Guide to the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America Division of Overseas Ministries Records

The Division of Foreign Missions, and later the Division of Overseas Ministries, continued the work of one of the oldest ecumenical agencies in the world, the Foreign Missions Conference of North America. The agency was founded in 1893 and served mission boards and agencies in the United States and Canada.

Of the twelve bodies which united to form the NCC in 1950, the Foreign Missions Conference (henceforth FMC) was the last to agree to membership. FMC voted down affiliation in 1949 only to approve it in January 1950. The chief issues in the debate on membership were the need for a distinctive style of work overseas and the fact that many of FMC's member boards were related to churches which would not be members of NCC. In fact, after the approval of membership, the constituent boards and agencies dropped from 103 to 79 in number. A minor factor in this drop was the elimination of Canadian member boards, since the NCC, unlike many of its predecessor bodies, limited itself to the boundaries of the United States. However a number of FMC bodies who did not affiliate with the Division of Foreign Missions (DFM) did retain various forms of associated status. DFM had substantially more relationships with non-NCC denominations than any other unit of the Council. A number of denominations used specific services of DFM requesting that their names and contributions not be listed in the annual reports.

The work of DFM was divided into area and functional or specialized departments. The former (whose names and boundaries changed from time to time) provided opportunity for consultation and cooperative work in Africa, Asia, Latin America, the Middle East, and Europe. The functional departments provided specialized services in such fields as literacy, education, audiovisual communication, medical, and agricultural work. The Associated Mission Medical Office provided direct medical assistance to missionaries. Until 1967 the Missionary Research Library, the foremost missionary collection in the world, was administered by the Division. Continuing the practice of the FMC, the Division held annual assemblies through 1965.

The work of the Division was substantially expanded in the NCC reorganization in the mid-1960s. Church World Service, which had conducted very substantial relief and development work since 1946, united with the DFM to form the Division of Overseas Ministries (DOM) on January 1, 1965. Although Church World Service maintained its corporate identity and central administration, its work was completely merged with that of the existing DFM departments. Both financially and administratively, DOM became by far the largest unit of the council.

The executive heads of DFM/DOM prior to 1973 were:

• Sue Wendell and Fred F. Goodsell, co-executive directors, 1950-1952
• Luther A. Gotwald, January 1953-June 1963
• David M. Stowe, July 1963-May 1970
• Randolph Nugent, 1971-1972

The Africa Department was one of the most active in the Division of Overseas Ministries (DOM) and its files are the most voluminous. It continued earlier work under the Foreign Missions Conference of North America (FMC), and no effort has been made to separate FMC from NCC material in this group, so records are preserved here from as early as 1921.

The NCC Africa Department was initially directed by Emory Ross who formerly served with the FMC. In 1953 Ross was succeeded by George W. Carpenter, formerly of the Congo. When in 1958 Carpenter departed to join the staff of the International Missionary Council (IMC), he was succeeded by a missionary in Angola, Theodore L. Tucker. Tucker's period of service with the Africa Department lasted until 1971 and covered the major restructuring of 1965 which transformed the Division of Foreign Missions into the DOM. The most significant feature of the new structure was the incorporation within it of Church World Service (CWS). Jan van Hoogstraten, a native of the Netherlands became CWS director for the Africa Department in 1965, and in 1970 his former associate, Nancy L. Nicalo became a co-director with him. Within DOM only the Africa Department had two CWS directors, suggesting perhaps the extensiveness of the service operations on that continent.

