Out of the Ordinary: Twelve Australian Methodist Biographies

Out of the Ordinary is an eminently useful and timely publication, providing brief overviews of the ministry of twelve lesser-known Methodist leaders in Australia in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Its availability in 2015 coincided with the bicentenary of the arrival of the first Methodist missionary in Australia (and the entire South Pacific) and it supplements two other significant publications of the same year: O'Brien and Carey's Methodism in Australia and Emilsen's An Informed Faith: The Uniting Church at the Beginning of the 21st Century.The twelve biographies in Out of the Ordinary include Methodist missionaries and missiologists, denominational leaders, university faculty, women of influence, indigenous leaders, preachers, and philanthropists. These studies flesh out the personalities and the details behind much of the macroscopic history provided in Methodism in Australia and, as such, it is essential reading for those who seek to understand Methodism's history over the past century.As part of my research I have been seeking to follow the evangelical-liberal debate that devastated the Australian Church in the last century. I found little reference to this topic in Methodism in Australia, while in contrast, I found the topic touched upon in many chapters in Out of the Ordinary. The biography of the conservative Arthur Jackson contrasted against the spectrum of liberal and semi-liberal theologians, Colin Williams and George Calvert Barber, was particularly helpful. The insights into indigenous missions in the Northern Territory, as provided in the biographies of Theodor Webb, Harold Shepherdson, and Lazarus Lamilami, similarly highlighted a topic about which too little has been provided in other publications.The development of an ecumenical agenda within Methodism and the process leading up to Church Union in 1977 is a helpful addition to Emilson's history of the Uniting Church. The emphasis on women's ministry in Australia (Mary O'Reilly and Alice Mofflin) and in the South Pacific (Dorothy Delbridge) revealed tensions and opportunities that are otherwise lost in the historical narrative. The influence of faithful financial supporters and the dominating presence of Queen's College in Melbourne are evident throughout this book.Apart from the biographical detail, Out of the Ordinary provides a sample of the work of current church historians, which is useful for a relative newcomer. The greatest strength of this book, however, is that it addresses a glaring need for detailed history of Methodism in Australia during its declining decades in the last century. I thoroughly recommend this book for those who have some of the general history of Methodism but seek more detail, or for those who simply enjoy reading the biographies of effective leaders who might otherwise remain lost in history.

Récupéré en direct depuis OpenAlex et désinversé. Les résumés ne sont pas conservés dans cette base de données : les index inversés représentent 8,6 Go des 9,3 Go de texte de la base, et le serveur dispose de 13 Go libres.