The Missionary Kids: Unmasking the Myths of White Evangelicalism (Holly Berkley Fletcher) - A Review
Being a pastor (now retired) with a
family, I am quite aware that clergy families face unique challenges. Preacher’s
Kids are often on display and expected to behave in particular ways. When it
comes to Missionary Kids (MKs), they experience even more unique challenges
than Preacher's Kids. Like PKs, MKs are expected to serve as exemplars in their
demeanor and behavior. In other words, MKs like PKs often live in a fishbowl.
But MKs face the reality that their parents are often idolized as spiritual
heroes and saints because they go to distant lands to share the Gospel. This is
especially true in White Evangelical churches. This mythos of heroism ascribed
to their parents is compounded for the children of Missionaries with the
reality that they must deal with the challenges of growing up in a foreign land,
while often spending much of their childhoods and youth separated from their
parents while attending boarding schools. So, what does this look like from the
perspective of an MK?
Holly Berkley Fletcher offers us an
insider's look at life as an MK in her excellent book The Missionary Kids:
Unmasking the Myths of White Evangelicalism. Fletcher spent much of her
childhood as an MK in Kenya. She is also a historian, having earned a PhD in
American History. Besides having taught at universities, she served for
nineteen years as a CIA analyst, focused on Africa. In this book, Fletcher draws
on her own experiences as well as interviews and conversations with other MKS.
For that reason, Fletcher offers us a rather full picture of the good, the bad,
and the ugly of what it is like to be an MK. As a result, we get to know both
the joys and the sorrows of life on the mission field, as well as the later
transition to life “back home.” The
subtitle to The Missionary Kids hints at Fletcher’s purpose in writing
this book. Her goal here is to uncover the realities of life as an MK,
realities that are too often shrouded in myths of sainthood and heroism. What
we learn here is that not every missionary is a saint or a hero. The truth is
that some missionaries engage in criminal behavior. As a result, children end
up suffering trauma and worse.
Fletcher begins The Missionary Kids with this haunting sentence: "I've only known one probable
murderer in my life, and he was an evangelical missionary" (p. 1). With
that statement, the myths of sainthood have been effectively unmasked. The
murder she references involved a highly celebrated missionary, with many self-reported
exploits, who was suspected of having an affair with another married missionary
and then killing his wife when she discovered the affair. But this is not as
unusual as we might expect. As we move through the book, we encounter
missionaries who sexually abused their own children and the children of the
communities they served. We hear of varieties of abuse taking place at the boarding
schools to which parents entrusted their children. We also hear about the
challenges of returning from the mission field to the United States. Challenges
that may be similar to the realities faced by the children of members of the
military when they return stateside, not knowing a real home. As Fletcher
reflects on her own experiences as an MK, the only homes she ever knew were the
ones she experienced on the mission field. The transition, as we discover, is
not easy.
While Fletcher writes from a post-evangelical
perspective, she does not write her book to dismiss the work of missionaries.
Rather, she wants to help those of us who are not missionaries to better
understand the realities faced by missionaries and their children. At a time
when scandals have rocked the American church, especially the evangelical
world, missionaries are still held in high regard. It is understandable, since
missionaries do take great risks to go to a foreign land to minister, but
missionaries are human beings and subject to human frailties. The problem is
that too often there is little or no accountability. As a result, some missionaries
will engage in inappropriate behavior that is often ignored or mishandled by
the agencies and churches with which they are affiliated. Too often, there is
little support, especially psychological support, for missionaries and their
children. Fletcher does an excellent job in revealing these realities with
compassion and clarity.
With all of this in mind, so that
we gain a better understanding of what MKs face, Fletcher writes:
If missionaries are the evangelical rockstars, we are the roadies, of sorts—although we're along for the ride involuntarily, and perhaps not performing much actual labor. Then again, we're definitely carrying the baggage. Many of us grew up feeling it was on us to help make the stars look good: show up, do your job, don't complain, don't screw up (p. 6).
“Do your job, don’t complain, don’t screw up” is the message
that was often drilled into the children of missionaries by their teachers and
other mission leaders. Imagine the pressure these children were under,
especially the pressure to not complain, lest you undermine the work of your
parents. That's a big load to place on a child.
Fletcher divides her book into four
parts: “The Myth of Calling,” “The Myth of Multiculturalism,” “The Myth of
Saints,” and “The Myth of Indispensability.” She divides the first section into
three chapters, beginning with one titled "Accessories to Martyrs."
That is such a revealing chapter title to start off the book. This chapter sets
the stage for what comes later by addressing the fact that the parents of these
children are seen at times as martyrs to be honored, while the children are
simply there in the background, often living far apart from their parents. She
writes that "Missionaries' inability to offer their children a stable
domestic life was alternately glossed over or played up in the context of their
sacrifice and martyrdom" (p. 31). Chapter 2 focuses on calling and how
that is experienced by MKS, who generally do not have a choice in the matter
and can be put in dangerous and traumatic situations by their parents' own
sense of calling. Finally, in chapter 3, titled "Jesus Is Their
Favorite," we learn about the common experience among MKS of parental
neglect, as they are often sent off to boarding schools far from their parents.
