Missionary Survey As An Aid To Intelligent Co-Operation In Foreign Missions
by
Roland Allen
Part 3 out of 3
always be a percentage of loss; in many cases that percentage would be
very high, and we doubt whether many schools have any record at all.
Under these circumstances to put into an inquiry such as that which we
propose a question concerning the after-life of scholars or patients
seems almost impossible. Yet we cannot be content. There are mission
schools which go on year after year educating boys for a business
career, and generation after generation of boys pass through the school,
large sums of mission money are expended on them, and the results _from
a missionary point of view_ are shrouded in Cimmerian gloom; or the
general darkness is relieved by one or two exceptional pupils who,
because they do very well, appear to justify the existence of the
institution in which they were educated, though they would probably have
been as valuable Christians if they had been educated in any other
school. In this way a very low average is often concealed. If a school
is judged by a few exceptionally good scholars, it should also be judged
by a few exceptionally bad ones. It is indeed of serious importance that
the missionary value of some of our medical and educational, especially
the educational, institutions should be carefully examined and tested by
an appeal to indisputable facts. It is generally supposed that education
in mission schools must necessarily produce a strong, enlightened, and
zealous Christian community. That it produces a large number of
Christians intellectually enlightened is certain: that they are zealous
evangelists is not as certain. We want a statistical table to reveal the
missionary value, not the commercial value, of the education given. But
what table can we draw? The preceding table which sets forth inquirers
and communicants is clearly insufficient though it is better than
nothing. Until every school keeps a careful record of the after-history
of at least a large number of its pupils it seems impossible to get any
clear light on the question.
4. With regard to the extent to which different races and classes are
reached by the missions, we may safely assume that the Christian
missions ought to extend their benefits to all classes and races in the
area, and that there ought to be some proportion between the efforts
made in each case. If, and when, the responsible leaders of the missions
decided that the time had come to concentrate on one particular kind of
work for one particular class, we may be perfectly certain that they
would have no difficulty in justifying their action. But in any case
action should not be taken without consideration of proportions, and,
therefore, it is important that the proportions should be known.
But in dealing with work in the province or small country we cannot
simply repeat the table prepared for the mission district. In the
province or country there are often missionaries at work who give
themselves up wholly to one class. It is difficult, if not impossible,
to distinguish every possible form of work; but seeing that very
considerable work is done amongst students, we have thought it well to
add one column in which the proportion of the children of different
classes who are attending Christian schools or living in Christian
hostels is set forth:--
_____________________________________________________________________
| | Agri- | | | |Remarks
Percentage Stud-|Offi- |cultural|Traders.|Labourers.| Crafts-|and
of: ents.|cials.|Small- | | | men. |Conclu-
| |Holders.| | | |sions.
________________|______|________|________|__________|________|_______
In
Population -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- |
________________|______|________|________|___________________________
In Christian -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- |
Constituency | | | | | |
________________|______|________|________|__________|________|_______
In Christian | | | | | |
schools and | | | | | |
hostels, -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- |
percentage | | | | | |
of children | | | | | |
of | | | | | |
________________|______|________|________|__________|________|_______
With respect to work among different races, castes, etc., no addition to
the table prepared for the district seems necessary, and we therefore
repeat it:--
--------------|-----------------------------------------|------------
| Races, Religious Castes, etc., whatever| Remarks
| they may be. | And
| |Conclusions.
