This book focuses on Anglican Confirmation in theology, liturgy, and practice from 1820 to 1945. This was a period of great change in the ways Anglicans approached Confirmation. The Tractarian movement transformed the Communion, and its ideas were carried overseas with the missionary movement. The study examines the development of a two-stage theology and its reception. It analyses the wave of liturgical revision expressed in England in the 1928 Prayer Book. It explores the episcopal changes in practice from the eighteenth-century paradigm to a new way of confirming. The revolution of the time has left a legacy that still informs practice, while doubts about theology and its liturgical application have left an existential crisis. The author reflects on how the current situation in various provinces has its roots in this period and the diffusion of ideas in the Communion. The book offers a fresh systematic examination of the neglected ecclesial practice of Confirmation, providing a more holistic view and clarifying developments to help us better understand the present. It will be of particular interest to scholars of Christian theology, liturgy, ecclesiology, and church history.

A history of Chinese immigrants encounter with Canadian Protestant missionaries, “His Dominion” and the “Yellow Peril”: Protestant Missions to Chinese Immigrants in Canada, 1859-1967, analyzes the evangelizing activities of missionaries and the role of religion in helping Chinese immigrants affirm their ethnic identity in a climate of cultural conflict. Jiwu Wang argues that, by working toward a vision of Canada that espoused Anglo-Saxon Protestant values, missionaries inevitably reinforced popular cultural stereotypes about the Chinese and widened the gap between Chinese and Canadian communities. Those immigrants who did embrace the Christian faith felt isolated from their community and their old way of life, but they were still not accepted by mainstream society. Although the missionaries’ goal was to assimilate the Chinese into Anglo-Saxon Protestant culture, it was Chinese religion and cultural values that helped the immigrants maintain their identity and served to protect them from the intrusion of the Protestant missions. Wang documents the methods used by the missionaries and the responses from the Chinese community, noting the shift in approach that took place in the 1920s, when the clergy began to preach respect for Chinese ways and sought to welcome them into Protestant-Canadian life. Although in the early days of the missions, Chinese Canadians rejected the evangelizing to take what education they could from the missionaries, as time went on and prejudice lessened, they embraced the Christian faith as a way to gain acceptance as Canadians.