Church of England Zenana Mission

The Church of England Zenana Missionary Society (CEZMS; founded 1880), also known as the Church of England Zenana Mission, was a British Anglican Christian missionary society established to spread Christianity in India. It would later expand its missionary work into Japan and Qing Dynasty China. In 1957 it was absorbed into the Church Missionary Society (CMS).

The Anglican church was inspired to create the Church of England Zenana Missionary Society by the example of the Baptist Missionary Society, which had inaugurated zenana missions in India in the mid 19th century. Women in India at this time were segregated under the purdah system, being confined to a women's quarters known as a zenana into which it was forbidden for unrelated men to enter. The zenana missions were made up of female missionaries who could visit Indian women in their own homes with the aim of converting them to Christianity.

The purdah system made it impossible for many Indian women, especially high status women, to access health care, and many were dying and suffering needlessly. By training as doctors and nurses, the women of the zenana missions were accepted by the women of India into their homes in a way that men would not have. The zenana missions expanded from just home visits to open mobile clinics in rural areas, women only hospitals and all girl schools, all staffed and run by women both recruited in Britain and those recruited and trained locally in India.

The success of the Baptists in gaining local acceptance would lead to the creation of Anglican zenana missions in 1880, and the adoption of similar tactics in countries which practised segregation of men and women, the society became active in Qing dynasty China in 1884,Japan in 1886, and Sri Lanka (at that time known as Ceylon) in 1889. The work of the society was supported by the endowment of trusts by notable people of Victorian England.

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