Gods empire : religion and colonialism in the British World c. 1801 1908 Studies the British missionary societies devoted to the British colonies: Society for the Propagation of the Gospel (Anglican) Association for the Propagation of the Faith (Catholic) Colonial and Continental Missionary Society (Evangelical Anglican) Wesleyan Methodist Missionary Society Colonial Church Society (Congregationalist) Colonial Schemes of both the Free and Established Churches of Scotland St. Augustines College Canterbury and Missionary College of All Hallows Drumcondra (Dublin) In Gods Empire Hilary M. Carey charts Britains nineteenth century transformation from Protestant nation to free Christian empire through the history of the colonial missionary movement. This wide ranging reassessment of the religious character of the second British empire provides a clear account of the promotional strategies of the major churches and church parties which worked to plant settler Christianity in British domains. Based on extensive use of original archival and rare published sources the author explores major debates such as the relationship between religion and colonization church state relations Irish Catholics in the empire the impact of the Scottish Disruption on colonial Presbyterianism competition between Evangelicals and other Anglicans in the colonies and between British and American strands of Methodism in British North America