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February 6, 2012 at 12:38 pm 
Al Stefanelli Deep within the heart of every evangelist lies the wreck of a car salesman. — H L Mencken
Evangelism is defined as “the preaching or promulgation of the gospel; the work of an evangelist” and “missionary zeal, purpose, or activity.“ The bible commands the believer to take on the role of evangelism and there is no shortage of instruction manuals on how to play the role. These programs cover a wide range of methods, from the simple “share your testimony with friends” to intricate and complicated methods that require a long-term commitment and a dedication to following the syllabus of a well-trained instructor.
The former presents a relatively minor intrusion on an individual that may or may not result in the attendance of a church service, and possibly the believer’s target becoming a believer themselves. The biggest problem with this form of evangelism, particularly to the unbeliever, is the annoying intrusion on our personal space while we are going about our day. Being approached at the grocery store or another venue by a local believer handing out tracts or following a planned pattern that was developed by someone else, such as “Evangelism Explosion.” But the latter? That involves professional evangelists, and therein the problem lies.
The Evil Of Missionary Evangelism…
Missionary evangelism is one of the most immoral and reprehensible activities to be inflicted upon humanity. Missionaries are not satisfied with handing out tracts or asking people in the grocery store if they “know Jesus.” That’s enough of a pain in the ass, but these people are fairly easy to dismiss. But missionaries are turbocharged evangelists who invade foreign countries to spread religion like a disease. They brand them “savages” and then proceed to systematically destroy their traditional beliefs and culture in the name of and at the command of God. If you doubt this, just find a Native American ask them.
On the surface, the work of missionaries appear to deserve applause and lauding. In fact, some of the deeds that are exemplary. Who would bring disdain against those who are bringing fresh water to outlying tribes, teaching agricultural skills and building medical facilities? While these deeds are commendable in of themselves, the strings attached force the re-categorization of these deeds from the altruistic to the nefarious. There is no reason, whatsoever, why these deeds cannot be accomplished without even mentioning God. The addition of evangelism to these efforts transforms them from humanitarian to the malicious. The primary motivation of the evangelist is destruction, which is decidedly inhumane.
Despicable Intentions…
The Missionary will tell you that their motivation is to “save souls,” but that is not the purpose of their type of evangelism. Missionary evangelism has little to do with saving souls. It is nothing more than pure memetic self-preservation. It is the single most effective venue that allows the religion meme to self-propagate like the virus that it is, and at alarming rates. Missionary evangelism is the fuel that feeds the success of one of oldest and most effective pyramid schemes in the known universe.
Many of the “targets” of the missionary are third-world nations which have large, tribal populations that most likely have an innate trepidation of the unknown, highly developed ancient ritualistic beliefs and quite possibly a lack of exposure to the modern world. These people groups are usually hard to reach for a variety of reasons, usually centering on customs and traditions that do not allow for the interference of outsiders.
It’s All About Fear…
The “magic” of modern farming methods, fresh water and clothing that better protects them from their environment, as well as forms of entertainment that were previously unknown, are methods that the missionary commonly use. These tribes are told that the Christian God is the one who is responsible for these things, and that is how the missionary gains their trust. Once these indigenous tribes are convinced that the Christian God is the benefactor for these improvements, the shoe of fear is dropped with impeccable accuracy. All that has been done can not only be lost, but the tribe may end up worse than they were before the missionaries showed up if they abandon the Christian God and return to their evil, savage and barbaric ways.
This fear is exacerbated due to the instinctive fear that most of these tribes already have due to the superstitions that surround their ignorance of the sciences that explain the naturalistic sources of weather patters, geological events, medical epidemics and such. When the missionary explains that they are now subject to the temporal and/or eternal punishment from an invisible, undetectable, omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent being, it plays perfectly into the aboriginal’s limited conceptual abilities. Missionary evangelism is a purposefully one-sided proposition that, when mastered, is presented in such a way as to convince an entire culture that the Christian God is the only one that can protect them from the catastrophic destruction of their souls, their lands and their livelihood.
The Dismissal Of All Other Gods…
Of course, you can’t have a bunch of other gods going around diluting the universal global authority of Jesus. To cinch the deal, the missionary explains how God speaks for all of mankind. Thus, the doctrine that all of mankind is under the authority of the Christian God and the rules that govern their behavior govern the behavior of everyone else on the planet.
