The Tragic Irony of a Patriotic Mission: The Indigenous Leadership of Francis Wei and T. C. Chao, Radicalized Patriotism, and the Reversal of Protestant Missions in China

Li Ma,Jin Li

doi:10.3390/rel11040175

Abstract

Motivated by a patriotic zeal for the national salvation of China, in the 1910s, US-trained Chinese intellectuals like Francis Wei and T. C. Chao embraced a progressive version of Protestantism. While Christian colleges established by liberal missionaries during this time initially contributed greatly to nurturing a generation of intellectual elites for China, its institutionalization of progressive ideas, and its tolerance and protection of revolutionary mobilization under extraterritorial rights, also unintendedly helped invigorate indigenous revolutionary movements. Meanwhile, in the 1920s, anti-Western and anti-Christian student movements radicalized in China’s major urban centers. When the communist revolution showed more promise of granting China independence, Francis Wei and T. C. Chao became optimistic supporters. However, neither of them foresaw the reversal of China missions under the Three-Self Patriotic Movement in the 1950s.

Highlights

While Christian colleges established by liberal missionaries during this time initially contributed greatly to nurturing a generation of intellectual elites for China, its institutionalization of progressive ideas, and its tolerance and protection of revolutionary mobilization under extraterritorial rights, unintendedly helped invigorate indigenous revolutionary movements
We focus on how Chinese indigenous leadership engaged with and responded to the rise and fall of American Protestantism in the first half of the twentieth century
We argue that there were a diverse range of parameters, such as geo-political conflicts, regime changes, social movements, and individual-level ideological shifts, that coalesced with historical circumstances to produce this outcome in China

Summary

Introduction

While Christian colleges established by liberal missionaries during this time initially contributed greatly to nurturing a generation of intellectual elites for China, its institutionalization of progressive ideas, and its tolerance and protection of revolutionary mobilization under extraterritorial rights, unintendedly helped invigorate indigenous revolutionary movements. China’s thirteen Christian colleges funded by American Protestant missionary societies reached over 3500 students in 1925.4 In comparison, the Republican Chinese government only founded two public universities.

Results

Conclusion