Author: Nicholas D. Kristof
Publication: The New York Times
Date: September 27, 2003
[Note from Hindu Vivek Kendra:
First, the Americans keep the Africans poor through policies like subsidising
cotton growers in the USA. Then send the missionaries to help the
poor!]
Mention the words "evangelical missionary,"
and many Americans conjure up an image of redneck zealots' forcing starving
children to be baptized before they get a few crusts of bread.
In reality, the wave of activity
abroad by U.S. evangelicals is one of the most important - and welcome
- trends in our foreign relations. I disagree strongly with most evangelical
Christians, theologically and politically. But I tip my hat to them abroad.
In a house beside the filthy garbage
dump here in Mozambique's capital, a 17-year-old named Sonia Angeline was
giving birth in early June. She had no doctor and no midwife, and after
four days in labor, she was a hairsbreadth from becoming one more Mozambican
woman to die in childbirth.
"We didn't have money to pay for
a taxi to go to the hospital," Ms. Angeline recalled, noting that her family
savings at any moment are typically worth about 10 cents. Her mother, Isabel,
says that if the baby still hadn't come after another day, well, she would
have continued to wait.
Fortunately, at that moment Katrin
Blackert, a 23-year-old volunteer for Iris Ministries, an American mission,
dropped by as part of her regular visits to children living at the dump.
Miss Blackert rushed Ms. Angeline to the hospital, paid the bill for the
emergency Caesarean out of her own pocket (O.K., it was only $4), and saved
the life of both mother and baby.
The help was extended solely on
the basis of need, for Ms. Angeline doesn't attend church. Moreover, Ms.
Angeline is living in a new home built by Catholic missionaries to replace
her old thatch hut - not because she's a Catholic, but because she's needy.
Evangelical missionaries are controversial
because they're very aggressive about gaining converts, so they antagonize
long-established religions and create rifts in communities. Critics say
they're bribing the poor with food to persuade them to change their faith.
There is some of that. Iris Ministries
offers meals with its Sunday services, and that's one reason they're well
attended. When local people come to seek cash for medicine or food, they
usually get the handout - but only after they join in prayer.
But I'm convinced that we should
all celebrate the big evangelical push into Africa because the bottom line
is that it will mean more orphanages, more schools and, above all, more
clinics and hospitals. Particularly when AIDS is ravaging Africa, those
church hospitals are lifesavers.
"In most of Africa, these are the
cornerstone of the health system," said Helene Gayle, who directs AIDS
work for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. "In some countries, they
serve more people than the government health system."
The evangelicals abroad are mostly
pragmatists, not ideologues, so they should be a good influence on the
Christian Right. While fundamentalists in America blindly oppose condom
distribution, evangelicals in Africa see their friends dying of AIDS. They
thunder against sexual immorality - but often hand out condoms.
"We don't condone adultery, but
we're pragmatic enough to see the country we live in," said Steven Lazar,
who runs Iris Ministries' orphanage. He notes that in nearly all of the
Christian weddings he attends in Mozambique, the bride is pregnant.
One of the evangelicals' most important
influences is in combating the second-class status of women and girls by
evangelizing not only for God, but also for equality of the sexes.
Pentecostalists, who make up one
of the fastest-growing sects, preach faith healing and raising from the
dead, but they also give a substantial voice in church to ordinary village
women. And that in turn empowers women in the home and community.
"In our Mozambican culture, women
don't have an active voice in the family," explained Ana Zaida, who teaches
Bible school. "But in Christian life, we discover that not just the husband
but also the wife can have a role. . . . So the wives fight to transform
their husbands."
At the end of my interview, Mr.
Lazar prayed for me - and came pretty close to asking the Almighty to ensure
that I wrote a nice column. The episode underscored the difference between
my world and his.
Yet while it sounds strange to say
so, evangelicals may be Africa's most important feminist influence today.
And how can one not welcome their growing presence as Ms. Angeline tells
of her rescue and cradles a lovely baby girl - not surprisingly, named
Katrin.