This speaks to the missionary’s efforts to convey the consequences of disobeying their deity, which are borne by all of humanity, regardless of their religious affiliation or lack thereof. In case the words of the missionary are not enough to cause the rejection of the tribal gods, there’s always the handy Old Testament and the first Commandment, which reads,
“Thou shalt have no other gods before me”
According to the bible, breaking this commandment is to be punished by genocide, including the annihilation of entire cities of men, women, children and animals. (Deuteronomy 2:33-34, Numbers 21:34-35, 1 Samuel 15:2-3, Joshua 6:21. Joshua 10:40). There is one exception in Numbers 31:15-16 which allows the sparing of women for raping purposes.
Evangelical Pandemic….
Once the tribe is converted, they are told that one of the commands of their new god is to become evangelists, themselves by virtue of Mark 16:15 (et. al.), which includes the command to,
“…go forth into the world and spread the Gospel to all nations.”
This becomes a vicious cycle as the newly-minted native evangelists pass on to their neighboring tribes the threat of hell for non-belief and then with further threats if they do not go forth and evangelize, and so on, and so on.
The end-game of the missionary evangelist is the planting and reproduction of indigenous churches to be led by native peoples to propagate the Christian religion in their own communities. It doesn’t take long to destroy entire cultures using this method. Once the tribe is converted and a tribal elder has been installed as the pastor of the newly planted church, the circle is completed. All that is left is “maintenance” using the tools of fear. The elder-as-pastor is further trained by the missionaries on the finer points of scaring the shit out of the rest of the tribe. This is done using two methods.
The pastor/elder preaches much of the time on the need for the dedication, worship and faith in God lest the tribe become separated from whom they have been told is the source of their agricultural successes and whatever other newfangled and modern items of convenience that the missionary had brought along with them.
The most effective tool of fear, though, is no different from the messages given to believers in completely developed and modern nations. Eternal punishment. Eternity can and often is explained, but in reality, the human mind cannot fathom the concept because there exists no comparative. This is handy, because it does not allow for an “escape clause,” and without this fear, the gospel is rendered irrelevant, ineffective and unnecessary.
Missionary Failures…
Much like the efforts of the grocery store evangelist who preys on innocent shoppers who are only trying to get to their vehicles without being molested by their neighbors, some tribes are converted and are successfully transformed, some are converted but eventually return to their indigenous traditions, and others outright reject the message – which sometimes has a detrimental outcome for the missionary.
Sometimes the missionaries are kicked out, but sometimes they end up wounded or even killed. Tribal justice can be very unforgiving, and the level of which any given tribe is dedicated to their deity will govern their reaction to the blasphemy that is committed by the missionary. Missionary evangelism can be very dangerous work, and the fact that it is totally unnecessary puts it on the list of some of the most foolhardy activities.
However, many missionaries understand the dangers of their chosen path and would consider their death as martyrdom, which increases their drive and determination.
It’s The Debbil…!
Given the primitive nature of indigenous tribes, the most popular means of evangelism is the use of the parable of the sower. Using the seed as a metaphor for salvation, the missionary finds common ground on which to trick…er… evangelize the aboriginals. The successes are attributed to God. The failures are attributed to “the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil, or Satan” (Revelation 20:2) In these evangelistic terms, the ones who reject even the initial efforts of the missionaries are usually left alone, and are categorized according to Luke 8:12, which reads,
“Those along the path are the ones who hear, and then the devil comes and takes away the word from their hearts, so that they may not believe and be saved.”
They justify not providing these tribes with the benefits of potable water, modern medicine and agriculture and better means of protecting themselves from the environment by virtue of always handy Matthew 10:14, which reads,
“If anyone will not welcome you or listen to your words, shake the dust off your feet when you leave that home or town“
The tribes that who initially embrace the message brought by missionaries, but realize they have only been tricked by these gifts are considered to have “fallen away.” This comes from Luke 8:13, which reads,
“Those on the rocky ground are the ones who receive the word with joy when they hear it, but they have no root. They believe for a while, but in the time of testing they fall away.”
I will not delve into an exegesis here, but reason demands that the tribes which outright reject being Christianized or reject it after a while have nothing to do with “Satan” going around “snatching away” any seeds.