The NCC inherited the older Far Eastern Joint Office (FEO), which had responsibility also for the Southern Asia countries from Pakistan to Indonesia, from the FMC as a subdivision in its Division of Foreign Missions (DFM). It was headed by Rowland M. Cross, who was succeeded by his associate, Wallace C. Merwin in 1955. Merwin, in turn served until his retirement in 1970. The word "Joint" was dropped from the title of the Department in 1960. In the restructuring of 1965, in which the DFM was replaced by the Division of Overseas Ministries (DOM), the FEO became the Asia Department. Boyd Iowry directed the regional work of Church World Service (CWS) which was integrated into the DOM in the new structure. In 1967 the continuing special interest in China was intensified with the appointment of Donald E. MacInnes as Consultant for China. The Asian region was divided in 1969 with the creation of a Southern Asia Department, leaving an East Asia Department to concentrate on the Pacific coast from Korea to the Philippines. Edwin M. Luidens became Executive Director of the new Department, with Merwin as Mission Director until his retirement. In 1972 East Asia became a Working Group within the Strategy, Technical Area Program Department (STAP), representing regional as opposed to functional concerns within a restructured DOM.

The China Committee maintained sub-committees for Hong Kong and Taiwan, which became the focus of mission to the Chinese after the establishment of the People's Republic on the mainland. Hong Kong was the center of extensive service activities directed especially to the millions of refugees, and a number of educational institutions, supported by funds designated for China. Before 1949 protestant mission in Taiwan had been chiefly British and Canadian Presbyterians. An influx of former China missionaries resulted in the establishment of many new churches, prominent among them being Methodist, Episcopal, Lutheran and Baptist bodies. One dramatic event documented in these records is the closing out of the CWS family feeding program there because of wide-spread corruption.

The Latin America Department (LAD) and subsequently, the Latin America Committee and Latin America Working Group (whose materials are not contained in these files), were successors to the Committee on Cooperation in Latin America (CCLA), which has a distinctive place in American mission history. The great World Missionary Conference in Edinburgh, 1910, excluded Latin America from its agenda on the grounds that it was an already Christianized region. As a result, a special conference on Latin America was convened in 1913 in New York by five mission boards. The conference resulted in provisional authorization for the establishment of the CCLA, whose first task was arranging the Congress on Christian Work in Latin America. The Congress met in Panama in 1916 and made the CCLA a permanent institution. The CCLA remained independent of the Foreign Missions Conference of North America until about 1938 and even after that date maintained an independent literature and audio-visual program.

The CCLA played a critical role in the life of Latin American Protestantism. It encouraged interdenominational work and developed major union institutions: the Collegio Ward in Buenas Aires, the Union Theological Seminary in the same city, and the Evangelical Seminary in Puerto Rico. From 1919 it published a literary and philosophical journal, La Nueva Democracia, which was read throughout the region. The first secretary of the CCLA, Samuel Guy Inman is credited with being the prophet of President Franklin Roosevelt's Good Neighbor Policy.

The term "Southern Asia" is rather fuzzier than the names of the other regional offices of the Division of Overseas Ministries, Africa, Latin America, East Asia and the Middle East and Europe. The term is usually used to refer to the sweep of countries south of China and Soviet Central Asia from Pakistan to Indonesia. Distinguished within this region are "South Asia" - the Indian subcontinent, now including Nepal, Pakistan, Bangla Desh and Sri Lanka - and "Southeast Asia" - everything South of China and East of India/Bangla Desh.

The place of this region in the table of organization of the Division of Foreign Missions (DFM)/Division of Overseas Ministries (DOM) has varied. In the original organization of the DFM there was a Joint Office for South Asia and the Near East (JOSANE), which coexisted with the Far Eastern Joint Office (FEJO). The terminology here is a little unusual, since "South Asia" included the Southeast Asian area, whereas the FEJO took in the Philippines along with China, Japan and Korea. The first Executive Director of JOSANE was A. Russell Stevenson, succeeded in 1957 by Roland W. Scott, in 1960 by Emil W. Menzel and in 1962 by Addison J. Eastman, a former Baptist missionary in Burma.

With the establishment of the DOM in 1965 a major restructuring created the Asia Department, encompassing FEJO and a part of JOSANE with the rest going to the new Middle East and Europe Department. Wallace C. Merwin of FEJO was the Director of the new department with Boyd Lowry of Church World Service as Associate Director together with Addison Eastman. Another shift occurred in 1969 with the division of the Asia Department into East Asia and Southern Asia Departments, with Eastman becoming director and Lowry Associate Director for the latter. In the restructuring of 1972 all the former departments became "working groups", and Boyd Lowry became Director of the South Asia Working Group.

