Abstrakt
This article examines the relationship between the Christian missionary and the other through an investigation of two experiments in Christian mission in the Americas in the mid-eighteenth century. One was the Jesuit reductions in Latin America, the second the Moravian Brethren mission in North America.
The focus is on their attitude towards the Native Americans they encountered, and what this has to say to us today in our very different historical and geographical contexts. The article thus deliberately presents two mostly positive examples of what happened when Europeans came face to face with the other, and this other came face to face with Europeans.
In conclusion, and with all the necessary qualifications for using history as a means of commenting on the present, the article suggests that these experiments in Christian mission may help contemporary Christians to reflect that their own meetings with the religious and cultural other are not doomed to disaster but can lead to mutual enrichment and a deeper understanding of who Christ is.