Missionary Council of the Church Assembly/Overseas Council of the Church Assembly

Records of the Council and its staff. Includes minutes of meetings of the Council and its sub-committees, reports and documents, correspondence, pamphlets and brochures, and financial records in relation to the Funds and Legacies administered by the Council.

The Missionary Council was established in 1921 by the Church Assembly to take the place of the Central Board of Missions, and the first meeting of the Missionary Council was held at 3 Bedford Square, London, on 1st February 1922, with the Bishop of Salisbury in the Chair. At the meeting the general functions of the Council were considered to be with regard to the provision of Missionaries, provision of funds, and 'Overseas problems'. These functions were then extrapolated to cover administrative difficulties, relations with other Missionary Boards, the relationship with missionary work of other Churches and organisation of a home base. It was also suggested that a Financial Committee, Home Base Committee and an Overseas Committee should be formed.

In 1945 a Missionary Appeals Committee was formed as a sub-committee of the Council. The task of this Committee was to scrutinise all Appeals made to the Church prior to them receiving blessing from 'high authority'. The expectation was an 'avalanche' of Appeals [following the end of the Second World War]. The first meeting of the Committee took place on the 8 January 1945.

As a result of the work of the Missionary Council Commission (MCC), which sat between 1946-1950, and the publishing of the Commission's Report, 'Growing Together', resulted in the Missionary Council changing to become the Overseas Council, with the first meeting being held on 24 April 1951.

In 1963 the Overseas Council combined with the Church Assembly Council for Ecumenical Co-operation (CACEC) to become the Missionary and Ecumenical Council of Church Assembly (MECCA). The 43rd and final meeting of the Overseas Council took place on 14-15 November 1963.

Chairman:

- Bishop of Salisbury, 1921-1934

- Bishop of Dover (later Guildford), 1934 -1940

- Bishop of Winchester (later Archbishop of York), 1940-1946

- Bishop of Leicester, 1946-1950

- Bishop of Liverpool, 1950-1963

General Secretary:

- Revd. C.C.B Bardsley, 1922-1923

- Revd. Garfield H. Williams, 1924-1929

- Canon A.W. Davies, 1930-1935

- Canon. J. McLeod Campbell, 1935-1953

- Revd. J.M.W. Adam, 1954-1955

- Revd. J.G.H. Baker, 1955-1963

Largely retains the arrangement created by an archivist in the 1990s. This follows a departmental structure of the central Board and its sub-committees, and then the areas of work of the Council. Within the series the files are generally in chronological order.

A number of the files continue beyond 1963, the point when the Overseas Council became part of the Missionary and Ecumenical Council of Church Assembly (MECCA).

Open

This catalogue was created following the generous awarding of a grant by the Andrew W Mellon Foundation via the National Cataloguing Grants Programme for Archives.

The material was appraised in line with the Lambeth Palace Library/Record Centre appraisal policy when cataloguing took place in 2014/2015.

No accruals are expected.

MSS 3121-2128 Lambeth Palace Library - see also: Reports of the Missionary Council in Proceedings of Church Assembly. Minutes of the missionary literature sub-committee of the Board of Missions for the province of Canterbury, 1891-1899 (MS. 2446).