Adopting for God focuses on the role of adoption evangelists in the transnational adoption movement between the United States and East Asia. It argues that both evangelical and ecumenical Christians challenged Americans to redefine traditional familial values and rethink race matters. Evangelical social awareness, ecumenical missionaries’ active anti-racist propaganda, and the latter’s increasing interest in global friendship all contributed to the inauguration and spread of transnational adoptions from East Asia. By challenging the perspective that equates missionary humanitarianism with unmi ... More

Adopting for God focuses on the role of adoption evangelists in the transnational adoption movement between the United States and East Asia. It argues that both evangelical and ecumenical Christians challenged Americans to redefine traditional familial values and rethink race matters. Evangelical social awareness, ecumenical missionaries’ active anti-racist propaganda, and the latter’s increasing interest in global friendship all contributed to the inauguration and spread of transnational adoptions from East Asia. By challenging the perspective that equates missionary humanitarianism with unmitigated cultural imperialism, this book offers a more complete and nuanced picture of the rise of an important twentieth-century movement. Adopting for God adds to the growing body of literature about how missionary cosmopolitanism changed America by underlining the ways adoption evangelists’ campaign for the adoption of mixed-race children challenged American perceptions of race and family.