| Christianity was propagated into China under the support of the unequal treaties,which exacerbated the social turmoil of Modern China.In late Qing,the social turmoil related to missionary cases always had something to do with missionaries’activities.The Boxer Movement and other anti-church cases were complicated responses to the Christianity propaganda in the local society of North China.Academic researches on the origins of the Boxer Movement have been mostly focused on either the external(imperialist aggression caused anti-church movement)or internal(social contradictions from inside caused anti-church movement)causes,which is far from adequate to explain why the Boxer Movement broke out.The most common approach to demonstrate the origins and the development of the Boxer Movement is concentrated on the Boxers as the anti-church group,while neglects its counterpart——the Christian churches——whose participation and response should also be taken into consideration.As a matter of fact,Christianity presence came before the anti-Christianity movement.Only by a thorough and penetrative examination of both the boxers and the churches can the complicated facets of history be revealed.The missionary field of the North China Mission of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions had greatly overlapped the central range of the Boxer Movement,which enormously shaped the interrelationship between each other.Moreover,the burst of the Boxer Movement was a social reaction to the Christianity expansion in North China.Therefore,a careful survey into the nature of the North China Mission and its interaction with the local society is essential to understand the origins of the Boxer Movement and the social changes brought by the missionaries.The North China Mission was a typical mission church,Yangjiao in Chinese,which was not a real indigenous church.The orientation of the North China Mission was largely confined to its organization mechanism.First,according to the congregationalism,the North China Mission was an independent unit,not ruled by or belonged to any other mission.All missionaries had equal rights on deciding Mission affairs.All Mission stations were independent to each other.Second,each station had great freedom to deal with arduous local church affairs.Third,missionaries were in the position of absolute leadership in the early stage,while native preachers and pastors were merely employed assistances to missionaries.Though with the increase of the Chinese clergymen,the organizational mechanism of the North China Mission developed into a Sino-Foreign Protestant Establishment where Chinese clergymen enjoyed much higher position in management,the North China Mission still showed a strong characteristic of Yangjiao with foreign missionaries in full charge of personnel and finance of the church.Mission church was a common church form during the period of the Christianity propaganda movement all over the world.If it had had nothing to do with the modern colonialism and the unequal treaties,it would have been a transitional form in the course of the indigenization of Christianity.However,the connection between them in missionary practices of the North China Mission changed the nature of the Mission’s work,and provoked fierce conflicts in local society,which dressed some missionary cases and disputes relevant to the Mission in appearance of international conflicts between China and the West.Taking shelter of the treaty system,the North China Mission did not encounter strong opposition from the local society at the very beginning.On the contrary,this shelter had a considerable appeal to ordinary people of lower class,especially the marginalized groups being suppressed by the Qing government,such as followers of secret sects.However,in many cases or disputes related to churches or Christians of the North China Mission,missionaries supported their churches and Christians over and over again,and took advantage of the treaty system and the power of American ministers and consuls in China to tyrannize the local mandarins and make Christians a group with power.With the church network becoming a political power network competing with the traditional administrative power,strong opposition from the local gentry class gradually arose in the form of anti-church activities led by the local ruling class,such as Dezhou anti-church case.In the late 1890s,the challenges and threatens from the church to the authority of the Qing court were even more serious than those from the sects which had always been regarded as "evil cult" and under brutal repression.Hence,during the Boxer Movement,though some mandarins knew clearly that the Boxers were similar to the sects,they did not suppress them but connived at their attacking on churches.Obviously,the purpose of the government was to drive all foreigners out of China.At the same time,missionaries’ destructive effects to the ruling order of the Qing court and the authorities of the local government reached the peak.Acting like judges,missionaries convicted the mandarins of crimes and pronounced sentences to them.Moreover,they insisted that the Qing court must punish the local mandarins and the Boxers to prevent any anti-church movement from happening again.The missionary way of the North China Mission greatly influenced the cognition of people.Qing court foresaw that Christians would gradually separate themselves from the civilian status,in order to prevent this from happening,it required local mandarins to deal with missionary cases unbiased and emphasized meantime that non-Christians and Christians were both its people.However,Qing court could not bear the united pressure from missionaries and their Ministers and consuls in China.Almost