Bertil Envall (29 October 1909,

Annedal Annedal is a Districts of Sweden, district of Gothenburg, Sweden, which falls with the Boroughs and districts of Gothenburg, borough of Linnéstaden. It is older traditional working class district. Much of the original housing was demolished in ...

Gothenburg Gothenburg ( ; ) is the List of urban areas in Sweden by population, second-largest city in Sweden, after the capital Stockholm, and the fifth-largest in the Nordic countries. Situated by the Kattegat on the west coast of Sweden, it is the gub ...

- 23 November 2011,

Backa, Gothenburg Backa also known as Hisings Backa is a suburb in Gothenburg, and was one of Gothenburg’s 20 districts. On January 1, 2011 Backa merged with two other districts of Gothenburg, Kärra-Rödbo and Tuve-Säve, to form the district of Norra Hisinge ...

) was a

Swedish Swedish or ' may refer to: Anything from or related to Sweden, a country in Northern Europe. Or, specifically: * Swedish language, a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Sweden and Finland ** Swedish alphabet, the official alphabet used by ...

Lutheran Lutheranism is a major branch of Protestantism that emerged under the work of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German friar and Protestant Reformers, reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practices of the Catholic Church launched ...

missionary A missionary is a member of a Religious denomination, religious group who is sent into an area in order to promote its faith or provide services to people, such as education, literacy, social justice, health care, and economic development.Thoma ...

and

bishop A bishop is an ordained member of the clergy who is entrusted with a position of Episcopal polity, authority and oversight in a religious institution. In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance and administration of di ...

emeritus ''Emeritus/Emerita'' () is an honorary title granted to someone who retires from a position of distinction, most commonly an academic faculty position, but is allowed to continue using the previous title, as in "professor emeritus". In some c ...

of the

Evangelical Lutheran Church in Malaysia The Evangelical Lutheran Church in Malaysia or ELCM is one of the four Lutheran bodies in Malaysia. It currently has 21 wikt:congregation, congregations nationwide with a total of 3,650 members.Bohuslän Bohuslän () is a Provinces of Sweden, Swedish province in Götaland, on the northernmost part of the country's west coast. It is bordered by Dalsland to the northeast, Västergötland to the southeast, the Skagerrak arm of the North Sea to the ...

Serving in Malaya

He was asked to serve as the superintendent of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Malaysia and Singapore in 1961 and was elected and consecrated as the bishop of the church in 1965 and 1966 respectively.

Attempts at Lutheran unity in Malaya

Envall was instrumental in initiating a consultative dialogue between the congregations established by missionaries of the

United Lutheran Church in America The United Lutheran Church in America (ULCA) was established in 1918 in commemoration of the 400th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation after negotiations among several American Lutheran national synods resulted in the merger of three German-l ...

among the ethnic

Chinese Chinese may refer to: * Something related to China * Chinese people, people identified with China, through nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity **Han Chinese, East Asian ethnic group native to China. **'' Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic ...

and the

Tamil Tamil may refer to: People, culture and language * Tamils, an ethno-linguistic group native to India, Sri Lanka, and some other parts of Asia **Sri Lankan Tamils, Tamil people native to Sri Lanka ** Myanmar or Burmese Tamils, Tamil people of Ind ...

congregations led by the

Tamil Evangelical Lutheran Church The Tamil Evangelical Lutheran Church is a Christian denomination in south India, which was established in 1919 and has approximately 500,000 members. Its headquarters is in Trichy, Tamil Nadu. It is one of the prominent mainline Lutheran c ...

and the Swedish mission in

Malaya Malaya refers to a number of historical and current political entities related to what is currently Peninsular Malaysia in Southeast Asia: Political entities * British Malaya (1826–1957), a loose collection of the British colony of the Straits ...

with the intention of establishing a single Lutheran church in Malaya. Despite agreeing on organisation and stewardship in general, disagreements arose upon the form of church government for the proposed national church. While the Swedish mission and the Tamil Lutherans was partial to an

episcopal polity An episcopal polity is a hierarchical form of church governance in which the chief local authorities are called bishops. The word "bishop" here is derived via the British Latin and Vulgar Latin term ''*ebiscopus''/''*biscopus'', . It is the ...

, it was not accepted by the representatives of the American mission who felt that the local Chinese Lutherans would not be familiar with that form of government. There were also disagreements on the nature of

apostolic succession Apostolic succession is the method whereby the Christian ministry, ministry of the Christian Church is considered by some Christian denominations to be derived from the Twelve Apostles, apostles by a continuous succession, which has usually been ...

as well as the significant differences in the culture, language and origins between the Tamils and Chinese who were ministered by the respective missions, the former consisting mainly of established Tamil Lutheran families while the latter consisted mainly of congregations of young individual Chinese who were first generation Christians. As a result, two Lutheran church bodies were established in Malaya; the Tamil Evangelical Lutheran Church districts in Malaya were reconstituted as the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Malaysia and Singapore (ELCMS) on 13 August 1962 whereas the mainly Chinese congregations of the American Mission was organised the Lutheran Church in Malaya (later renamed the Lutheran Church in Malaysia and after Singapore's independence in 1965, the

Lutheran Church in Malaysia and Singapore The Lutheran Church in Malaysia or LCM () is one of four Lutheran bodies in Malaysia. It currently has 52 congregations nationwide with a total of 6,736 baptised members and is the largest entirely Lutheran body in the country. Until 2012, th ...

) a year later on 3 August 1963.Vierow, Duain William. A comparison of Tamil and Chinese Lutheran Churches in Peninsular Malaysia and Singapore, DMiss thesis, Fuller Theological Seminary, 1976, 268pp.

Retirement and death

Envall retired and returned to Sweden in 1977 where he stayed until his death on 23 November 2011.

Sources

* Core of original article translated from the

Swedish Wikipedia The Swedish Wikipedia () is the Swedish language, Swedish-language edition of Wikipedia, started in 2001. A free content online encyclopedia, it is the largest reference work in Swedish history, while consistently ranked as the most visited or on ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Envall, Bertil 1909 births 2011 deaths 20th-century Lutheran bishops Lutheran missionaries in Malaysia Swedish Lutheran missionaries Swedish expatriates in Malaysia Swedish men centenarians People from Gothenburg