Followers of the Dao of the Bible

Abstract

Studies of pre-1950s Chinese Canadian Christianity have tended to occlude Chinese perspectives and experiences for a number of reasons, including a lack of sources. Drawing on largely unpublished Chinese and English source materials including scrapbooks, correspondence, reports, membership rosters, marriage, funeral and clergy records, Chinese nationalist registers, diaries, oral histories, photographs and material culture, this article investigates Chinese experiences of Canadian Presbyterian missionary work in Victoria, Cumberland, Calgary, Winnipeg, Toronto and Montreal between 1896 and 1950. By examining the personal archival materials of Ma Seung, Frank Chan and Ernest Mark, and era-specific Chinese political involvements and fieldwork data, this article challenges previous simplistic understandings of the Chinese missionary experience that were based solely on the perspectives of mainstream Christian institutions and society. This article emphasizes the Chinese context and concepts such as the dao, efficacy ( ling), and affect ( renqing, or human sentiments) that guided relationships and faith in early Chinese Canada. It aims to provide a more complicated understanding of why Chinese ministers chose to Christianize fellow Chinese, and why before 1950 many Chinese chose to be nominal Christians and only a small number converted.