Course Description

This survey course invites students to encounter the story of Christianity from the Protestant Reformation (beginning in 1517) to the end of the twentieth century. It highlights the experiences of Christian communities in the ‘Old World’ (Asia, Africa, and Europe) and the ‘New World’ (the Americas and Oceania) as they move through the major turning points of the Reformation and Counter-Reformation, eventually reaching religious toleration in modern nation states; the rise of Pietism, the Evangelical Awakenings and Liberalism amidst the European Enlightenment, political revolutions and industrialization; the spread of Catholic and Protestant missions in connection with European colonization and its interactions with indigenous forms of Christianity and other religious traditions in Africa and Asia; the emergence of national churches after decolonization and initiatives for ecumenical unity following the World Wars; the rise and fall of Communism and the conflicts of the Cold War; the revival of Islamic nationalism in the Middle East; and the apparent decline of the church in the West alongside the rise of Pentecostal Christianity in the Global South in the context of economic globalization, environmental crises, and the pursuit of human rights and social justice.

This course will take a multi-centred approach to the history of world Christianity, paying attention to the significant experiences of Christian communities in all five continents from their own perspectives. It will incorporate readings from original sources which give students the closest possible access to the actions, words, and thoughts of some of the major actors in these historical episodes.