--------------|-----------------------------------------|------------
In Population | ---- |
--------------|-----------------------------------------|------------
In Christian | ---- |
Constituency | |
--------------|-----------------------------------------|------------
5. Concerning self-support, one table should, we think, suffice. We
cannot possibly adopt any estimated necessary expenditure such as we
proposed in the table for the station district because in the province
that estimate would be almost impossible to make. Different missions
have different ideas, and their estimates have for themselves some
reality; but they have no reality for others, and a mere average of the
estimates given for all the missions of the province would have still
less reality. It would be an absurd guess, meaning nothing. If we want
to judge progress in self-support we must have some definite key figure
by which to judge it. What figure then can we use? The total cost of all
the work carried on in the province is an impossible figure.[1] The mere
contribution of the native Christians by itself means nothing. That is
the figure generally given. The native Christian subscribed $6000 last
year, $7000 this year. Here is progress. The progress is an addition of
$1000. But does that tell us their progress towards self-support unless
we know what self-support implies? In the year the Church ought to have
increased in numbers, and the $7000 may represent exactly the same
position as the $6000 represented last year. Expenses may have
increased: the $7000 may be actually further removed from self-support
than the $6000 last year. We must have a proportion of which we can
trace the variation if we want to see progress. But is there any expense
which we can use to strike the proportion? Suppose then we suggest the
pay of all evangelistic and pastoral workers and provision and upkeep of
churches, chapels, and preaching rooms. That would at least give us
something to work by. But it might be difficult to calculate. We would
propose then, as a secondary item, some easily calculable and known
expense, something which every missionary accountant knows, such as the
pay of all native pastors and evangelistic workers, and then compare
with these the contributions of the Christians for Church and
evangelistic work only, excluding all fees for education and medicine.
That would, we think, give us a standard which we could apply without
having to consider complications introduced by such things as Government
grants to schools or hospitals. We propose then to judge progress in
self-support thus:--
---------------------------------------------------------------------
| Total Cost | Total | Total |
| of all | Salaries of | Native |
| Evangelistic | all Paid | Contribution, |
Province.| and | Native | excluding | Remarks and
| Pastoral | Evangelistic | School or | Conclusions.
| Work, Men | Workers, | Hospital |
| and Material. | including | Fees or |
| | Pastors. | Donations. |
---------------------------------------------------------------------
| | | |
---------------------------------------------------------------------
[Footnote 1: In Dr. Eugene Stock's "History of the C.M.S.," vol. ii., p.
420, we are told that "In 1863,... 400 families raised 1371 rupees,
equal then to L137. These families consisted mainly of labourers earning
(say) 2s. a week; so that a corresponding sum for 400 families of
English labourers earning 12s. a week would be L137 x 6 = L822, or over
L2 a year from each family. A few years later, taking the whole of the
C.M.S. districts in Tinnevelly and reckoning catechumens as well as
baptised Christians, their contributions were such that, supposing the
whole thirty millions of people in England were poor labourers earning
12s. a week, and there were no other source of wealth, their
corresponding contributions should amount to L6,000,000 per annum." Yet
he says on the very next page that "It was not possible for the native
Church, liberal as its contributions were, to maintain its pastors and
meet its other expenses (he does not say what the _other expenses_ were)
entirely. The society must necessarily help for a while.... This grant,
in the first instance, had to be large enough to cover much more than
half the expenditure."
If this was the case in one part of a province, what would happen if we
took the whole expense of all work carried on in a whole province or
country and used that as a standard by which to test progress in
self-support?]
Turning now from the force at work we must consider the force in
training, for this is prophetic. Let us then take first a table which
shows the proportion in which students are being trained for pastoral
and evangelistic work, for medical mission work, and for educational
mission work, in the province or country, regardless of the place at
which they are being trained, whether that place is inside or outside
the area under consideration. This ought to show us on what lines we may
expect the work to develop in the near future.
_____________________________________________________________________
Total |For Evangel- | | | | |
Students |istic Work, |Propor- |For |Propor-|For Educa-|Remarks
in |including the |tion of|Medical|tion of|tional |and
Training.|Pastorate. |Total. |Work. |Total. |Work. |Conclu-
| | | | | |sions
_________|______________|________|_______|_______|__________|________
| | | | | |
_________|______________|________|_______|_______|__________|________
Then we must examine more closely, if we can;--and first of the
_evangelistic_ workers. The difficulty is to classify, because
ecclesiastical nomenclature is so confused that it is almost impossible
to use any terms which would be widely recognised. The best we can do is
to distinguish grades of training, beginning from the top thus:--
1st grade, college or university.
2nd " high school.
3rd " regular Bible school.
4th " intermittent, irregular Bible instruction.
It will probably be found that the first grade is commonly prepared for,
and looks forward to, the charge of a settled congregation, or of an
organised church, and the lower grades do the pioneer work, and it may
well suggest itself to thoughtful men whether this is rightly so.
