Svenska Missionskyrkan och SMU i Övre Norrlands Distrikt
History: Missionskyrkan och samerna
The Mission Covenant Church of Sweden (MCCS) early history is closely connected to the Sámi mission. MCCS was founded 1878 and already 1880 it sent out the first missionaries. Of 5 missionaries 3 were sent to Lapland and the Sámi. Sámi mission was kind of popular in Sweden at that time in the churches. The three missionaries came from the Missions School at Kristinehamn to southern Lapland in August 1880. They were Karl Johan Gustafsson, Jan Erik Ågren and August Lindgren. They learned the language (south sámi) in Malå. Lindgren went further north and quite soon on to Finland and Russia. In 1885, Jöns P Nyström came in his place to southern Lapland.
They worked in huge areas and had difficulties in getting into the culture. The work did not give expected results and 1892 it was decided for them to emphasise work among settlers rather than among the reindeer herding Sámi.
This was the end of the Sámi mission time, but several missionaries have still had good contact with the Sámi people. Pastor Sven Freidwall, the last "mountain missionary" in the church had good contacts in Southern Lapland in the 1950-ies to 70-ies.
In 1995 a first Sámi service in modern time was held in Hemavan in Southern Lapland by the MCCS. After that, Sámi church work has grown. Not so much from the idea that Sámi should be object for missionary activities more than Swedes or others, but from a wish to offer the Sámi a way of being Christians in a Sámi way. This is important, as we see that the Sámi are underrepresented in our churches today.