God? We Don’t Need No Stinking God!
There are several organizations that engage in humanitarian efforts without molesting the traditions of other cultures. Doctors Without Borders brings medicine all over the planet, The Water Project brings potable water to areas who have little or no access to it and organizations like the Foundation Beyond Belief cover everything else. All without evangelism.
In short, missionaries are scaring people into changing their behavior and abandoning their tradition. They are destroying entire cultures for the single purpose of expanding their traditions. They are no different that corporate raiders, and that makes them decidedly immoral.
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Ooh, this is a fun one. I rountinely get harrassed by people like this at Times Square and Grand Central on the subway…or did, until I loudly said to one “There is no God but Allah and Muhammed is his prophet.” That got me some very weird looks, and they don’t bug me any longer
I find it’s more productive than actually arguing about theology or history, as they 1) almost universally don’t know any of it and/or 2) are in complete denial and will talk right over you. I actually do have a fair bit of education in these fields, which surprises people.
Next time say Lady Gaga instead of Muhammed and see what happens.. it will probably be worth a laugh.
Yeah sure. Just one example, a missionary couple from my previous church. The wife is an MD. They work in a clinic next to an orphanage in Uganda, an orphanage that previously had no medical support. The husband teaches reading to kids, does the usual well-digging construction help etc., and yes, horror of horrors, offers a makeshift seminary class for adults. They have also adopted severely handicapped Ugandan children who otherwise would have died. (Somewhere, Pete Singer weeps.)
I’m guessing, because of the moronic stereotypes presented routinely on this blog, some impressionable ass will actually believe that they withhold medicine from those children who won’t profess Christ. Yes, I am quite certain there are people on this blog stupid enough to believe that.
Just I’m sure they are not served better by your tiny fisted “Now I’m going to kick some Christian ass! No holding back anymore, nosiree! Watch out!” approach (btw, when will all this happen? I’ve been waiting since I started reading your blog.) No, I’m sure they prefer the tangible benefits offered by those missionaries. But you, as a white man in a wealthy country, know what is better for them. Right?
Azuma Hazuki,
Is that a challenge? If so I accept.
I’m willing to bet that there are some groups of people who would give up all that medicine and education just to get rid of annoying christians. AND I’m willing to bet that some tribe leaders sacrifice their own personal integrity and ‘accept’ christianity just to get medicine, education, and water for the rest of their group. That’s good leadership and it’s very couragous of them, but at a personal cost. Kinda like a nice single lady who turns to prostituion just to feed her kids. There is no honor in pimping for jesus. It a racket that’s full of dishonest intentions.
I know an atheist jewish guy who worked in Nigeria. I work in India. Your argument is most invalid as it assumes atheists don’t do charity work. Giving to a church is not charity, it’s propping up institutions that need not exist. I see no difference between the priest and the hobo who believes in alien brain scans.
Rice conversion is rice conversion. My culture was destroyed by people who used your excuse. Oh it’s helping them. That’s the problem. People were helping them with the express issue of making them read the bible and be a “christian”, now you do so with the hope that they ask you about your fancy invisible man. Because to them it’s not “Humans Bringing Food” it’s “That jesus fella has told humans to bring food”.
You see, I don’t bother with a seminary class. I find that as nonsensical as sacrificing goats or praying for intervention from the God of Flowers (hah!). I however do help teach anganwadis (informal midwives and primary care nurses). The biggest problem missionaries have is that they keep listening to imaginary friends rather than real problems. Does your clinic distribute condoms and teach proper health and sex education? Not Pro Life Abstinence bullshit? Because Uganda is famous for trying to fudge HIV rates. Roughly 6% to 15% of the country is HIV positive… And a lot of the reason is due to the anti-condom stance since Abstinence and Be Faithful are pushed more than condoms.
Why do you need a seminary class? See that’s what it boils down to. That’s like “It’s not about religion, but we are going to build a church next to our hospital”.
The always dependable Heddle offers one counter example that proves that what we’re talking about here never happens, and hasn’t happened repeatedly all over the world.
Heddle, you could save a lot of time by just posting “No True Christian” or whichever weak argument you want to pull out. Or maybe just number them, like restaurant meals. “I’ll have the #3, thank you.”