Then, _educationalists_ in training: again we divide by grades
roughly:--
1st grade, college or university.
2nd " normal school.
3rd " high school.
4th " teachers of illiterates.
The college students presumably look forward to work in the high
schools, or colleges, or normal schools; the normal school pupils to
work in normal schools, high schools, and large primary schools; the
high school pupils to work in village schools; and the teachers of
illiterates to village work, or work among the poor in the towns. Of
_medicals_ the generally recognised distinctions seem to be, qualified
practitioners, assistants, and nurses.
Following these lines we should obtain simple prophetic tables for each
of the three branches of work.
(i) Students in Training for _Evangelistic_ Work.
----------------------------------------------------------
1st Grade. | 2nd. | 3rd. | 4th.
College. | High School. | Regular | Intermittent.
| Bible School | Teaching |
------------------------------------------- --------------
| | |
| | |
----------------------------------------------------------
(ii) For _Educational_ Work.
----------------------------------------------------------
1st Grade. | 2nd. | 3rd. | Teachers of
College. | Normal. | High School. | Illiterates.
------------------------------------------- --------------
| | |
| | |
----------------------------------------------------------
(iii) For _Medical_ Work.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
1st Grade. | 2nd. | 3rd.
To be Qualified Doctors. | Assistants, including Dispensers, |Nurses.
| etc. |
----------------------------------------------------------------------
| |
| |
----------------------------------------------------------------------
If we had those tables for _men and women_ we should see fairly plainly
how the work might be expected to develop.
But here we ought to remember the difficulty which we set forth earlier
in discussing the missionary influence of our various activities,
medical and educational, from a Church building point of view. A great
many boys are educated and trained at mission expense to be evangelists,
medicals, and teachers in mission employ, who serve indeed for a period
according to their contract and then disappear into Government service
or private practice. It is a serious question whether missionaries can
be raised up successfully in this way. "I will give you training if you
will promise to serve the mission," is not a very certain way of
securing ready, wholehearted, zealous service of Christ. We have found
out its uncertainty in many cases at home; we have found it out in
still more frequent cases in the mission field. Unless we keep a very
careful record of the after-life of those whom we train, and a very
honest one, we are apt to ignore the failure, a failure which we cannot
properly afford, and consequently we cannot know what we are really
doing by our training. We ought to know the truth in this matter, both
for our encouragement and our admonition. Happily here, we think, we can
find an easy and a valuable test. If we ask what proportion of those
whom we train continue in their missionary work after the end of their
first term of service, we shall certainly have some enlightenment; for
it is true of medicals and educationalists, and of evangelists, though
in a much less degree, that if any man continues in missionary work
after he has fulfilled the letter of his contract, it will generally be
because he has his heart in the work; for missionary work seldom, if
ever, offers the emoluments of Government service, or of private
practice. We ask then--
SURVEY OF WORK IN A PROVINCE
---------------------------------------------------------------------
|Evangelistic | Medical | Educational
--------------------------------+-------------+---------+------------
Total Students | | |
--------------------------------+-------------+---------+------------
Trained at Mission Expense, | | |
Wholly or in Part. | | |
--------------------------------+-------------+---------+------------
Number who Continue in | | |
Mission Work after the end | | |
of the Term of their Contract. | | |
--------------------------------+-------------+---------+------------
Proportion of Total Students | | |
who so Continue. | | |
--------------------------------+-------------+---------+------------
Remarks and Conclusions. | | |
--------------------------------+-------------+---------+------------
If the institutions in which the training is actually carried on lie
within the province, then we ought to have tables such as we have for
the schools in the station area for these institutions. We need no
elaborate statistics in this place, because the work of these
institutions should be specially treated in departmental surveys. Here,
all that we need is to relate the work of the schools or hospitals which
were omitted in the station district survey, because they served a
larger area than the station area, to the work done in the province or
country. The educational returns from each station area must be added
together and the returns of these larger institutions added to the total
educational statistics; that will give us the work done in the larger
area in proportion to population.
