Introduction

The main aim of this chapter is to examine the role Naga missionaries, from the Indian state of Nagaland, play in helping us to understand the idea of “spiritual migration”. In an important sense, human history has been marked by migration – in a way, we are all migrants. On an abstractlevel at least, the term “migration” is a difficult concept as it encompasses a number of interlinked factors – political, economic, social, historical, and religious. Although there has been some research on migrants’ religious experience in destination countries (Adogame 2012; Kahl 2014), I want to reflect on the strategic mobility of spiritual migrants “called” to a place not by human design but by divine sanction, and the motivation for this migration being, in part, the impact it will have on the home territory. In this sense, the chapter advances our understanding of the relationship between mobility, religious networks, and the transnational dynamic, and how it aims to generate new social and cultural dynamics both in destination and home contexts (Brown & Yeoh, this volume).

This chapter examines Naga Baptist missionaries going to specific parts of Asia – China, Thailand, Cambodia, and Laos. It focuses on three questions: 1) what motivates these missionaries; 2) in what ways missionaries negotiate and navigate the worlds beyond their immediate context; and finally 3) how these processes relate to the broader ideas of mission.