Paternalistic – Me?

by Tom Hanks

Paternalism was the last thing in the world I expected to find myself guilty of when assigned to university work. Perhaps your experience— and disillusionment with yourself — has been similar.

Paternalism was the last thing in the world I expected to find myself guilty of when assigned to university work. Perhaps your experience— and disillusionment with yourself — has been similar.

After all, had I not read all the right books stressing the importance of "indigenous principles," received most of my Christian nurture in a university fellowship that depends upon "student initiative"— and weren’t Latin American university students about the last group in the world who would ever meekly buckle under the dictates of a "gringo" missionary? They’d set off a bomb under our house— or at least write signs all over the walls saying, "Yankee Go Home"— if I ever inclined toward paternalism, I was confident.

Now, I must admit, I seriously misread the picture. And I gather that I am not alone in my struggles with the problem. At a recent meeting another North American— more sensitive on the issue and with far more experience in encouraging student initiative than I expressed his frustration. He’d spent his first year afraid to do much of anything for fear of undercutting student initiative and his second year struggling with the problem of how to act vigorously without becoming paternalistic.

What had I failed to take into account? I had thought of paternalism as a deadly thing which I must be very careful not to create in my relations with students, instead of recognizing that often it is the dominant, strangling pattern of relationship that exists in the church in Latin America. It is not that the student worker must be wise enough not to create such a monster. Rather he must be courageous enough to destroy the monster that now exists.

Evangelical students do not always come to the university bursting with faith, zeal and initiative in the things of God. They come from a culture that – perhaps more than any other— has sinned against Christ’s command in Matthew 23:9, "Call no man your father on earth, for you have one Father, who is in heaven." Religion in this culture for centuries has meant going to the "padre" to confess your sins, find out what God’s will is, and have a mass said for your beloved dead in purgatory. Is it any wonder that in regard to the things of God, many students feel "unworthy" to attempt leadership and tend to wait for "the professionals" to do it?

Of course, the arrival of independent missionaries from the fundamentalist wing of the North American church changed the pattern somewhat. But cultural patterns deepened through centuries are not changed in a few years. Nor have the evangelical churches planted in Latin America always been pure ideals of "indigenous principles." Evangelicals have discovered the privilege of personal prayer and Bible reading. But in terms of strategic initiative in evangelism the "pastor" has often simply replaced the "padre."

In San Jose, for instance, members of churches often stop coming if the pastor does not come to visit after their first absence from church. Visitation, instead of a corporate responsibility of the entire church, is a professional function that the pastor is expected to fulfill, contrary to James 5:14, Matthew 5:31-46, etc..

Paternalism is thus a general church problem, and not just a missionary-national problem. But undoubtedly the problem is compounded when we add the missionary element. If there are elements even in secular society which tend to look at the dollar as the cause and possible cure of any problem, we should not be surprised that evangelical students look northward for something like "evangelical marines" who might stage a parachute invasion of the university for them.

Analyzing the problem, however, does not help us with the agonizing question about missionary participation in university work. He finds himself in a culture that lie little understands, where the cultural expectation in terms of initiative and leadership in any area is typified by the political "caudillo." If university-led political revolutions are produced by student "caudillos," can we expect to produce an evangelical counterpart by adhering to democratic principles of corporate responsibility and avoiding dominant, aggressive leadership patterns?

If instant organizational success be our goal, probably the principle of corporate student group responsibility should be shelved. However, our Lord’s example in the Temptation suggests that there are things more important than instant success. As men of the 20th century we easily confuse the voice of our public relations instinct with the voice of conscience!

What, then, in practical terms, can the missionary do to help student witness and slay the dragon of paternalism?

1. If university work is a major aspect of his assignment, it is urgent that he enroll in the university. Anyone who ties it knows that this involves a bit of red tape, precious time "wasted," etc. But so does physical birth and growing up— the method our Lord chose to identify himself with us, in preference to "parachuting in." Nothing is likely to convince an evangelical student more quickly that "more missionaries" are not the ultimate solution to university evangelism than observing a few of us in our bumbling efforts to make friends, slaughtering the Spanish subjunctive to "give our testimony," etc. If our secular and linguistic training is sufficient to enable us to teach in the university, that of course opens up many other possibilities and a new set of problems. But generally, enrolling in the university will prove basic to all other effective action.

2. Encourage prayer at the university. My wife and I were still in language school when (with understandable haste to do something) we began a prayer luncheon for students in our home. It seemed the only thing to do. Had not the students unanimously assured us that religious meetings were not permitted at the university? Then, several months later I happened to be at the university during the lunch period (none of our student acquaintances had ever stayed around, I gather). To my amazement there was a delicious lunch economically served and empty classrooms all around!

So now we’re watching anxiously to see if a student prayer meeting can survive a transplant from a missionary home to campus. Some, it seems, miss the quieter, more secure, chapel-like atmosphere of the home. No danger in a missionary home, you see, of some rude classmate popping his head in the door and asking, "What in the world are you doing?" Likewise little danger of one staying to find out and getting converted.

Anyone who has read or seen the film of Elsa, the lion who was "Born Free," knows it is infinitely easier to leave an animal free than it is to domesticate it and then try to teach it to be "indigenous." At this stage, I’d sooner try to pray with a student staring down my nose at a Coke bottle with my eyes open than resort to the missionary home as the meeting place. There may be a few universities in Latin America where even grace before coffee in the student center is punished by execution at dawn, but I suspect by far the major problem is not the ferocity of the university administration, but the timidity of the evangelical students. After all, they are a religious minority, but what they need to be is encouraged, not domesticated!

