Jonathan Chao and “Return Mission”

The Case of the Calvinist Revival in China

Bibliographic Data

ID11296104
AuthorsAlexander Chow (0000-0002-3062-9307, University of Edinburgh, corresponding author)
Year2019
Volume36
Issue3
Pages442-457
Publication date2019-10-09
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueMission Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0168-9789 • E-ISSN: 1573-3831
PublisherWalter de Gruyter GmbH (PUBLISHER • DE)
DOI10.1163/15733831-12341678
OpenAlexW2923824562
LanguageEN
Citations received3
References cited8

Studies on mission and migration have often focused on the propagation of Christianity from a home context to a foreign context. This is true of studies of Christian mission by Catholics and Protestants, but also true in the growing discussion of “reverse mission” whereby diasporic African and Korean missionaries evangelize the “heathen” lands of Europe and North America. This article proposes the alternative term “return mission” in which Christians from the diaspora return to evangelize the lands of their ancestral origins. It uses the case study of Jonathan Chao (Zhao Tian’en 趙天恩), a return missionary who traveled in and out of China from 1978 until near his death in 2004 and is considered an instrumental figure in the revival of Calvinism in China. This article suggests that “return mission” provides a new means to understand the subjects of mission and migration, and raises new challenges to questions about paternalism and independency

Archaeology · Calvinism · China · Christianity · Context (archaeology · Diaspora · Ethnology · Sociology · Christian Theology and Mission · Gender Studies · History · Philosophy · Religion, Society, and Development · Religious studies · Religious Tourism and Spaces · Religious Studies

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