Even many MKs who do not go to such schools can experience neglect as their parents
put ministry ahead of family obligations, all in pursuit of fulfilling a sense
of call.
Part 2 focuses on the “Myth of
Multiculturalism.” The first chapter (Ch. 4) is titled "Bubble Boys and
Girls." In this chapter, Fletcher reveals that rather than experiencing in
any real way the cultural context in which their missionary parents work, the
children are often kept in a bubble. Part of the reason for this is rooted in
racist attitudes toward the communities the missionaries are working with.
Fletcher shares her own experience of being "bubblewrapped," such
that she had few encounters with the culture around her, including encountering
children of her own age. In Chapter 5, she continues this conversation by
focusing on "The Great (Race) Escape." Here, Fletcher notes that most
American evangelical missionaries are White and that the idea of
color-blindness replaced overt racism among missionary attitudes, but Black
Christians continue to be silenced in White contexts. In Chapter 6, Fletcher
speaks of "A Cultural Trade Imbalance." She notes here that while
missionaries often bring American values and culture to their missionary
efforts, they are rarely on the receiving end of the culture and values of the
people with whom they work. This includes the educational experiences of MKs,
who, at least until recently, rarely learned much of the culture and history of
the places where they were living. This was especially true in African contexts,
such as the one Fletcher experienced.
She titles Part 3 "The Myth of
Saints." It is here that we learn of the dark side of the missionary
enterprise. In Chapter 7, titled "The Untouchables," Fletcher writes of
the power dynamics in the missionary relationship with those they seek to reach.
The reality is that missionaries are rarely peers with those with whom they minister,
such that they often live at a much higher standard of living than the people
they seek to reach. This also includes a sense of isolation from their context,
something that is especially true for MKs. In Chapter 8, which is titled
"One Big Happy Family," she writes of the missionary community. While
we might assume that this is one happy family, too often this is not true. Yet, they are in many ways a family. Then in
Chapter 9, she speaks of the missionary enterprise being "A Breeding
Ground for Abuse." This is a disturbing but enlightening chapter, since
she reveals in this chapter the ways MKs have suffered traumatic mental,
spiritual, and physical injury due to abuses, including sexual abuse, while at
the same time being pressured not to complain. The result is that little is
ever done to hold abusers accountable. While abuse is one of the challenges
faced by MKS, so is being "Sent Home" (Ch. 10). Being sent home is different
than going home. Being “sent home” can result from several issues, some of
which involve the behavior or health of MKS. Concerns about abuse, perhaps on
the part of a missionary parent, can also lead to families being sent home,
ripping a child up from what has become home. Chapter 11 is titled
"Fighting for Change." In this chapter, Fletcher offers us some good
news. She writes about efforts underway that have been made to change things,
especially when it comes to oversight and accountability. A lot of this change
is due to the lobbying of MK survivors, together with the larger public
engaging in public shaming of mission organizations that cover up abuses. In
Chapter 12, Fletcher writes about the challenge of when "Theology Trumps
Policy." In this chapter, she talks about several places where
"theology" led to challenges, such as the emergence of the Purity
Culture in the early 2000s, which led to the shaming of victims of sexual
assault and questions of gender equality. Here again, issues of race and racism
emerge.
The final section, Part IV, focuses
on the "Myth of Indispensability." In other words, she asks the
pertinent question of whether missionaries are indispensable. In her view,
missionaries, while having a purpose, are not indispensable. So, in Chapter 13,
titled "Getting Out of the Way," she reveals the many ways in which
getting out of the way by American missionaries has proven to be a good thing.
The problem is that many missionaries and their supporters don't trust the emergent
communities of faith. The problem here is, as she notes, "one of the
things Western Missionaries and ministries too often can't shed is a sense of
their own righteousness, and sometimes the greater the sacrifice, the greater
the tendency to slide into narcissism" (p. 221). In Chapter 14,
"Searching for Home," Fletcher shares the difficult realities faced
by MKs when they return to the States and search for a home that is not a home.
They are, in many ways, nomads. For some, this leads them back to the mission
field because that is the only home they have ever known. She may not have
become a missionary, but she reveals her own longing for home in Kenya. A lot
of this involves not having a firm sense of identity.
As Fletcher writes in her
conclusion to The Missionary Kids: "The MK experience has a lot to
teach the American church, but it has lessons for us all. The missionary kids
know more than most how tenuous our grasp is on the things we try to own:
identity, place, belonging" (p. 260). By unmasking the myths of White
Evangelicalism, Holly Berkey Fletcher helps us better understand the realities
faced by MKs, while also raising questions about our own faith and how we live
it. It's a complicated story that, when told as Fletcher does, reveals both the
good and the bad. I have friends who have raised their children on the mission field, who seem to have done well. But this isn't true for all. So, to understand the good, we must also acknowledge the bad
and work to overcome it. Fletcher does an excellent job of telling a story that
is rarely told about what she and others have experienced as children living as
Missionary Kids. Hopefully, by telling these stories, things can change for the
better.
The book under review may be purchased at your favorite retailer, including my Amazon affiliate or my Bookshop.org affiliate.
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