Mission and Development

God's Work or Good Works?

Matthew Clarke

• Publisher: Continuum
• Year: 2012
• ISBN:
  9780826444943
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Religious Institutions & Organizations

This book considers the implications, consequences, opportunities and constraints faced when mission and development endeavours coincide. This is explored from various perspectives, including that of history, theology and those involved in mission work and missionary organizations. Despite eighty per cent of the world's population professing religious belief, religion has been largely excluded from consideration of those seeking to achieve development in poorer countries. Moreover, the work of missionaries has often involved the provision of basic welfare services that in many parts of the world predate the interventions undertaken by 'professional' secular aid workers. Are missionaries doing development work or is development a critical aspect of mission?

1

Introduction: Good and God—Development and Mission

Matthew Clarke

Introduction

Approximately one billion people live in extreme poverty, with another two billion people surviving on around US$2 per day. Life for those living in poverty is characterized by ill health, limited access to clean water and hygienic sanitation, poor quality housing, hunger, illiteracy and premature death. Such material deprivation in developing countries has been the impetus for international efforts to eradicate poverty throughout the second half of the last century. More recently, the global community has responded by committing to the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Emanating from a number of international conferences during the last decade of the last century, the MDGs are a set of eight internationally agreed goals to improve the well-being of the poor in developing countries. They are designed to address many of the multidimensional aspects of poverty and include: (1) eradicating extreme poverty and hunger; (2) achieving universal primary education; (3) promoting gender equality; (4) reducing child mortality; (5) improving maternal health; (6) combating HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases; (7) ensuring environmental sustainability; and (8) developing a global partnership for development. Both developing and developed nations pledged to meet these goals by 2015.

However, improving the lives of the poor is a complex undertaking with often little agreement as to how can this be best achieved.¹ The intrinsic goal of development is to advance human dignity, freedom, social equity and self-determination. Good development outcomes are best achieved when communities have the ownership of the goals and processes of development and where there areparticipatory representation, transparency and accountability mechanisms. Good development outcomes must also explicitly consider gender and diversity. Development involves processes that require an appreciation of existing endogenous strengths and (often) exogenous interventions. Successful development requires critical analysis, mutual learning and acceptance of its paradoxes and dilemmas. Those working to improve the material lives of the poor (including the poor themselves as well as those external to the community) rightly view the interventions implemented as good works.

This book considers how the good work (or development) described above intersects with God’s work undertaken by religious organizations, specifically missionary organizations. In this sense, mission—as understood in mainstream Christian teaching²—is a continuation of Jesus’ mission of service rooted in ‘love’, which itself was entrusted to his disciples whom He had sent out to share His Good News. While the root desire of mission therefore dates back to Jesus sending out his disciples, the practice of mission has differed sharply since then with the focus ranging from religious conversion to Christian belief through preaching to serving the poor and the marginalized without being vocal in faith (Nemer, 2001). It is not the purpose of this book to seek a consensus on the appropriate approach to mission; rather, it is to consider how mission activity intersects with development interventions as currently being implemented.

Therefore, the mission approach that emphasizes action over words is most similar to modern development practice. Moreover, this history of active engagement with material well-being, long pre-dates secular interests in improving the lives of the poor. For example, the fourth-century missionaries encouraged literacy through the development of alphabets in Europe, the twelfth-century missionaries enhanced agricultural production techniques in Europe, the seventeenth-century missionaries in the New World promoted the legal rights of local indigenous people, while the nineteenth-century missionaries supported gender equity through creation of educational facilities for girls in Asia and provided medical care in Asia and Africa (Pierson, 2007). These endeavours—education, food security, human rights, gender and health care—dating back several centuries are all fundamental to current development initiatives and are central to the achievement of the MDGs.

Development Best Practice and Religion

President Truman’s 1949 inauguration speech is often cited as the beginning of the international community’s recognition of the need to improve the lives of the poor in developing countries. While development occurs at all levels of society, non-government organizations (NGOs) have been the primary agents of secular developmental activities at the local community level over the past six decades. Promoters of NGOs suggest that they are cost-effective in service delivery, have an ability to target the poor and vulnerable sections of the population, are able to develop community-based institutions and are able to promote community participation to ensure the likelihood of sustained impact. In addition, NGOs are considered to have intrinsic characteristics ‘such as strong grassroots links; field based development expertise; the ability to innovate and adapt; [a] process oriented approach to development; participatory methodologies and tools; long term commitment and emphasis on sustainability; [and] cost-effectiveness’ (World Bank, 1995, p. 15).

