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Article: Indian Missions
- Article from:
- Dictionary of American History
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2003 The Gale Group Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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INDIAN MISSIONS
INDIAN MISSIONS
represented an important form of contact between Indians and Europeans from the 1500s through the 1900s. No Native group escaped contact with Euro-American Christians seeking to restructure and transform Native beliefs and societies into Christian ones. Mission work provided the underpinnings of conquest for all three major European groups and the Americans: Spanish Catholics, French Catholics, English Puritans, and American Protestants. All saw the missions as a means to convert the Indians not only to Christianity but also to the missionaries' culture and society. Most apparently successful missions operated where Native culture had been decimated by ...