Hey heddle you seem to have quite a lot to say. You know what sucks about the internet? You just don’t get the emotion of the thought. You know what I mean? Besides it’s much easier to have a conversation in real time rather than pecking back and forth. I wonder… when it comes down to it, can you back up all your smart comments and incredible insight? I host a couple of podcasts and I am inviting you to do just that. There is a live show on Tuesday at 3pm pst. If you can’t make that then we can schedule on another day and time that works. I figure it will be a great opportunity to show people you aren’t just some wuss who giggles to himself as he huddles over a keyboard saying things he would never have the testicular fortitude to say in person.I’ll be awaiting your reply so we can get it set up.
Yes, sure, if I know what the topic is and also if I can first listen to some of your podcasts and make sure you are serious and not just some raving lunatic gonzo. If your podcasts sound at least semi-professional and semi-intelligent, I’ll do it.
Well I’ve never been described as a “raving lunatic gonzo” Seems like a strange thing to suggest. Did I give you that impression from my post?
I’ve had the following people on as guests: PZ Myers, Brian Dunning, Matthew Chapman, David Silverman, DJ Grothe, Blair Scott, DPR Jones, Mr Deity, Eugenie C Scott, Peter Gilmore and many of the authors found at freethought blogs. My show has also been featured on the James Randi Educational Foundation website.
Here is a link where you can find some of my work http://angryatheist.info
You can contact me at this email ourlord_darwin@yahoo.com
People who just walk up to you and want to be your friend are weird. They often play the hurt feelings card when you reject them too. Evangelism is a very creepy thing to experience. I did it when I was in youth group a long time ago and I didn’t like it at all. I really didn’t want to bother other people just like I don’t want other strangers to bother me with with something that I have no interest in. Kirby vacuum salesmen are creepy too. But at least I’ve got them to come in and clean my house, only to kick them the hell out after. I did give one guy a beer for his troubles, though. Poor saps. I ALMOST feel sorry for them, but I don’t. Actually, it’s the teenagers who evangelize that I’d love to invite in and sit them down and talk with. But only if they pester me first. lol
Another reason to tax the churches and not allow tax deductions for religious “donations”. As far as heddle is concerned, when your missionary friends do their “good” without conditions, then you can claim that they are doing good. Anything else and they are poisoning the well.
I support both ending tax breaks for churches and for all charitable organizations. You shouldn’t be subsidizing my charities, and I shouldn’t be subsidizing yours. If you actually have any, that is.
Aborigines have “limited conceptual abilities”?!
I know you didn’t mean that to come across as racist as it sounds. I would suggest rewriting that last clause.
Actually, I meant that exactly how I wrote it. Race has nothing to do with it. Tribal communities that are nestled deep in the interiors of various countries that have no access to television, radio, news, computers, cellphones, the Internet, electricity, etc., have very limited conceptual abilities with respect to the modern world; especially where superstitious beliefs are concerned. They make very easy prey for missionaries, particularly where divine punishments are concerned.
No, Al, their *conceptual abilities* have nothing to do with it. They’re just as able to process concepts that are explained to them as anyone else. It’s a *conceptual framework* problem; they have limited access to the information available to global civilization with which they could *form or acquire the concepts* that would help them resist the missionaries’ message.
I think the only way to fix the problem is to insist that all socially-useful work carried out be completely divorced from religious activity.
If you want to feed the hungry, or house the homeless, that is fine.
If you want to feed the hungry and then deliver a sermon to them afterwards, then that is not quite so fine. And if you want to feed the hungry on condition that they listen to a sermon in order to receive any food, then that is utterly reprehensible. And anyone who would rather throw food away than help a person in need is not at all a nice person; they evidently care more about their own proselytising activities than actually feeding hungry people.
And the separation between charitable and missionary work needs to be enforced rigidly — right to the point of not even taking place in the same place at the same time. Even merely wearing religious insignia while helping vulnerable people is not good, because it is still a divisive tactic: it marks the religious person out as different from normal people. And when people feel desperate, they sometimes do things they wouldn’t ordinarily do.
I’ve said a few times that I’d rather starve to death than accept food from a Christian; though that’s easy for me to say right now, as I’m far from being in the position of having to make that choice.
Reading this, I was struck with the similarities to the missionary work that was so popular in North America in years past. And we know how well that turned out.