But in the province it is important to consider the relation in which
the different grade schools stand to one another; because if the aim of
the missionary educational system is the education of the Christian
community, and the higher schools are designed primarily for Christian
pupils from the lower schools, this relation is of importance. It is
possible to build an organisation too narrow at the base and too heavy
at the top, and then to fill the higher schools with non-Christian
pupils without any definite understanding of the way in which that
practice is to serve the main purpose of the mission. Then these schools
stand on a distinct and separate basis from the rest of the mission
activities, and the work of Christian missions in the country is split,
part aiming directly at the establishment of a native Christian Church,
and part "aiming at the general improvement of morals, and social,
religious, and political enlightenment. Thus we arrive at that chaotic
state in which the mission as a whole is not subordinate to any dominant
idea of the purpose for which it exists, which alone can unify the work
of all its members. But if the colleges and schools are designed for
mutual support, and if the higher have any relation to the lower grades,
then there must be some proportion between the base and the
superstructure, and that proportion must be known and expressed in any
survey worthy of the name. We include, therefore, the following table:--
---------------------------------------------------------------------
| Mission | Proportion | Proportion | Remarks
| Schools, | to | to | and
| Number | Population. | High | Conclusions.
| of. | | Schools. |
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Primary | | | |
Schools | | | |
---------------------------------------------------------------------
High | | | |
Schools | | | |
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Normal | | | |
Schools | | | |
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Colleges| | | |
--------+-----------+--------------+-------------+-------------------
In the province also we must know the educational facilities afforded by
non-missionary agencies, if we are to have any true conception of the
work of the educational missions. We must therefore add a table for
these schools.
------------------------------------------------------------
| Non- | Proportion | Remarks. |
| Missionary | to | |
| Schools, | Population. | |
| Number of. | | |
-------------------------------------------------------------
Primary Schools | | | |
-------------------------------------------------------------
High Schools. | | | |
-------------------------------------------------------------
Normal School | | | |
-------------------------------------------------------------
Colleges. | | | |
-------------------------------------------------------------
Here it is not necessary for us to find the proportion between the
higher and lower grade schools, because we are not surveying the
non-missionary educational work, and their scheme of proportions is not
our business.
A comparatively slight addition to the tables for medical work in the
various station districts will suffice to give an adequate impression of
the medical work done in the whole area. We need not go into details,
for the medical work should be, and generally is, reviewed by Medical
Boards in their reports. For us now, all that is needed is the addition
of tables, similar to those which we used for hospitals in the station
area, for hospitals excluded from any station survey.
Two other subjects ought to be included in this provincial survey,
namely, literature and industrial work. First, we must try to find a
table which will express the work done by those important missionaries
who are engaged in providing Christian literature, both for the
Christian community and the heathen outside. Here we find once more the
difficulty that, whilst a few missionaries are wholly engaged in this
form of missionary work, much is produced by missionaries who have
already been included in the tables as either evangelistic or
educational or medical missionaries, and we also touch bookselling and
other kindred commercial questions. With the commercial aspect of this
work we cannot deal. The following tables will throw light on the extent
to which Christian literature is being produced and read:--
(i)
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Number of Missionaries wholly Engaged | Proportion of Total
in Literary Work. | Missionaries.
---------------------------------------+-----------------------------
|
---------------------------------------+-----------------------------
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Number of Vernacular | Number of | Proportion of Sales
Christian Books Produced | Christian Books | to Population.
in the Year. | Sold in the Year.|
---------------------------------------------------------------------
| Bibles or | | Bibles or |
| Scripture | Other | Scripture | Other
| Portions. | Books.| Portions. | Books.
-------------------------+-----------+--------+------------+---------
| | | |
-------------------------+-----------+--------+------------+---------
If the business side of literary work is difficult, the whole position
of industrial missions is still more difficult. In some countries
industrial missions seem to be trading ventures with a Christian
intention, in others industrial missions are really almost entirely
educational establishments. The best tables which we have ever seen
dealing with this subject were those drawn by Mr. Sidney Clark in one of
his papers, "From a Layman to a Layman".[1] All that we can do is to
suggest that industrial missions which are in the main clearly and
unmistakably educational should be included in the educational work, and
that the missions with large commercial interests, even if they are
doing a valuable educational work for the community, should be treated
separately, thus:--
[Footnote 1: Printed for private distribution by Mr. S.J.W. Clark, 3
Tudor Street, Blackfriars, London, E.C. 4.]
