Long shadows

As my students would tell you, words cast long shadows called connotations. Some words cast longer shadows than others.

That word. Missionary. It can be a dirty word. When Robert and I first went to Mexico as missionaries, we lived in an isolated Mixtec village. Coming into town for groceries one day, someone told us there were fellow Canadians in town, a rare thing in that part of the country, so we looked them up and invited them over for coffee. We knew they worked for MCC, a Christian organization promoting community development in the area, so we expected, as fellow travelers and workers among the indigenous of the area, a pleasant chat and a comparing of notes about home and work and what had brought us to this corner of Mexico.

Unfortunately, the conversation began something like this;

Us: “So what do you do here?”

Them: “We work in such and such villages as development workers helping people build clay stoves.  And what do you do?”

Us: “We work in such and such villages as missionaries helping people learn about God.”

At the word missionary, the room chilled, and the faces of our guests froze in shock. I watched as the woman tried to draw words into her mouth. I could see a muscle twitch in her temple as she clenched and unclenched her jaw. She finally spit the words at us as she got up to leave, “How dare you try to change their ancient spirituality.” (She never caught the irony that she was trying to change their ancient way of cooking.) To this couple our task was an abomination.

Or it can be an empty word. You’ve all heard the sermon, “We are all called to be missionaries right here at home. There is no need to get on a plane.” The people preaching these sermons don’t see how foreign missionaries effectively bring Christ to those who don’t know him. They expect the job to get done through more natural channels. A church I know went through a leadership change and preached an entire series on this topic, questioning the idea of any missionary calling at all beyond the call to reach your neighbor. They printed in their literature that missionaries who travel afar to plant churches in other cultures are expensive and  ineffective, and revoked their funding. Ouch.

Or it can be a treacherous word. When Robert and I first worked in a Mixtec village in Mexico, we were the first outsiders to live there. And still, a group of teachers stopped us on the path to challenge us. “We know who you are,” they said. ”We know why you are here. We know what you will do. You will come into our village bringing clothes and food. You will buy people with your money. Just like the politicians. And you will divide the village and undermine all our ways and customs. You should leave.”

We should know why we go to far off places and challenge people’s ancient spirituality. We should know how we’re called. Perhaps most importantly, we should know what we are meant to do when we get there—and what we are not. This has to be the hardest question to answer. How do we make that ambiguous word missionary an inspiration? How do we make one connotation stick when we all own the word together?