in every missionary case,the church was the party who won and civilian was the party who got punished,sometimes mandarins would get punished as well.Under the circumstances,Qing court could not have full control of Christians anymore,which caused hatred towards Christians.Non-Christians also considered Christians as dissidents or even enemies.The term Er mao zi referring to Christians called by the Boxers explicitly indicated the tension between Christians and the local society,and this tension was highly manifested during the time of the Boxer Movement.After the Eight-Power Allies Forces invaded China,some missionaries as individuals performed aggressive activity which reinforced the impression of missionaries as imperialist aggressors and the image of churches as Yangjiao.In people’s eyes,the image of Yangjiao of the North China Mission included another meaning,that was,it represented civilization and advance.Before the outbreak of the Boxer Movement,common people especially the marginal groups welcomed church schools,dispensaries and hospitals opened and operated by missionaries,among which the medical service was most effective in eliminating the prejudice towards missionaries and reaching the local people.The Mongolians showed particular appreciation for the western goods,technology and knowledge introduced by the missionaries.After the Boxer Movement ended,the Qing court began to reform its country,and gave no political obstacles for missionary work.During this period,Christian churches appeared to be quite popular among people on the whole though they had been extremely hated before,and the modernity of Christian churches became a sign of advance.To satisfy the ruling class’s eagerness for western technology and knowledge,missionaries of the North China Mission gave more energy to the work relevant to reform,history,technology,culture and lectures on patriotism,while reduced pure evangelism efforts.When carrying out missionary work among the lower class,missionaries tended to make use of modern western technology to draw people’s interest.Christian schools gradually gained wide acceptance as well.The North China Mission took part in the experiment of running Christian universities with other missions,in the hope of improving the quality of Christian higher education and making the Christian universities the most influential unit in China.However,in what was called the "golden age" in the history of the Christianity in China,the nature of the North China Mission(that is Yangjiao)did not change in essence.Besides,the characteristic of Yangjiao was strengthened when the Mission tried to show the people its "advance" and "civilization".The rift between Christians and non-Christians was only covered temporarily rather than healed effectively.On the other hand,mission church was not a completely foreign church in the full sense,as the so called Yangjiao was obviously featured with indigenous characteristics.The North China Mission had to participate in the transaction and trade of the real estate because it needed physical space for church activities,like chapels and meeting places.What’s more,church schools,dispensaries and hospitals which served missionary work and church communities were inseparable from local resources.In fact,preachers and believers of the North China Mission were all natives and composed an overwhelming majority in the church.The fact that they had their long and complex relationship of interest and conflict with others in local communities added complication to the relationship between the North China Mission and the local society.The conflicts between Christians and non-Christians on marriages,funerals,ancestor worships were not simply conflicts of religion and culture,but closely related to the existing chains of interest of the local society,such as the parental authority,inheritance,dismemberment of property and so on.The intricate relationship between the North China Mission and the outside communities also included the ways of the world.This was the reason why some Christians got protection from non-Christians during the Boxer Movement,and also the reason why non-Christians usually brought in Boxers from other places to attack the Christians in their hometown.It was true that the turbulent times brought great challenges to Christian churches and the storm of the Boxer Movement almost brought crowning calamity to the North China Mission,but it was also true that the North China Mission gained tremendous opportunities for development and prosperity.The Barbaric artillery fire from the Eight-Power Allies Forces gave a heavy blow to the anti-church forces in North China,at the same time,it frightened and put an end to the force of conservative xenophobia in Qing court.After the year of 1901,the opposition with animadversion of weapon to Christianity stopped abruptly,the "peace" under the situation of semi-colony brought a short developing period for Christianity,what was called the "golden age".Without political obstacles,missionaries of the North China Mission did not need support from American ministers and consuls in China any more.In face of the new situation,missionaries adjusted their strategies in order to satisfy the new demands of China.For example,they made great efforts to promote education,withdrew the country station and relied entirely on cities as radiation centers to surrounding areas.In doing so,they hoped to expand church’s social influence.Nevertheless,this "golden age"for Christianity boom was also the critical time when the Chinese national consciousness awakened.Actually,a time of combating Christianity with the weapon of animadversion was approaching quietly. |
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