From the Sidelines of Empire : Canada's Protestant Mission to Korea, 1898-1938

Abstract

In the early twentieth century the Canadian Presbyterian and subsequent United Church mission to Korea worked within the restrictions of Japanese colonialism until 1 942. Given this setting the mission has been portrayed as non-political and pragmatic in its efforts to continue its work under colonial rules which hampered the Canadians' religious, educational and medical projects. The accommodations that the mission made with the Japanese colonial government regarding school curriculum and attendance at State Shinto ceremonies tested not only the mission's overall strategy of creating a self-supporting Korean Church but also the mission's religious underpinnings. In previous histories these accommodations with colonial regulations were depicted as necessary for the survival of mission institutions and in tum the protection of Korean Christians. This study disputes this view and argues that changes in Euro-American business culture and bureaucratic frameworks influenced the Canadian mission. These influences set the mission organization as paramount. While seeing themselves as no less religious than their evangelical predecessors, mission administrators who embraced the new bureaucratic model made compromises that aligned the Canadians with Japanese colonial policies intended to stifle Korean nationalism and erode Korean identity.