Of all the challenges facing Christian evangelists today, one of the most pernicious concerns yesterday. It’s the charge that Christian evangelism over the centuries has been a destructive force, aligned with European colonialism and bent on the exploitation and, ultimately, the destruction of Indigenous cultures.
There’s no point denying that there have been distorted forms of evangelization by the sword, which no one today would defend. Yet if spreading the faith itself comes to be regarded as destructive, it could create powerful new pressures against evangelization culturally and, potentially, even politically and legally.
How are Catholic evangelists to respond to the charge that historically speaking, Christian missionary efforts have been a negative experience for their target cultures?
The primary defense most believing Catholics would offer is one which no secular judge or jury would ever accept: that Baptism brings souls closer to God and puts them on the surest path toward eternal salvation. But there are at least three other arguments that can be made in defense of Christian missionary endeavors.
Preserving, building up cultures
First, far from destroying Indigenous cultures, in many cases Christian clergy and laity have been instrumental in preserving them. For example, lay Christian missionaries often preserved local languages in Africa, Asia and the Pacific Islands in the 19th century by providing them with a written alphabet in order to translate the Bible.
Second, instead of oppressing and exploiting the local people they encountered, over the centuries missionaries have expended enormous amounts of time, energy and resources attempting to lift them up.
This is why the Albanian missionary nun Mary Teresa Bojaxhiu, better known as Mother Teresa, was given a state funeral in India, with Indians of all backgrounds praising her efforts to serve the country’s poor.
This is why in Mongolia today, the Don Bosco Technical School functions as both a high school and a technical college, educating roughly 250 students every year while also hosting a center for street children and orphans, providing their food, boarding, education and daily needs, despite the fact there are fewer than 1,500 Catholics in the entire country – meaning the vast majority of students aren’t Catholic and will never become Catholic.
Historically speaking, there may have been no force that has invested greater resources in the development of Indigenous cultures around the world than Christian missionary movements.
Third, while individual Christians were complicit in the most brutal and exploitative forms of colonization, the broad thrust of the faith cut in the opposite direction, resisting the legacy of colonialism and standing on the side of the Indigenous.
In 1838, for example, a party of white colonists slaughtered at least 28 unarmed members of the Indigenous Wirrayaraay people in New South Wales, Australia. A Baptist minister named John
Saunders preached a celebrated sermon condemning the slaughter, thundering that “the spot of blood is upon us, the blood of the poor and the defenseless, the blood of the men we wronged before we slew. … We are guilty here.” When seven perpetrators were tried, convicted and sentenced to death, Catholic judge John Plunkett referenced Psalm 36 in pronouncing judgment:
“The crime has been witnessed in heaven and could not be concealed.”
Despite popular narratives to the contrary, the truth is that through the long and admittedly mixed history of colonization, there have always been Christians who stood up against abuse, often at least as numerous as the groups committing them.
Moral vision rooted in scripture
As historian Meredith Lake put it, writing about Christian resistance to oppression during the colonization of Australia, these Christians “had a moral vision rooted in an understanding of the Bible – especially in the idea of God’s concern for the poor and oppressed, and his righteous judgement against injustice. This idea is pervasive in the text of Scripture … (and) gave a biblical shape to humanitarian defenses of Indigenous people.”
In the collision between the West and the rest of the world over the last 500 years, no group has stood more consistently and courageously for the preservation, development and recognition of local cultures than Christian missionaries. Scores of those missionaries have given their lives in defense of the people they felt called to serve.
How do we defend Christian evangelism against charges of a checkered past? Make sure it’s the whole past we have in view, not just selected chapters of it. When the whole story is told, Christian missionaries will be the heroes at least as often as the villains.
John Allen Jr. is the Fellow of Communications & Media at the Word on Fire Institute and president and editor of Crux, an independent online news site specializing in coverage of the Vatican and the Church. This is condensed from an article published at www.wordonfire.org.