_Industrial Missions_,
(a)
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Province. | Number of | Amount of Mission | Proportion of
| Industrial | Funds Allotted to | Total Mission
| Missions. | such Work. | Funds.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
| | |
__________|______________|_____________________|_____________________
(b)
---------------------------------------------------------------------
| Number of | Number of Missionaries | Proportion of
Province. | Industrial | Engaged in such | Total
| Institutions. | Institutions. | Missionaries
---------------------------------------------------------------------
| | |
__________|________________|________________________|________________
(c)
-------------------------------------------------------------
| Number of | Number of | Proportion of
Province. | Industrial | Native Agents | Native Christian
| Missions. | Employed. | Workers Employed.
-------------------------------------------------------------
| | |
__________|_____________|________________|___________________
In some missions the proportion of missionaries and native workers so
employed would be very small; in others they would be very considerable.
There is now a tendency to hand over some of the industrial work as it
develops along commercial lines to Boards of Christian men who are
interested in the social and spiritual aspect of the work.
In the province we must also consider union work, work done in common by
two or more societies,[1] sometimes evangelistic, sometimes medical or
educational training, sometimes the establishment, or enlargement of an
educational or medical institution; or sometimes, as in Kwangtung in
South China, several societies unite in a "Board of Co-operation". This
union of societies for the better and more efficient performance of
their work is a most important development of the last few years:
important both to the workers on the field and to us at home. We ought,
therefore, to have a short table to show what is being done.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
| Number of Societies | |
Number | Co-operating in |Number of |
of |--------------------------------| Societies |Remarks
Societies|Evangelistic|Medical|Educational| Co-operating| and
at Work. | Work. | Work. | Work. | in all Work.|Conclusions.
---------+------------+-------+-----------+-------------+------------
| | | | |
---------+------------+-------+-----------+-------------+------------
[Footnote 1: The larger and more important movements towards corporate
union, such as those now taking place in S. India, China, and E. Africa,
lie outside the scope of this survey until their completion affects
their statistical returns. Then the importance of them will speedily
appear.]
CHAPTER XI.
THE RELATION OF THE STATION TO THE WORLD.
We have now dealt with the survey of the station and of the province or
small country, but the final end of missionary work is the attainment of
a world-wide purpose. The Gospel is for the whole world, not for a
fragment of it, however big. Missionary work cannot properly be carried
on in any place except by means and methods designed with a view to the
whole, and missions can never be properly presented to us at home so
long as we are taught to fix our eyes on small areas; because the great
characteristic of missions is their vastness. This is what is so
uplifting and ennobling in the work. Every little piece of mission work
ought to be directed on principles capable of bearing the weight of the
whole. We ought to be able to say, "The whole world can be converted by
these means and on these principles which we are here employing in this
little village". If the methods and the principles are so narrow that we
can build no great world-wide structure on them, we can take little more
interest in them than we do in the petty politics of some little parish
at home.
We have then yet to demand that we shall be able to put every little
station into its proper place in this larger whole, and to see how its
principles and methods are illumined by the vision of the whole, being
established with the design of accomplishing the whole task. We turn
then now to this larger view of mission work. The tables which we have
drawn for a province or small country would enable us to compare the
work in each area with another such area in the larger whole, and to
judge whether we were unduly neglecting any; where the Church was
strongest and where it was least established; where it was more capable
and where it was less capable of taking over that work which rightly
belongs to it, of extending its own boundaries, and of maintaining its
own life. We should not send hasty missions here or there because some
interesting political event attracts the eyes of men to this or that
particular country, but on definite missionary principles, acting on a
clear and reasonable understanding of the missionary situation in the
world.
The commission of Christ is world-wide, the claim of Christ is
world-wide, the work of Christ, the Spirit of Christ are all-embracing;
and the work which missionaries do in His name should be all-embracing
to. We should conduct all our work, and plan all our work, at home and
abroad, with our eyes fixed on the final goal, which is for us, so long
as we are on this earth, coterminous only with the limits of the
habitable globe. We cannot be content to approach even the largest areas
as though our action was limited by them. All our policy in every part
should be part of a policy designed for the whole. If it is not designed
to accomplish the whole it is not adequate for any part.
