Scottish Protestant missions are organised programmes of outreach and conversion undertaken by Protestant denominations within Scotland, or by Scottish people. Long after the triumph of the Church of Scotland in the Lowlands, Highlanders and Islanders clung to a form of Christianity infused with animistic folk beliefs and practices. From 1708 the Society in Scotland for Propagating Christian Knowledge (SSPCK) began working in the area. In 1797 James Haldane founded the non-denominational Society for the Propagation of the Gospel at Home. Dozens of lay preachers, divinity students and English preachers were sent to the region. In the early nineteenth century a variety of organisations were formed to support evangelism to the region.
From the late eighteenth century the Industrial Revolution led to a rapid urbanisation of Scottish society. This created alarm amongst the Christians of the new Middle Class. The first urban mission was founded in Glasgow in 1826 and drew on all the Protestant churches. Thomas Chalmers advocated the "aggressive method", emphasising self-reliance backed up by intensive Sunday school and evangelistic efforts. By the 1870s every middle class urban congregation had its evangelisation association and usually a mission station. An inter-denominational Home Mission Union in Glasgow was formed in 1885 which ensured that rivalries did not develop. The "Layman's Revival" reached Scotland in 1859 and lasted until 1862. The visit of American Evangelists Moody and Sankey in 1874–75 revitalised the Evangelical mission.
The Scottish churches were relatively late to take up the challenge of foreign missions, but they came to embrace them enthusiastically. They were among the leading forces in European and American activity in India, sub-Saharan Africa, the West Indies, China and the New Hebrides, and missionary work became one of their major contributions to the business of Empire. Scottish foreign missionary work was mainly undertaken by small, local organisations that were often inter-denominational. The most famous Scottish missionary, David Livingstone, became an icon of evangelic outreach, self-improvement, exploration and a form of colonialism. Women also played a major role with single women like Mary Slessor becoming missionaries in their own right.
The Evangelical effort began to decline in intensity in the final decades of the nineteenth century. Urban religion became dominated by the working classes themselves, with new proletarian organisations. In the early twentieth century the focus of the churches broadened to include social problems. The 1910 World Missionary Conference held in Edinburgh, has been seen as the culmination of nineteenth-century Protestant Christian missions. The missionary drive began to decline after the First World War, although the Church of Scotland continued to attach importance to its efforts. Most of the imperial aspects of the foreign missionary project had gone by the 1950s and humanitarian efforts began to be more significant. Despite declining church attendances Evangelical missions continued in Scotland into the twentieth century. There were a series of initiatives connected with the re-united Church of Scotland between 1947 and 1956. The Tell Scotland Movement resulted in the controversial 1955 Billy Graham All-Scotland Crusade, which arrested the decline in church attendance. However, attendance declined rapidly from the 1960s, resulting in a reduction in home mission activity. Most evangelism was now left to local congregations and it was much smaller in scale. By the twenty-first century the increasingly secularised Scotland became the subject of a number of "reverse mission" from countries that Europeans and North Americans had originally evangelised.
Highlands and Islands
Long after the triumph of the Church of Scotland in the Lowlands, Highlanders and Islanders clung to a form of Christianity infused with animistic folk beliefs and practices. The cults of saints like Bride and Maelrubha persisted, beside rituals like the sacrifice of bulls and the cleansing of milk, along with tales of fairies, kelpies and other beasts. There had been localised success during the Reformation, undermined by a shortage of Gaelic-speaking clergy and the vast scale and inaccessibility of some parishes.C. G. Brown, Religion and Society in Scotland Since 1707 (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1997), , p. 85.
The Scottish Society for the Promotion of Christian Knowledge (SSPCK) was founded by Royal Charter in 1708. Its aim was partly religious and partly cultural, intending to "wear out" Gaelic and "learn the people the English tongue". By 1715 it was running 25 schools, by 1755 it was 116 and by 1792 it was 149, but most were on the edges of the Highlands. The difficulty of promoting Protestantism and English in a Gaelic-speaking region eventually led to a change of policy in the SSPCK and in 1754 it sanctioned the printing of a Bible with Gaelic and English text on facing pages. The government only began to seriously promote Protestantism from 1725, when it began to make a grant to the General Assembly known as the Royal Bounty. Part of this went towards itinerant ministers, but by 1764 there were only ten. Probably more significant for the spread of Protestantism were the lay catechists, who met the people on the Sabbath, read Scripture, and joined them in Psalms and prayers. They would later be important in the Evangelical revival.M. Lynch, Scotland: A New History (London: Pimlico, 1992), , p. 364.
