Discreet Proto‐Pentecostals: The Catholic Apostolic Church in North America

Much recent work has been undertaken on the beginnings of Pentecostalism in North America, and its antecedents in the nineteenth century. These efforts have outlined the theological contributions of the Holiness movement, revivalism, and nineteenth‐century healing movements. One group that has been largely overlooked is the Edward Irving influenced Catholic Apostolic Church, which has been seen as making a minimal contribution as a precursor to Pentecostalism in general; it has especially been seen as peripheral in the Americas. This article will use contemporary newspapers and recently digitised primary sources to argue that the Catholic Apostolic Church was a significant force in the pre‐history of American and Canadian Pentecostalism, with hundreds of followers in key cities, regularly exhibiting prophecy and glossolalia throughout the second half of the nineteenth century.     

Four Decades of “Discreet” Charismata: The Catholic Apostolic Church in Australia 1863–1900

For some years, the historiography of Australian Pentecostalism has been dominated by the belief that Pentecostalism came to Australia in 1909 through the agency of Sarah Jane Lancaster who had, in turn, been influenced by news of overseas events. There had, apparently, been little or no influence in the Australian context by such groups as the Catholic Apostolic Church, which formed in Britain in 1835, in the wake of Edward Irving's proto‐Pentecostal theology. Although members of the Catholic Apostolic Church arrived in Melbourne in the 1850s, the general view was that they had by then abandoned their earlier pursuit of the charismata. In 2012, I argued (based on a limited sample of evidence) that the adherents of the Catholic Apostolic Church in Australia both taught and practised the charismata throughout the second half of the nineteenth century. This evidence is contained in the Angels’ Report Books, located in Bradford, West Yorkshire. Since then, the Bradford collection has been fully digitised, thereby allowing a comprehensive review of the Catholic Apostolic Church's charismatic activity and further evaluation of the Lancaster hypothesis. The significance of this research is that it allows a considerable re‐framing of the pre‐history of Australian Pentecostalism, demonstrating that the Catholic Apostolic Church taught and practised glossolalia, prophecy and divine healing through the last four decades of the nineteenth century.     

Young,Ernest P.Ecclesiastical Colony: China's Catholic Church and the French Religious Protectorate

China's relationship with and experiences under imperialism have been a consistent topic among scholars of modem Chinese history.Ernest Young's new book,Ecclesiastical Colony:China's Catholic Church and the French Religious Protectorate,is an important contribution to this effort by examining the nature of this relationship as concerns the Catholic missions in nineteenth-and early twentieth-century China.In Young's study,Christianity is seen through its political as well as religious commitments.