History

More than 300 years ago, the Reverend Thomas Bray, an Anglican priest in London, formed the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge (SPCK) to “promote learning in the plantations and abroad and to propagate Christian knowledge at home.

In 1700, the Bishop of London sent Thomas Bray to “the Colonies.” He crisscrossed the colony on horseback, noting the need for books and resources that would ensure a healthy future for Christianity. He saw wonderful things his newly found agency could do. Within weeks of his return to England, SPCK was preparing libraries for shipment to Maryland, South Carolina, and New York. As time passed, SPCK provided libraries for our first universities and began our public school system.

Since 1698, the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge has distributed over 30 million books and provided the means for translating the Book of Common Prayer into more than 200 languages. SPCK sent the first printing presses to India, opened the first British schools for poor children, gave equal education to girls, sent the first printed books to Australia, established libraries for clergy and missionaries in many countries, and published the first Braille books.

SPCK is the oldest Anglican missionary society in existence. Although SPCK has changed with the times, its fundamental mission remains the same: to sound the Gospel to all peoples in all nations by providing them ways to produce, publish, and distribute Christian knowledge in print and other media. Today the worldwide network of SPCK consists of chapters in Great Britain, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, and the United States.

In 1983, SPCK/USA was established at the School of Theology of the University of the South in Sewanee, TN. Through SPCK/USA, you are provided an exciting opportunity to participate with all the provinces of the Anglican Communion in a joint effort for Christian mission in over 125 countries. SPCK/USA is a founding member of the Episcopal Partnership for Global Mission. As a missionary society and servant of the Episcopal Church, SPCK/USA works for the proclamation and understanding of the Gospel in and by all nations.

The USA chapter of SPCK, SPCK/USA, has been expanding the mission of SPCK since 1983. Some of the the projects undertaken by SPCK/USA include:

• Translation of the Education for Ministry (EFM) program into Spanish.
• Production of church music recordings reflecting Hispanic spirit and character, called Unidos.
• Assistance in funding the translation of the Book of Common Prayer into the Lakota language of the Sioux people.
• Support of St Tikhon's Theological Institute in Russia to train over 100 seminarians.
• Purchase of a 20 foot container of paper for the Uganda Bookshop.
• Cooperation with other dioceses to raise funds to print the Book of Common Prayer in Wichi for the Mataco Indians of Northern Argentina.
• Shipping hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of theological books, audio visual materials and equipment, and vestments to seminaries, clergy, and Bible colleges around the world. Since the beginning of the Adopt-A-Seminary Program in 1985 the program has grown into a worldwide network providing library resources to over 200 seminaries and theological education programs in 50 countries. An ecumenical cross-section of schools has received hundreds of thousands of dollars of recycled theological books from SPCK/USA through this project. These books come to our warehouse from the libraries of clergy, individuals, and parishes. Today this program has become the largest and fastest growing component of SPCK’s ministry.

The revival of religious teaching was the core of Bray's purpose. Today, Thomas Bray's vision of seeing that libraries are available to those around the world continues through SPCK and SPCK/USA.