How then could we gain a vision of the whole, a whole composed of such
vast and diverse parts? Obviously we must have for every country in
which any missionary work is carried on some common returns, either
those which we venture to suggest or others which some abler minds might
suggest; but that they must be common to all, and fundamental in
character, is obvious; and they must be reduced to proportions on a
common basis, or comparison and combination will be impossible; and
they must be as few as possible in order to avoid confusion.
We suggest, then, that if we had the four tables which follow we should
possess a reasonable basis, sufficient for our present needs, especially
since we suppose they would be supported by the tables for the different
provinces, countries, and stations which we have already suggested, and
they ought to be supplemented by surveys made by each society of its own
work and by departmental surveys of medical, educational, industrial,
and literary work made for the special direction of each of these
branches. But for a first general view of the whole we propose:--
(1) A table showing the force at work in the area in relation to the
population:--
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Proportion to Population.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Province| Popula-| Total | Chris- | Com- | |
or | tion. | Foreign | tian | municants | Paid | Unpaid
Country| | Mission-| Constitu-| or Full |Workers.| Workers.
Area. | | aries. | ents. | Members | |
--------|--------|---------|----------|-----------|--------|---------
| | | | | |
________|________|_________|__________|___________|________|_________
---------------------------------------------------------------------
That would give us a general view of the force at work in relation to
the work to be done and of the proportions between its constituent
parts. Then (2):--
---------------------------------------------------------------------
| Proportion of Paid | Proportion of
| Workers | Unpaid Workers
-------------------|------------------------|------------------------
Propor- | |
Christian tion |-----------|------------|-------------|----------
Constitu- of | | To | |To
ency. Liter- | To | Christian | To |Christian
ates. | Com- | Constitu- | Com- |Constitu-
| municants.| ency |municants. |ency.
-------------------|-----------|------------|-------------|----------
| | | |
-------------------+-----------+------------+-------------+----------
That would give us an idea of the character and power of the force. (3)
---------------------------------------------------------------------
| | | Percentage | Percentage
| | Paid | of Total | of Total
| Missionaries.| Native | Foreign Funds| Native
| | Workers.| Employed in. | Contributions
| | | | Employed in.
-------------+--------------+---------+--------------+---------------
Evangelistic | -- | -- | -- | --
----------------------------+---------+--------------+---------------
Medical | -- | -- | -- | --
----------------------------+---------+--------------+---------------
Educational | -- | -- | -- | --
----------------------------+---------+--------------+---------------
Other forms | -- | -- | -- | --
of work | -- | -- | -- | --
-------------+--------------+---------+--------------+---------------
That would give us relative emphasis on different forms of work.
(4)
-------------+---------------------+--------------+------------------
| Total Amount Paid | |Relation of Native
Christian | to Native Evangel- | Total Native | Contribution to
Constituency.| istic Workers In- | Contribution.| Pay of Workers.
| cluding all Pastors.| |
-------------+---------------------+--------------+------------------
| | |
_____________|_____________________|______________|__________________
That would give us some idea of the extent to which the native
Christians support the existing work.
Now if we could form some idea of the force at work in relation to the
country in which it is working; and some idea of the character of the
force; and some idea of the relative emphasis laid on different forms of
work, and some idea of the extent to which the native Christians support
the work, we should, we hope, be able to form a reasonable estimate of
the extent and progress of our efforts in the world. The whole number of
forms would not be very large, for there would only be about 150 areas
from which such forms would be required, and these could be combined so
as to give us a view of the situation in the world such as the mind
could grasp.
This is, we admit, rather a hasty and tentative expression of the way
in which we might satisfy the present need; but it seems to us that the
time is ripe for the consideration of this great subject, and we can
think of no better plan than to propose tables, and then to leave others
to criticise and amend them, or to suggest better ones, or better
methods of attaining an object which few would deny to be desirable.
With proper tables, these or others, we should then be able to trace the
meaning and results of each station which we founded and to put it into
its place in a reasoned scheme of things, and that is the crying need.
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