China Centenary Missionary Conference

The China Centenary Missionary Conference, held in 1907 in Shanghai, China commemorated 100 years of Protestant missionary work in China and debated future courses of action. Among other actions, the conference approved a resolution endorsing the exclusion from Chinese law given Chinese Christians in the "unequal treaties" imposed on China by European countries, the United States, and Japan.

The Conference celebrated the centenary of the arrival of the first Protestant missionary to China, Robert Morrison. It was convened on April 25 and adjourned on May 8, 1907.

Attendees at the Conference totaled 1,170 persons, mostly missionaries from every province of China and with representatives from 25 countries. About 100 missionary organizations were operating in China, although not all were present at the conference. Most attendees were British and American. Despite the fact that the subject of the conference was the promotion of Christianity in China fewer than 10 Chinese can be identified among the delegates. Also, although missionary wives and single women missionaries outnumbered male missionaries in China, women were under-represented. Several served on a committee related to women’s work.

American missionary author and Congregationalist Arthur Henderson Smith and British Presbyterian John C. Gibson were elected joint Chairmen for the Conference. Eleven Committees presented resolutions on different subjects of interest to the delegates.

The tenor of the Conference was optimistic. The martyrdom of 189 Protestant missionaries – men, women, and children -- during the Boxer Rebellion seven years before was hardly mentioned. Since the Boxer Rebellion, the Chinese government had undertaken a large number of internal reforms and missionaries perceived a much greater openness by the Chinese to Western influences, including Christianity.

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