Recent Rise of the Korean Missionary Movement

Sociological Assessment with Religious, Economic, and Developmental Dimensions

Abstract

Bishop Stephen Neill, an eminent historian of Christian mission, finishes his entry on "Christian Mission" in Mircea Eliade's epoch-making The Encyclopaedia of Religion with the following remark: 

In the past, the gospel travelled across continents and oceans almost exclusively in one direction. Has not the time come to establish two way traffic, to have the gospel travel across continents and oceans in many directions? If this is true, the word mission may be in need of new and contemporary definition. I Neill's entry was published in 1987. Some twenty years following the savant's predictive remark, the time has come to redefine the term mission. It is true that the gospel travels across continents and oceans in many directions today. Traditional missionary-receiving countries are now becoming missionary-sending countries and vice versa. Among these two- way transactions, the trans-national missionary movement of Korean Christianity serves as an outstanding case for a new and contemporary definition of mission,