3. Encourage Bible study at the university. Again, you may be assured, as we were, that Bible study at the university would not be permitted. However, one of the graduate students secured permission to have Bible study in the university. My wife and I practically shouted our hallelujahs. One student vocalized his disappointment: "A room at the university will be a cold atmosphere we need a home to meet in!" a sentiment obviously not shared by his Roman Catholic classmates who sit in the classrooms by the droves, but who can rarely be coaxed to make a fleeting visit under cover of night to the meeting in the missionary home! So again we face the question: can a domesticated Bible study survive the transplant to the university? Or will the work have to be begun again with a new generation of students who have not been submitted to domestication in a missionary home?

This is not to deny that the missionary home can have a use in university work. The atmosphere of a home can give students an ideal for their own life. And we have seen some lovely Christian marriages of students now in the professions result from students who have met in our home. But lovely Christian marriages are not to be identified with an indigenous work in the university. Perhaps the home may effectively serve as an occasional auxiliary meeting place. But start there, and you may have to explode the bomb to get the students out, to the detriment of your personal relations with the students.

4. In Bible study and leadership training emphasize biographical study (especially from the Bible, but historical biography can help too). In accounts of leadership exercised by men of God (Abraham, Moses, Joshua, David, Nehemiah, Paul, Luther, Wesley, etc.), we have a basic point of contact with students from a culture that stresses the personal, the individual, and the caudillo-type leader. As the student begins to understand God’s purpose for the man of God, he can move on to comprehend the more difficult lessons (in Latin culture) of regarding God’s purpose for the people of God (student group, local church,etc.). Thus we must move from the purely and simply "indigenous" (the caudillo is completely "indigenous" to Latin American culture) to the biblically indigenous (the servant who suffers for and with the people of God).

5. Encourage pastors in their ministry to students. If you are a missionary with pastoral experience, you may be able to identify with pastors perhaps even better than you can with students. If you can help and encourage pastors to develop a ministry of biblical expository preaching, of sympathetic prayer for their "rebel students" in the university, you may accomplish more than by your direct ministry on campus. And if you can strengthen the local church in its ministry to high school students, you may multiply the effective witness in the university for future student generations.

6. Stay away from planning meetings. If you’re concerned about the university witness, undoubtedly you will be invited, even pressured to attend. And if you don’t think too much about it (as I didn’t), you may even convince yourself that you have an indigenous student work – with students dashing all over putting your ideas into action. Then dawns the day when you ask yourself, "But when was the last time they came up with a good original idea and carried it out?" and you realize it’s not that they can’t, it’s that I’m dominating. As long as I’m sitting around in planning meetings, chock full of all the latest things I’ve read about how they’re doing things in the USA, why should anyone bother to ask the more difficult questions and do the really creative work of developing a program that reflects the peculiar genius of the national culture?

This is a danger of traveling staff as well as resident missionaries. I’ve seen students take a year’s program ready-made from visiting Latin staff, and then find that Peruvian or Argentinian or Mexican imports don’t necessarily thrive any better in Costa Rica than my all-too-familiar "made in USA" brand.

Paternalism in ideas is perhaps the subtlest and most difficult type of deal with. Obviously we can’t (it’s not the scriptural ideal and it’s impossible besides) quarantine students from all contact with foreign ideas. It has been pointed out that the most indigenous church in history (Ethiopian) has also been one of the most sterile in part due to its isolation from the give and take with the whole body of Christ. But if we stay away from planning meetings we may at least avoid "over-selling" an idea. A discussion on "how to get ideas" might help more than our perennial, faithful attendance at executive meetings. A few well-planned questions before the executive meeting may prove more fruitful than the year’s program handed out on a silver platter, however well garnished the platter with good intentions and exhortations to "be indigenous."

7. Teach students by example to praise and appreciate creativity. Not just in prayer meetings, though this is basic. I find it almost impossible to spend 15-20 minutes in a prayer meeting praising God, and then turn around and criticize my brother. But sometimes we missionaries act like a pretty critical, dour lot. Perhaps it’s part of our tradition of "missionary piety." The "natives" don’t do things the way we do back home, and we assume that that means they’re doing things wrong, and we criticize, and our national brethren get the idea that a negative critical spirit is an essential part of "true spirituality."

I’ve seen several instances in a few years in San Jose of outstanding examples of creative initiative buried under a mountain of critical stones from church members. And often the missionaries were in the forefront of those casing the first stones. One radio program that dared to utilize contemporary music to attract young people was roundly condemned, despite many outstanding positive features. And a new publication that sought to speak prophetically to the church almost suffered a prophet’s martyrdom with the first issue. One leading evangelical even threatened a lawsuit against the publication!

As a result of this critical spirit the hallmark of piety in our churches becomes dead conformity in all areas. Members would rather be fed to the lions than suggest a really new (or even old, but forgotten since the time of the Apostle Paul) approach to the work of the church. It would appear that we have entirely forgotten that our God is the Creator God, who made us in his image (with an instinct for creativity). The tragic result in Latin America, where stunning artistic creativity predates the arrival of Columbus, is an evangelical church that in many places can only sing hymns translated from Fanny Crosby, preach that the sum total of what God requires of man in ethical conduct is to be found in certain negative fundamentalist taboos, and pass out tracts translated from Billy Graham. Is it any wonder that creative ethical solutions for Latin American social and economic problems rarely have been forthcoming from evangelicals and so far, the advent of foreign university work ideals has not changed the picture much?

Any new effort or idea is likely to be less than flawless. And there will always be an abundance of critics in the churches who can point out the flaws – and see nothing else. The missionary who involves himself with university students needs to be especially sensitive to whatever is "worthy of praise" (Phil. 4:8), encouraging them to trust God for the great things he can do through students.

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