Thought provoking article, thank you.
You seem to be assuming, though, that indigenous religions/superstitions/practices are always better/preferred to Christian religion/superstition/practices, and therefore that their religious conversions are always a net detriment, even if the missionary brings other benefits to the community (water, crops, medicine, etc). This doesn’t seem self-evident to me, care to defend this position?
Is it primarily the issue of losing cultural distinctiveness? Or does it depend on the specific religious practices of the group in question? Is teaching and encouraging rationality/skepticism an appropriate or realistic goal instead?
I also have a pretty serious problem with your characterizations of the motivations of christian missionaries:
I can tell you, from personal experience, that Christian missionaries do, in fact, believe that their primary motivation and purpose is “saving souls”, “reaching the lost”, “spreading the gospel”. You could hold that they are wrong to do so, or that they destroy cultures in the process, but I believe that they are sincere in their faith.
The sincerity of faith doesn’t make the action a good one.
Because I can name another faith that is extremely sincere in it’s actions and we wouldn’t consider those actions very nice (HINT! It’s Islam!)
The sincerity of action of christianity has encouraged the destruction of Native American and Australian Aborigine cultures. In India some of the biggest stances against condoms were from Christians (Holy hell! While India was crossing a Billion, Mother bloody Theresa was off telling people she thought birth control was bad.).
The sincereity of action of missionaries is one of the reasons Africa was so buggered particularly on the HIV and AIDS front.
The road to hell is paved with good intentions. Now here is the thing… If an islamic charity came to the USA from Saudi Arabia and offered poor people money to set up businesses and infrastructure in exchange for attendance or indeed with hints given about attending a mosque. Would that be acceptable?
Good god no. Your country would throw a hissy fit. Bill O’Reilley would have an Aneurysm so bad that his head would explode from the rage. And do you know why?
Because deep down we understand that someone desperate is taken advantage of.
I’m not actually arguing about any of those things, its just that (unless I was misreading it) the original article was actually claiming that Christian missionaries weren’t sincere about their motivation to “save souls”, which I absolutely disagree with, partially because I personally know several missionaries. I think arguments about the effect of their actions (regardless of motivation), are more interesting and useful (and actually do make up the rest of the original article).
You’ve pointed out some issues with specific Christian theologies (that I don’t necessarily disagree with), but its pretty easy to identify similar problems in other religions as well, like the belief in reincarnation and karma that helps support the oppressive caste system in India.
That brings us back to the initial question I posed, which is: as a rationalist/skeptic/atheist, shouldn’t we be working against religion/superstition/irrationality wherever we find it? Are native religions necessarily better than the ones we normally spend most of our time talking about (Christianity/Islam)?
Should we really be in the business of comparing religions against each other to decide which is the least bad?
Or is preservation of native cultures a primary motivation, over and above water/medicine/crops? (Obviously, we’d want BOTH if we could have it, but that’s not really the question at hand.)
I don’t imagine there are any remaining people groups that still practice stuff like cannibalism or child sacrifice, and I don’t know a lot about the specific practices of other native religions, although I’ve heard of all kinds of things like female circumcision, feet binding, neck stretching, child brides, and abandoning or killing babies of the wrong gender.
All that to say: Al is claiming that replacing these native religions with Christianity is always a bad thing for these people groups (even factoring in improvements in living conditions that many missionaries help provide). Even now that I no longer believe that the religious claims of Christianity are true, I still don’t see how you can support this in the general sense, only perhaps in specific cases when looking at a specific people group or a specific native religion.
Somewhat of a side note, I don’t know that the destruction of Native American culture is really the right comparison to make here, since I think you could make a strong case that the physical invasion of the land and the displacement of the native peoples was arguably the primary destructive force here. (Although I could be talking out of my ass on this one, I haven’t studied this much.)
@Heddle
You aren’t worth the challenge. This is because there is no challenge. The presuppositionalist worldview admits of no challenges; it is self-sealing and circular. Nothing will convince you to change your mind, because in your mind, everything stems from the conclusion you wish to draw in the first place.
There is a problem with this of course, a very large one which I articulated about you in another thread, but you won’t admit it. So no, there will be no challenge from me for the same reason I wouldn’t try arm-wrestling with Venus de Milo: I refuse to have a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent!