The Forgotten “Grandfather” of Protestant Mission

Abstract

The abortive French Protestant mission to Brazil in 1556 has been noted by historians but has generally been treated as, at best, a footnote to the story of Protestant missionary work. A major factor in the neglect of what was almost certainly the first effort at cross-cultural mission overseas on the part of European Protestants is found in the fact that the classic work of Jean de Lery describing this mission in detail has, until recently, remained untranslated from its original French. This article describes Lery's contribution to the history and theology of mission and argues that his book deserves recognition as one of the classic missiological texts. Furthermore, it is suggested that Jean de Lery's work demands a revision of our understanding of the nature of the relationship between Calvinism and mission, and that it offers a contemporary challenge to faithfulness in the era of full-blown globalization.