Catholic History |
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 Hearts on Fire: The Story of the Maryknoll Sistersby Penny Lernoux “A marvelous book that tells a tremendously inspiring story . . .”—St. Anthony Messenger Press 300pp. Photos, notes, bibliography, index. ISBN 1-57075-019-X Paperback $15.00 |
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| "In our history books we read about the almost mythical pioneer American women who underwent incredible hardships and adventures in the opening of the country's frontiers. But these Maryknoll Sisters are flesh-and-blood pioneers--women who are still on the world's geographical frontiers while also moving toward new understandings of the human condition. Founded in 1912, they were the first congregation of American Catholic women to go abroad in mission, and I emphasize American rather than Catholic because their history reflects "the American Century" of economic, political and religious expansion, and the traits that distinguish them--individuality, courage, generosity--are American characteristics. But these Maryknollers are different as well, because they stand outside the mainstream: Like others who seek a different dimension of life, they beckon us to that part of the American dream that does not depend on material success but is inspired by religious ideals. ". . . . Mary (Mollie) Josephine Rogers, the founder of the Maryknoll Sisters, never doubted the headship of the (Maryknoll) Fathers in mission work, but she was determined that the Sisters not be permanently relegated to the role of domestic helpers in the United States. After four frustrating years of repeated petitions, the Vatican (Congregation for Religious) gave approval for the Maryknoll Sisters to be established as a missionary Congregation (or Institute) under the Archdiocese of New York. A year later, in 1921, the first group of Maryknoll women set out for China . . . . [They] were welcomed into the Chinese homes, whereas the men were prevented from such contact by strict Chinese customs . . . Although the pioneer Maryknoll women could not have articulated it, they had become missioners said Sister Barbara Hendricks, former president of the Maryknoll Sisters, because of 'a desire, a compulsion, to search for the "other"--someone else who needs you. China was the symbol of the completely other--the one who lives at the other end of the world. But it is only through that other person that you find out who you really are. In the end you are searching for another dimension of yourself.' "The search was heroic precisely because it was mythical--it did not depend on quantifiable facts and figures but on a faith that transcended the rational and that conveyed the Good News that God is love." Hearts on Fire: The Story of the Maryknoll Sisters by Penny Lernoux 300pp. Photos, notes, bibliography, index. ISBN 1-57075-019-X Paperback $15.00 |
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