UC San Diego

In the early twentieth century, family reform became a matter of national importance in China. This dissertation addresses a Protestant Christian movement to “Christianize the home,” which sought to thus reform Chinese society and indigenize Christianity. Chapter one discusses the formation of the Christianize the Home Committee of the National Christian Council of China (NCC). As part of a transnational organization, the Home Committee responded to both Chinese and American culture and beliefs. This responsiveness afforded an opportunity for women’s leadership, and those in the Home Committee maximized upon that opportunity between 1922 and 1938. In chapter two, I analyze publications from missionaries and Chinese Christians about ancestor worship. Their debate led some to reject evolutionary hierarchies of civilizations and instead parse the good from the bad in Chinese and Western cultures, trying to save both Chinese culture and Christianity in a modernizing milieu threatening to both. My third chapter shows how the idea of fulfillment theory became widespread. This idea that divine inspiration had shaped non-Christian religions led many to consider the unique strengths that Chinese culture could contribute to world Christianity.

In chapter four, I examine practical approaches to reconciling filial piety with Christianity and a competing vision of family spirituality that came from the United States. In the fifth chapter, I examine model Christian families in two pieces of fiction published in 1930s China. In both, women’s education and service within and outside of the home builds the home’s spiritual power. Both emphasize the agency of children, and both show a partially extended family in which filial piety is reflected.

That the Home Committee’s visions of the Christianized home included conservative elements like respect for the family structure, affirmation of filial piety, and a tempered patriarchy helped it to be accessible and to resonate with treasured Chinese family values. The expansive, flexible ideal of the Christian home made it a place of creative power where character is formed and where women lead, a place characterized by improvement. This progressive institution was suited to weather the storms of the twentieth century and contribute to Christianity’s success in China.