Henry Martyn Day Lecture 2024 “Whatever Happened to Missionary Enthusiasm? The Transformation of Protestant Globalism from Bishop Selwyn’s Cambridge Sermons in 1854 to Today” by Prof Brian Stanley

Henry Martyn Day Lecture 2024: Wednesday 6 November 1600-1730 GMT

Title: Whatever Happened to Missionary Enthusiasm? The Transformation of Protestant Globalism from Bishop Selwyn’s Cambridge Sermons in 1854 to Today

Abstract

The waning of Christian enthusiasm for foreign missions is one of the most striking transformations observable since Bishop Selwyn’s visit to Cambridge in 1854, which aroused great excitement. How do we explain the trend? As a result of theological change, growing understanding of world religions, and the postcolonial reaction? While these answers are plausible to an extent, the lecture draws attention to other possible explanations: the impact of photography on perceptions of non-European peoples, and especially of children; the role of the two world wars; and the consequent rise of development NGOs. The lecture concludes by reflecting on what European Christians may have lost by the weakening of their previous confidence that the Christian gospel is indeed good news for all humanity.

Bio

Brian Stanley is Professor Emeritus of World Christianity in the University of Edinburgh.  Before moving to Edinburgh in 2008 he spent thirteen years in Cambridge as a Fellow of St Edmund’s College, first directing the Currents in World Christianity Project in the Faculty of Divinity, and then as Director of the Henry Martyn Centre (now CCCW). His most recent books are Christianity in the Twentieth Century: A World History (2018), and a revision of lectures given by the late Professor Andrew F. Walls, The Missionary Movement from the West: A Biography from Birth to Old Age (2023).