Role Of Missionary In New Nations Changing

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30080, 14 March 1963, Page 2

Role Of Missionary In New Nations Changing

A marked change in the role of the Christian missionary in newly-independent countries has taken place in recent years, according to Miss Stella Purchas yesterday on. her return to Christchurch after 30 years’ overseas service with the Church Missionary Society. “Our missionaries now go to a country at the invitation of the church already established there and remain only for as long as they are required,” she said. etaoishrdelutaitoaosinlM

Uganda, where Miss Purchas was last posted, was an example of the new set-up. There, at the present time; invitations outnumbered the recruits available. Missionaries were welcome so tong as they were willing to serve the church as colleagues of the Africans.

“As a mission. the CALS, in Uganda ceased to attempt to make decisions for the established Anglican Church there some years ago, but our missionaries are glad to serve the church as they are required," she said. Dr. Max Warren, generalsecretary of the society in London, had emphasised for many years that the true role of Christian missionaries was to witness to Christ as servants of the church rather than to become leaders in the church of a country to which they had been sent, she said. Missionaries who stills held positions of authority did so at the request of the indigenous church. “I am sure that is why there has been no turning against missionaries in Uganda, as there has been in some of the other newlyindependent countries,” she said.

Self-Governing

The Anglican Church in Uganda had been completely self-governing since 1960, when a new Province of the Anglican Church was formed. Of the eight dioceses within the province, four were now under African bishops and four under English missionary bishops.

“Now that the Christian church is established in so many countries missionaries go from one part of the universal church to work with the church in other countries,” she said. Increasing numbers of African Christians were now visiting other countries and making their own contribution to the spiritual life of the churches.

"Two-Way Traffic” “A two-way traffic between the older church and the younger churches has developed,” she said. “The C.MJS. has encouraged this mutual exchange within the church in recent years.” Last year church leaders from India and Japan visited Uganda to strengthen the fellowship between their respective churches. “This year Obadiah Kariuki, the Bishop of Fort Hall, Kenya, will visit Australia and New Zealand after he attends the Anglican Church Congress in Toronto,” she said. The Church Missionary Society sent its first missionaries to Uganda in 1877 in response to an appeal of help from the King of Buganda. Two years later the first Roman Catholic missionaries were sent to Uganda and since that time most of the education in the country bad been in the hands of the two churches, ■he said.

“At the time of Uganda’s independence celebrations last year, the Prime Minister (Mr A Milton Obote) acknowledged the great contribution made to the country by Christian missionaries.” she said. Miss Purchas, who was educated at St Margaret’s College, Christchurch, and who was on the teaching staff there for a short time, began, her training as a missionary at St. Hilda’s Missionary Training College in Melbourne in 1932.

Her first posting was to Hangchow, China. After furlough in New Zealand, in 1938 she returned to China and was stationed at Ningpo when it was occupied by the Japanese in 1941. From 1943 to 1945 she was interned in a Japanese concentration camp near Shanghai. At the end of the war Miss Purchas returned to Shanghai, after furlough in New Zealand, and remained there until 1951, two years after the city was taken over by the Communists. Since 1951, when she left China, she has served the mission in England, Kenya and Uganda. She last visited New. Zealand in 1956. Now retired from the mission field, Miss Purchas has no definite plans for the future.