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Introduction: Xiamen Protestantism Over the Years

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Protestantism in Xiamen

Part of the book series: Global Diversities ((GLODIV))

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Abstract

I was recently told of a Christian from Xiamen who, born during the tumultuous Cultural Revolution , grew up on the small island of Gulangyu . When this individual started kindergarten in the mid-1970s, she was shocked to find that some of her new playmates did not know who God was and she was even more horrified to see that her classmates did not pray before their lunch.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    A recent conference produced a volume that offers a critique of the 1949 divide for the study of Chinese Christianity (Wong et al. 2017). Notable among the contributions here is a chapter by Ying Fuk-Tsang (2017).

  2. 2.

    All RCA missionaries in Xiamen were affiliated with the ABCFM until the RCA created its own mission board in 1857.

  3. 3.

    The missionary branch of the Presbyterian Church of England was called the English Presbyterian Mission , so some scholars refer to this as EPM .

  4. 4.

    The origins and significance of this RCA /PCE union are presented in great detail in Cheung (2004).

  5. 5.

    In Chinese, this was known as the Minnan Jidujiao Zhanglao Zonghui or the Minnan Christian Synod. The actual Synod did not hold its first meeting until the following year, in 1893. Though Xiamen is the most influential city in South Fujian today, during the Qing , when the city became one of China’s first treaty ports, it was administratively under Quanzhou .

  6. 6.

    For an interesting study on how Otte is being remembered in Xiamen today, see Liu (2017a).

  7. 7.

    Most of the RCA missionaries were from Dutch-American communities. Otte, for instance, was born in the Netherlands but grew up in the US. After graduating from medical school, he again spent a year in the Netherlands and after starting his missionary career, he returned there to solicit funds for medical missionary work in Xiamen.

  8. 8.

    This school did not adopt this English name until 1914. For a time, the RCA combined with the LMS and PCE in administering the school, giving it the name “Union Middle School” (Xiehe zhongxue).

  9. 9.

    Unlike the original Yude, Bethany is a co-educational Christian school.

  10. 10.

    http://english.xm.gov.cn/xiamenoverview/population/.

  11. 11.

    This was especially true for mission sources, which frequently used “Amoy ” to denote the whole South Fujian mission field.

  12. 12.

    http://www.xmtravel.gov.cn/news/1486372108391.html.

  13. 13.

    At the national level, this is called the State Administration for Religious Affairs (SARA). At lower levels, the RAB is often mixed with the Bureau of Ethnic Affairs.

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  1. Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity, Göttingen, Germany

    Chris White

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    Chris White

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White, C. (2019). Introduction: Xiamen Protestantism Over the Years. In: White, C. (eds) Protestantism in Xiamen. Global Diversities. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-89471-3_1

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