Past & PresentBy Chad Bragg

• It is estimated that at the time of Columbus’ first journey there were 12 million

• Missions to the natives began almost immediately upon the arrival of Europeans

• Missionaries very ethnocentric

• Native Americans thought to be unable to grow in the faith unless they adapted European culture.

• Mission work often thwarted and relegated as secondary due to war, expansion, and survival in the “New World”

Spanish (Catholics): Southwest

French (Jesuits): Northeast

English (Puritan): East

“Fearful whites… concluded what they had suspected all along: that no Indian could ever be trusted. Contagious fear led to blanket condemnation of all natives; the missionaries could not counteract the anti-Indian prejudice fed by wartime hysteria” (Bowden, 132).

• After King Philip’s War - opinion of the Natives had turned to disdain and fear

• Because of dwindling native population complacency over conversion of natives grew

• Almost unanimous consent that natives needed to be “civilized” before they could be converted

1710 - 1749 1711 - 1779 1723 - 1792

1741 - 1808 1718 - 1747 1721 - 1808

• At the end of the 18th century, the Revolutionary War all but halted missions to the natives

• After the war, treaties were made and constantly broken by the United States Government.

• Tribes were moved from one place to the next to make way for the expanding claims to land of the non-natives

• 1830: Andrew Jackson pushes Indian Removal bill through congress – most of the tribes remaining in the east forced to move west

• Natives living in the West resisted acculturation and some physically fought against westward U.S. expansion

• 1869: President Grant created Board of Indian Commissioners to oversee U.S. relations with natives (headed by Christian layman from 13 different denominations)

Government Relations

• Infancy of a new nation – American culture more solidified

• Baptist missionary, Isaac McCoy worked with natives in the Ohio, Indiana, Kentucky area

• John Stewart & James B. Finley, Methodist missionaries, involved in missions in Midwestern states

• Agencies such as the American Indian Missionary Association (Louisville, KY), and the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions sponsored missionaries and set up schools to train natives

• Missionaries continued to expect natives to adapt to American culture

• Natives began to practice more syncretistic Christianity

• Many natives continued to be syncretistic – adapting Christian and native aspects into the practice of religion

• Missionaries begin to loosen up on their assimilation tactics

• Pan-Indianism movement: tribes work together seeking “to preserve alternative, more meaningful life-styles”

• Native-American Church: syncretistic church, practices the use of peyote, membership estimates around 250,000

• In 2006, there were just under 700,000 First Nations individuals in Canada, over 2% of the population.

• In 2005, the U.S. Census Bureau estimated that about 1.5 percent (roughly 4.5 million) of the U.S. population claimed to be of American Indian or Alaska Native descent.

• Many of the Native American Tribes are considered unreached or “unknown” on Joshua

• About 33% live on or near reservations. Most of the rest live scattered about in major cities.

• Missionaries need to be aware of the history • Mission work cannot be ethnocentric• Must be aware of the culture and avoid

syncretism• Important to establish indigenous workers• “The American church needs to stop viewing First

Nations people as simply a mission field and see them as valued and needed members of the Body of Christ” (Twiss, 20).

• Missionaries should humble themselves before God and Native Americans.

• Twiss, Richard. One Church, Many Tribes. 2000.

• Edwards, Jonathan. Memoirs of the Rev. David Brainerd. 1822.

• Wyss, Hilary E. Writing Indians. 2000.

• Knapp, Henry M. “The Character of Puritan Missions: The Motivation, Methodology, and Effectiveness of the Puritan Evangelization of the Native Americans in New England.” Journal of Presbyterian History 76:2 (1998)