Transnational Charity in the Religious Press: Children as Charitable Agents

Kristine Moruzi, Deakin University

The nineteenth-century periodical press demonstrates children’s active roles as supporters of philanthropic enterprises. By considering how children were inducted into patterns of philanthropy, this paper examines the methods by which child readers were exposed to others in need and encouraged to act. In this paper, I draw on examples from the British Wesleylan Juvenile Offering (1844-1878), the Canadian Epworth Era (1899-1914), and New Zealand’s Break of Day (1909-1962) and Lotu (1922-1972) to explore how children were trained about religion, missionary works, and charity. Because of the span of these periodicals of over a century, they demonstrate the extent to which the religious press responded to cultural, social, and economic shifts while simultaneously maintaining their focus on their missionary efforts. Moreover, the publications enable the discussion of transnational similarities and differences in periodicals aimed at young people. In this paper, I argue two related points: first, that the periodical press was instrumental in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries to attracting and retaining children to actively support a specific religious charitable organisation; and second, that the models of charity depicted in these magazines share a religious charitable sentiment that requires religious feeling, work, and commitment.

No extended abstract or paper available

 Presented in Session 261. Save the Children?: Childhood, Charity, and Humanitarianism