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Industrial Mission history

A website for the recording of the history of the Industrial Mission movement

The aim: to promote understanding of Industrial Mission and to learn the lessons it has to teach us.

Objectives:

To locate and list the archives of Industrial Mission teams and attempt to ensure their safekeeping
To publish interviews with industrial chaplains
To encourage history-writing

Since the Second World War clergy and laypeople of many Christian denominations have visited industry, exercised a pastoral and prophetic ministry, pursued the issues raised by their work, and educated the churches in the realities of industry.

The Industrial Mission movement has been an important means of countering the increasing secularisation of our world - by which we mean the distancing from each other of the Christian Faith and the Church on the one hand and the secular world and its institutions on the other.

For over sixty years industrial chaplains and many others involved in the Industrial Mission movement have been bridging this widening gulf, and they have learnt lessons as they have done so. As the Church today seeks new means of tackling increasing secularisation it is essential that we hear the voices of those who have for so long been involved in this task.

As the Church relates through its parishes and by other means to regeneration in urban areas, the methods which Industrial Mission has developed will be increasingly useful, so to study the way these methods have been employed in the past will help us to relate today to rapid change.

The Christian Faith, the Church and the economy and its institutions need to relate to each other so that signs of the coming of God's Kingdom can be more faithfully created both in our economic institutions and in the Church. As new forms of mission in the economy are developed, the history of Industrial Mission will be an important source of inspiration and guidance.

There are now two book length treatments of industrial mission available:

1. Engaging Mission: The lasting value of Industrial Mission for today, by Peter Cope and Mike West, published by Grosvenor House: ISBN 978 1 908596 81 9

Available on Amazon for £9.99 by clicking here

2. Bridgebuilders: Workplace chaplaincy, a history, by Malcolm Torry, published by Canterbury Press: ISBN 978 1 84825 036 9, £19.99.

Available on Amazon for £16.99 by clicking here, or for the lower price of £15 from: The Rev'd Malcolm Torry, 37 Becquerel Court, West Parkside, London SE10 0QQ. Cheques payable to 'Malcolm Torry'.

An index for Bridgebuilders can be found here

The authors of papers, interviews and lists on this site retain their copyright. Other material © the Industrial Mission Association, 2006, 2007

Disclaimers: The views on this site are not necessarily those of the Industrial Mission Association. The Industrial Mission Association accepts no responsibility for the content of websites to which there links on this site.

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