Mission and Postcolonialism

In the light of the Taliban's recent hostage situation with a group of Korean missionaries, a lot of people are asking what boundaries should be set for evangelism. Should Christians go into countries and spread the love and Lordship of Jesus? In the midst of the anguish of our sisters and brothers, some have said that we should take a diversity/pluralist view (if for nothing other than pragmatic safety reasons). If I hadn't seen it so many times before, I would have to laugh at how certain sectors of "the West" are trying to push their idea of palatable religion onto the flaming zeal of these faithful martyrs. (Umm...isn't that pushing your cultural agenda? Or is nebbish sensitivity training an indigenous part of all human cultures?)

Forutunately, I've thought about this, too. What are the appropriate limits of the gospel? Whence its perspicuity? What about the exportation of women's liberation through missions? Should we cease the "circumcision" of women among African tribes that are evangelized?

As brutal and savage as one might consider that, the same thought was in the mind of most orchestrators of these 17-20th c. missionary efforts. We have not changed - we simply switch foci. Whereas missionary efforts of 150 years ago may have tried to encourage trim hair and lots of clothing (while saying nothing about the heavy-handed patriarchal family structure), today's missionaries would be content to let "natives" run around in loin cloths so long as they had adequate diversity training.

In each case, we make the fundamental mistake that the gospel is tied to our culture. When we politicize the gospel, evangelism becomes a ploy of party politics (no different from the spread of capitalism or communism "to lift people out of their misery"). The safer method - one which lets the Gospel penetrate and change a culture from within - is to lead people into a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ and then let the Holy Spirit come upon them to transform their culture in appropriate (if agonizingly slow) ways.

Those Cornelius moments happen and teach both missionaries and the missioned how wide God's community is.