The Rise and Fall of the Methodist Church in Fiji

The Methodist Church is historically very important to Fiji for the pioneering work their missionaries did to make the place part of the modern world. The first group of Europeans to come to Fiji was the Christian missionaries who started coming from 1835 with the sole aim of Christianising the people of the country. The credit goes to the Methodists, who were the first of the missionaries to come, followed by the Roman Catholics and others, all of whom came to Lakeba in Lau, as it was considered fairly safe because of the Tongan influence. The Lauans did not seem to have practised cannibalism.

The Methodists established schools and the Launas were happy to send their children to school but it was only after almost two decades that they succeeded in converting Ratu Seru Cakobau, who was regarded as the highest chief with the title of Tui Viti (King of Fiji). Most Fijians followed Cakobau and that stopped the practice of cannibalism. The majority of Fijians had accepted Christanity even before Fiji became a colony in 1874 while the Indians, most of whom were brought between1879 and 1916 as indentured labourers, refused to be converted and staunchly clung to their religions.

One writer noted that “credit must …be given to the Fijian people as a whole, who turned within a few short years from utter savagery to a peaceful and civilized life. Men who had been practising cannibals for years changed completely when at last they decided to embrace Christianity” (Burns, 1963). Credit also goes to the Methodist missionaries who succeeded in convincing the indigenous people to give up their savage ways and embrace civilization

My contact with the Europeans in my early years in Fiji was limited to that with the missionaries. My first contact was with the Methodist missionaries who ran a maternity hospital in Ba. The doctors (and some of the nursing sisters) were from Australia who had come to serve the people so they were very different from the other groups of Europeans whose main concern at that time was maintaining their status quo.

Later I came into close contact with the Methodist missionaries who were engaged in the field of education. I found them as dedicated as their colleagues in the health profession but with one important exception. The early missionaries were all teachers and education was their tool for conversion. Conversion still remained a priority for these missionaries. The schools maintained high academic standards because of the dedication of these teachers, and the Indian parents were eager to send their children to these schools because of that.

The missionary teachers, however, still made efforts through scripture classes etc. to influence the young people to become converted to Christianity. When the missionaries first came to Fiji and tried to convert the Fijians their main aim was to stop them from some of their ‘barbaric practices’ such as cannibalism and human sacrifice and to make them part of the modern world. But by trying to convert the Indians who had religions as advanced as Christianity (according to Bernard Shaw the Indian religions were more advanced than Christianity) these missionaries were contributing to religious fundamentalism because they tried to make the young people under them believe that Christianity was the only true religion.

Slowly the ethnic Fijians who were very broad in their outlook on religion started becoming influenced by this religious fundamentalism. The Methodist leaders in particular, by failing to stop their lay preachers like Butadroka from preaching racism against the non-Christian Indians from the pulpit, contributed to the religious bigotry that swept through Fiji from 1987.

The Methodist missionaries in 20th century Fiji should have adapted to the changing world and preached Christian values without condemning any other religion. I know that at least some of the Australian missionary teachers in Fiji condemned other religions because I taught in a Methodist school and in my early years there was an Australian teacher (in fact, she was the wife of the Methodist priest) who not only condemned other religions but also made fun of Catholics. The suggestion seemed to have been that the Catholics were not true Christians.

My daughters went to the primary section of the Methodist school where I taught and their Fijian scripture teachers never condemned any religion or put up Christianity as the only true religion. They taught Christian values instead. On the other hand there were some Indians who came to teach scripture from the Bible College outside Lautoka and they condemned other religions especially Hinduism. When my daughters continued to come and tell us what was happening my husband decided to take it up with the Fijian Head Teacher. She was very apologetic when she heard what was happening and rightly pointed out how she never condemned any religion and only taught the youngsters values.

The Australian Methodist Missionaries in Fiji should have realized from the 1970s, when Butadroka started preaching racism from the pulpit, the need to change their outlook. Instead they waited for over ten years until the church became completely overrun by Fijian nationalists preaching fundamentalism. By the time the Australian missionaries still working with the church in Fiji realized what was happening it was too late as the church had become so transformed that it was no longer ‘Christian’. So the pioneering work that the Methodists had done with the Fijians in getting them to be part of the modern world was all lost as Fiji slipped back into anarchy in the name of Christianity.

In 1989 a few days before Diwali that year Indian places of worship in Lautoka city were burnt down by a Methodist youth group. There was a meeting in Lautoka to protest against what was done but during the meeting the police came and tried to stop the speakers by taking the loudspeakers away. The Indian religious leaders then asked the Indians not to have the usual public celebration of Diwali to show their protest at what was happening. So on Diwali night that year, there were no lights except one or two at the entrances to welcome Lakshmi. The few firecrackers that were heard came from Fijian homes as over the years Fijian children had got used to celebrating Diwali as a national festival. The silence of that traditionally noisy night spoke louder than any noise any politician could have made.