In 1797 James Haldane founded the non-denominational Society for the Propagation of the Gospel at Home. Dozens of lay preachers, divinity students and English preachers, such as Charles Simeon (1759–1836) and Rowland Hill (1744–1833), were sent to the region. They preached an evangelical gospel, influenced by the ideas of Tom PaineBrown, Religion and Society in Scotland Since 1707, pp. 88–9. and established independent churches across the Highlands.D. W. Bebbington, "Missions at home" in M. Lynch, ed., The Oxford Companion to Scottish History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), , pp. 422–3. When Haldane and his brother Robert accepted the principle of adult baptism in 1808 most of them became Baptist chapels. Gaelic school societies were founded, beginning in Edinburgh in 1811, supporting travelling schools to the northern Highlands and western Isles. The Congregational Union of Scotland was formed in 1812 to promote home missions. In 1827 the Baptists consolidated their efforts in the Baptist Home Missionary Society. In 1824 the government provided funds to build 32 churches and 41 manses in the Highlands. After the Disruption in 1843 most of the expansion was in new churches established by the Free Church. Missions to fishermen and seamen began with the Seamen's Friend Societies.
The mission to the Highlands and Islands was highly successful in transforming the religious complexion of the region and the lives of the people. It succeeded in creating a stronghold of Evangelical Presbyterianism. At the Great Disruption in 1843 most of the clergy and congregations would demonstrate their allegiance by leaving the Church of Scotland for the breakaway Free Church.Brown, Religion and Society in Scotland Since 1707, p. 90. Callum Brown argues that the mission to the Highlands and Hebrides was Scotland's first "foreign" mission and acted as a "dry run" for future work in Africa and Asia.Brown, Religion and Society in Scotland Since 1707, p. 91.
Urban missions
From the late eighteenth century the Industrial Revolution led to a rapid urbanisation of Scottish society. By 1859 almost a third of the population were resident in a town of more than 10,000 people. This created alarm amongst the Christians of the new Middle Class, who noted that there were insufficient churches to accommodate the growing number of urban workers and their families. Preaching in 1827 Thomas Chalmers warned of the "home heathens", "paganism" and "dense irreligion" of an urban poor who were alienated from the Church, morality and the social order. Fears of non-church going would be confirmed nationally by the "emergency" revealed in the Census of 1851. The result was a new emphasis on Christianising the urban working classes that resulted in a series of missions to the towns.Brown, Religion and Society in Scotland Since 1707, pp. 95–6.
The first urban mission was founded by David Nasmith (1799–1839) in Glasgow in 1826 and drew on all the Protestant churches. This City Mission spread to almost every British and Irish city and the US.Brown, Religion and Society in Scotland Since 1707, p. 103. Chalmers' experiment in St. John's, Glasgow, published in The Christian and Civic Economy of Large Towns (1821–26), provided a model of urban mission based on lay visitation. He advocated the "aggressive method", in which poor relief was replaced with a voluntary system, distributed parsimoniously to the poor after intrusive questioning by church elders. The emphasis on self-reliance was backed up by intensive Sunday school and evangelistic efforts, underlined by frequent visitations, sometimes as often as once a month, undertaken by large number of volunteers who pressured parents and workers to participate.Brown, Religion and Society in Scotland Since 1707, pp. 97 and 102-4. The system was widely adopted by the Free Church after the Great Disruption and would be taken up by the Church of Scotland under the leadership of A. H. Charteris (1835–1908) in the 1870s. By the 1870s, every middle class urban congregation had its evangelisation association and usually a mission station, where members of the working classes were encouraged to strive for financial independence and the status of full congregational membership. After the expansion of congregations in the 1860s and 1870s there was considerable duplication of effort and competition between churches and denominations in Glasgow. As a result, an inter-denominational Home Mission Union was formed in 1885, which divided the city into small districts, ensuring that the whole city was covered and that rivalries did not develop.Brown, Religion and Society in Scotland Since 1707, p. 105.
A new wave of urban revivalism began in New York in 1858, sometimes called the "Layman's Revival" because of the prominence of lay preachers.M. E. Dieter, The Holiness Revival of the Nineteenth Century (Scarecrow Press, 2nd edn., 1996), , p. 75. It reached Scotland the next year following a trade depression and enthusiasm would continue in a heightened form until 1862. In the major manufacturing districts of the country, prayer meetings were held in offices and factories and in the streets of Edinburgh and Glasgow. Some viewed the revival with alarm, as it caused absenteeism from work and long prayer meetings disrupted the working day. The visit of American Evangelists Ira D. Sankey (1840–1908), and Dwight L. Moody (1837–99) to Edinburgh and Glasgow in 1874–75 revitalised the Evangelical mission, leading to the founding of the Glasgow United Evangelistic Association. The Tent Hall was opened in the city in 1876, which hosted poor relief and evangelical meetings, and the Bible Training Institute for training lay evangelists was founded in 1892. Charteris was instrumental in the foundation of the Women's Guild in 1887, which underlined the role of women in the missions. They also acted as Biblewomen, reading scriptures, and dominated teaching in the Sunday schools.