The Fallacy of the Short-Term Mission Trip
Christian denominations differ on many issues, like gay marriage, abortion, or which semi-automatic weapon is best for home defense. But one thing universally agreed upon is the magic and wonder of the short-term mission trip.
Step into any suburban church in America and you will find courageous Christian soldiers marching onward from their cul de sacs toward the jungles and savannas of disease-ridden, war-torn third world countries, with three objectives in mind.
First, deliver the good news of White Jesus and convince as many natives as possible to accept Him as their personal lord and savior. Second, participate in some half-assed project that locals will finish after you get the hell out of their way. Third (and most important), let the cute Black children touch your hair. Don’t forget to take pictures. (You won’t forget to take pictures.)
Yes, in just two weeks time, minus the final three days, which are spent recovering at the nearest all-inclusive beach resort, you and your group of 20 unskilled, portly churchgoers can change a heathen community forever.
This trend is also prominent at Christian colleges and universities. Having graduated from such a school, I had the chance to join this exercise in futility in January 1999. Our assignment: build a church in Mandeville, Jamaica.
Wait, we have to construct an entire church building in two weeks with 20 college kids and an English professor?
As it turned out, we would only be joining an ongoing effort to finish construction of the building. Once completed, though, this church would likely rid all of Mandeville, Jamaica, of evil pot smokers, foul-mouthed reggae music, and heathen Rastafarians forever. So, as you can see, this job was still pretty god damn important.
The first morning, a Sunday, we put on our finest clothing: suits and ties, (long) dresses, and painful dress shoes. Then we walked a mile in 95 degree heat to the church service, which was held in the church that we weren’t yet done building. Three hours later, when the service ended, we went upstairs to see what we’d be working on over the next 11 days.
If OSHA covered Jamaica, and an OSHA guy would’ve shown up to the job site at this moment, his best move to preserve our safety would have been to assassinate our group leader so we’d be forced to fly home. Otherwise, there was a 73% chance of a an out-of-control wheelbarrow full of partially mixed concrete taking out an occupied ladder before plummeting off an open ledge and crushing three 10-year-old kids who were painting below.
Over the next ten days, God was certainly present. I know this because no one died or suffered severe injuries despite our astounding lack of knowledge and skill. However, I never convinced anyone to accept White Jesus as their personal lord and savior, so hopefully all of those people stayed alive until the next mission group arrived, so as to not burn forever in a lake of fire after they die.
On our last day at the job site, we put the finishing touches on the one window we had installed, said goodbye to our new Jamaican friends, then pleaded with them to never walk into the deathtrap of a building we had just been constructing.
Perhaps you can sense that I had a different takeaway from my short-term mission trip than what was intended. But I think it was the correct one. Like most white Americans, I grew up believing that my country and religion was superior to all others, and that people from other countries and religions always needed our help if they wanted to live the correct way and avoid hell. I came home knowing that we white Americans were really the ones who needed the most help.
That was 21 years ago, so one might hope that people came to their senses and ended this ridiculous practice, choosing instead to focus on how American Christians can work to change U.S. economic, foreign, and climate policy by electing officials who…okay, I’ll stop right there. We know that ain’t gonna happen.
Alas, as long as there are suburban American churches with some combination of the words “bridge”, “journey”, “life”, and “way” in their names, the short-term mission trip will live on. Here’s hoping those who go will be changed for the better, return with an improved perspective, and leave White Jesus behind at the airport baggage claim for good.