The Work of the Division of Foreign Missions (DFM) and its predecessor, the Foreign Missions Conference of North America (FMC), was divided into departments which were either regional or functional in character. This distinction was institutionalized with the founding, in 1965, of the Division of Overseas Ministries (DOM) and with the creation of a Department of Specialized Ministries. The Department of Specialized Ministries stood alongside the regional departments and included all functional activities - except personnel - within it. The present series preserves the records of five of these functional agencies, serving the technical work of overseas mission across geographic lines.

Agricultural Missions. Concern for specialized rural work surfaced about the time of the founding of the International Missionary Council, when it was estimated that there were only fifteen specifically rural missionaries in all fields. A body founded in 1920 to meet this need was the International Association of Agricultural Missions. It was reorganized in 1935 at the Christian Rural Fellowship and published a bulletin under its name. A more highly organized and technically oriented body was founded in 1930 as Agricultural Missions, later Incorporated, under the Chairmanship of John R. Mott.

This latter body came into association with the National Council of Churches through the Rural Missions Cooperating Committee and agency of specific mission boards. Its staff was that of Agricultural Missions Inc. and it raised funds for the former. With the founding of the DOM the RMCC became Agricultural Missions-Rural Development Program. From 1931 to 1954 Agricultural Missions was directed by John H. Reisner, formerly Dean of Agriculture of Nanking University. He was succeeded in 1955 by the Educational Secretary, Ira W. Moomaw, who in turn was succeeded in 1965 by Benton Rhoads.

Agricultural Missions trained rural missionaries, conducted surveys and studies, and published books, pamphlets and a newsletter. Of special interest in these files are evidence of extensive lobbying and consulting with regard to the federal foreign aid program. Reisner was a consultant to the Food and Agricultural Organization of the UN and closely associated with the Director of the National Catholic Rural Life Conference.

Christian Medical Council. Originally, the Christian Medical Council for Overseas Work was in function closely parallel to Agricultural Missions. It conducted surveys and consulted with the mission boards in their medical and hospital programs. Formerly a department of the FMC, it came into the NCC without a change in function, and was phased out in 1971 as mission board involvement in overseas hospitals was sharply reduced. The CMC was closely related to the Christian Medical Commission of WCC, with which it should not be confused. It was especially involved in united hospital efforts, such as the United Christian Hospital in Hong Kong. From the founding of NCC until 1960, CMC was directed by Douglas N. Forman. Frederick G. Scovel was succeeded by James C. McGilvray in 1966, who was seconded to the World Council of Churches in 1969. McGilvary was succeeded by William L. Nute, who presided over the liquidation of the Council.

Overseas Personnel Recruitment Office (OPRO). OPRO was formerly known as the Missionary Personnel Program and ultimately in 1972 as the Overseas Personnel Section after it ceased to engage in direct recruitment. This agency was responsible for the annual interdenominational training programs for outgoing missionary personnel as well as discussing standards and methods of missionary preparation. During the 1960's it was active in direct recruitment, particularly of medical and other technical personnel on behalf of the mission boards and overseas cooperative enterprises. Its directors were: E. Bruce Copland to 1958, Addison J. Eastman 1960-1961, William Parkinson 1962-1965, and Herbert O. Muenstermann 1967-1972.

Committee on World Literacy and Christian Literature (Lit-Lit). In distinction from all the agencies and programs in this series, Lit-Lit lived in the shadow of a single individual, Frank C. Laubach (1884-1970). Laubach was congregational missionary to the Moros in Mindanao, and he discovered a technique for teaching literacy. Mission boards cooperated to make possible his itineration to propagate his methods beginning in 1927. In 1938 Lit-Lit was organized specifically to continue his work. Laubach was a mystic and a charismatic personality; qualities which helped popularize his work and make him a world figure who was considered for the Nobel Peace Prize. However, he also caused endless headaches for his collaborators. World Literacy Inc., founded to raise funds for his work, separated from Lit-Lit and employed Laubach after his retirement as a missionary. The agency worked outside NCC emphasizing primarily government-sponsored literacy work. Laubach also worked independently with such organizations as World Neighbors and created a private foundation, Laubach Literacy Fund, while still publicly identified with a number of other organizations.

Lit-Lit sponsored literacy campaigns by churches and missions and produced reading material for new literates. The "Story of Jesus" was most widely used and appeared in a number of volumes which were printed in more than sixty languages. Also included in these files are those of ALFALIT, the independent literature program of the Committee on Cooperation in Latin America which was eventually merged into Lit-Lit.

The Directors of Lit-Lit were Alfred D. Moore to 1956, Floyd C. Shacklock, 1956-1967, and Leslie C. Sayre, 1967-1970. To a degree more continuity was provided by Frederick Rex, who came to Lit-Lit from UNESCO, serving as Educational Director after working on a literacy campaign with Laubach from 1953 to 1970. In 1971 a new body, Intermedia, was created to combine the work of Lit-Lit and RAVEMCCO (see below).

Radio, Visual Education and Mass Communication Committee (RAVEMCCO). RAVEMCCO was formed by the Foreign Missions Conference in 1948. This reconstituted the Standing Committee on Audio Aids Overseas as a "functional representative committee". It continued as such until it merged with Lit-Lit, becoming Intermedia in 1971. RAVEMCCO published technical literature, conducted surveys, sponsored conferences, and encouraged the use of modern mass-media methods. It was closely involved with radio station DYSR in the Philippines and the Lutheran-sponsored Radio Voice of the Gospel, transmitting from Ethiopia throughout the Near East and to Africa and Southern Asia. RAVEMCCO Directors were W. Burton Martin, 1953-1959, Edwin M. Luidens, 1959-1962, and Barnerd M. Luben, 1962-1971.

World Day of Prayer. "Projects" in the title of Series VI refers especially to the World Day of Prayer. Groups of Protestant church women gathered first in 1887 to pray for home missions and slightly later for foreign missions. The two were combined as the World Day of Prayer in 1919; an activity sponsored by the Federation of Women's Boards of Missions. The legal successor to the Federation is the Committee on Special Programs and Funds within the NCC, which is closely related to Church Women United and its predecessors.

The Department of Churchmen Overseas began in 1951 as the Joint Department of American Communities Overseas. The joint department was created within the NCC by the merger of the Committee on English Speaking Union Churches Overseas of the Foreign Missions Conference and the Committee on Religious Work on the Canal Zone of the Federal Council of Churches. In 1958 the word, "Joint," was dropped from the title as the department became a regular part of the Division of Foreign Missions. In the next year it became the Department of Overseas Union Churches. Then in 1962 it became the Department of Churchmen Overseas. When the Division of Foreign Missions became the Division of Overseas Ministries in 1965, the Department became the Churchmen Overseas Program under the Department of Specialized Ministries. It remained as such until the NCC reorganization of 1972 when it became the Ministry to Service Personnel/Overseas Union Churches and the Committee on American Laymen Overseas within the Overseas Strategy and Program Department of the Division of Overseas Ministries.

From its beginning, the Department's purposes were "to encourage the growth of ecumenical fellowship among these union churches across the world" and "to strengthen the Christian impact of English speaking communities abroad." Its functions were:

1. Building up a fellowship of union churches and extending the outreach of each church.
2. Developing a system for relating church members from North America to these union churches.
3. Establishing and maintaining contacts with business, labor, and other groups with a view to strengthening the Christian witness through the personnel of union churches outside the continental United States.
4. Consulting with government as needs require.
5. Rendering assistance in the establishment and maintenance of union churches as needs require.
6. Representing member communions and boards in other types of ministry to these communities as may be authorized by the General Board.

J. Quinter Miller was acting executive secretary of the Department in 1951 and 1952. Robbins W. Barstow was executive director of the Department from 1952 to 1959. From 1960 to 1972 Raymond A. Gray served as director.

Church World Service, "the largest overseas relief and reconstruction program ever undertaken by the American churches," has always played a distinctive role in the National Council of Churches. It receives and disburses more than half of the total revenues of NCC and is an operational agency with its own substantial domestic and overseas staff. Church World Service (CWS) is also distinctive in its special relation with government. CWS is a member of the Advisory Committee on Voluntary Foreign Aid, a State Department agency. Because of this, CWS is eligible to distribute the surplus foodstuffs accumulated by the Department of Agriculture with the consequent stringent government regulations and oversight. In 1955, for instance 70 million pounds of the 78 million pounds distributed by CWS was surplus commodities under Public Law 480. Dealing with commodities on this scale also involved CWS in intimate dealings with foreign governments. This aspect of its work is well illustrated in a letter from a new secretary for Latin America to the director of work in Jamaica: "Of course we are having a good crisis every other day, an improvement from once a day. Brazil gives trouble frequently, but the two standbys are Haiti and Chile." (R.F. Smith to L. Lomas, 6/12/66). It is interesting to note that the first two Directors of Church World Service were veteran missionaries, while the fourth and fifth came to CWS out of extensive experience in government service.

CWS was a founding member of NCC. Although it was itself a new organization, constituted on May 8, 1946, it was heir to a succession of church foreign aid organizations going back to the First World War. It was the union of three existing organizations, some of whose files remain with series VIII: the Church Committee on Overseas Relief and Reconstruction - concentrating on Europe particularly; the Church Committee for Relief in Asia - strongly emphasizing China; and the Commission for World Council Service, created in 1945 to be the American arm of the great work on church reconstruction in Europe undertaken by the new World Council of Churches (WCC).

CWS came into the Council as a semi-autonomous Central Department. CWS merged with the Division of Overseas Ministries (DOM) after its formation in 1965, although its independent corporate status remained. Eventually each geographic department of DOM had a "mission" director and a "service" director, the latter representing the areas of interest of CWS. The Director of CWS himself was Associate Executive Director of DOM. For this reason the separate CWS series in the NCC archive contains primarily material from before 1965.

Before the founding of NCC, CWS was sponsored by three agencies: the Federal Council of Churches; the Foreign Missions Conference of North America; and the American Committee for the World Council of Churches. The first two joined NCC at the same time as CWS, and the third continues its special function. CWS has at all times worked in close coordination with what is currently titled the Commission on Interchurch Aid and Refugee World Service of WCC.

The most pressing issue facing CWS at its inauguration was church reconstruction in the war devastated areas of Europe and Asia, especially China. Interest in other geographic areas, generally the Far and Middle East, Africa, and Latin America, came later. In most cases CWS files can be supplemented with the appropriate DOM series.

As the pressure of post-war reconstruction lessened, attention was increasingly turned to self-help projects, but immediate disaster relief has always been a CWS specialty.

In 1947 CWS created the Christian Rural Overseas Program (CROP) which for a time was operated jointly with Catholic Relief Services and Lutheran World Relief. CROP organized state wide campaigns for donations of agricultural products to be sent overseas. It also maintained close relations with the Heifer Project of the Church of the Brethren. CWS's own activities may be separated into four categories which correspond to the organization of materials in this series: General Administration, Overseas Program (OP), Material Resources Program (MRP), which was responsible for collecting and shipping commodities, and Promotion. Important in the last-named area is the One Great Hour of Sharing, a national annual offering taken up by member churches of NCC to support the program of CWS.

The Executive Directors of Church World Service were: 

• Abbe Livingston Warnshuis (called Executive Vice President), 1947-1950 
• Wynn C. Fairfield (first Executive Director of the Central Department of CWS within NCC), 1951-1954
• R. Norris Wilson, 1955-1961
• Hugh D. Farley (first as Executive Director of CWS then as Associate Executive Director of DOM), 1961-1966
• James A. MacCracken (Executive Director of CWS under Farley, 1965-1966), 1967- 1974