NGOs can be effective across a range of development issues. NGO activities may include both service provision and advocacy. Work with communities, or grassroots programmes, account for a significant proportion of NGO activities. This includes activities such as the provision of education services, care and support for those with HIV or malaria, feeding programmes to improve child nutrition, agricultural extension programmes or microfinance schemes. Depending on the nature of the activity, NGOs include men and women, local leaders, youth representatives, religious leaders and local government officials in decision-making.

The importance of NGOs in improving the lives of the poor is evidenced by the increasing resources provided to them from official development assistance budgets. Funds flowing to and through these organizations have grown rapidly in recent years. NGOs also receive funding directly from private donations, with this support for NGOs also increasing in recent years (Agg, 2006). Indeed, the public does respond very generously to appeals launched by NGOs for humanitarian emergencies (Feeny and Clarke, 2007) and those events, such as the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami, generate significant financial resources for NGOs (Clarke, 2008).

Success in improving the lives of the poor by NGOs has improved in recent years as these agencies have better understood community dynamics and the importance of supporting community empowerment (Ife, 1995). The structure of power and domination is overturned when community activities are strengthened and people themselves are allowed to run and take control of these development interventions. Their sense of self-worth is restored when they are able to sustain these interventions through their own efforts (Kirk, 2000). They are more encouraged as they see themselves partaking and contributing as members owning their projects. However, empowering communities do not happen immediately and it takes a great deal of struggle, time and effort among people who are committed to genuine community development. Further, cooperation in the community, as well as participation, inclusiveness and consensus, are among the different facets of community development that also need to be taken into consideration.

Without active (as compared to passive acceptance) involvement in all stages of community development, including needs analysis, project identification and design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation, it is unlikely that any impact of the particular intervention will be sustained (Uphoff et al., 1998; Dale, 2004). Sustaining the impact of a community development intervention is therefore more likely to be achieved if the beneficiaries, local community and other key stakeholders have actively participated in and ‘own’ the intervention. There are a number of reasons for this. First, inclusion of those directly affected group in the planning stages will more likely ensure that the rights development needs and their causes are identified. Secondly, the responses planned will take into account local resources and strengths of the local communities in a better manner, which will ensure that there is less reliance on external inputs. Finally, community participation will also aid in the ongoing management of the project as the decision-making processes would have been developed in the initial stages to include the relevant local beneficiaries and key stakeholders, which will continue once the external funding has ceased.

In recent years, international financial institutions, multilateral agencies, national governments and NGOs have, by and large, incorporated the term ‘empowerment’ into their development jargon (see Stiglitz, 1999; Craig and Porter, 1997; Sihlongonyane, 2003). If the rhetoric is transformed into practice, this means that community members are actively encouraged to identify their own needs, design the response, implement the project activities and also monitor it and evaluate its progress. Community empowerment requires participation from all sectors of the community—not just entrenched community leaders or those with interests to protect and enhance. Community participation requires the voices of women, the young, old, landless, disabled and other marginalized groups, just as it requires from traditional leaders, religious leaders and landowners. Community empowerment within development interventions has now become widely accepted as the minimum requirement for successful and sustained development outcomes (see Chambers, 2005). At this point, it is clear that religious organizations, including missionary organizations, can play a very important role in achieving effective and sustained community development outcomes.

As discussed above, a concern with the material deprivation of the poor has been felt and acted upon for many hundreds of years by religious organizations undertaking successful ‘development’ interventions within their missionary work (Luzbetak, 1988). Organized religions have long played an important role in enhancing the welfare of the local communities. While religious teaching is primarily concerned with providing spiritual leadership, an interest in the physical welfare of their communities has also been a core aspect of their existence. This concern with physical welfare is often expressed and delivered through affiliated faith-based organizations, such as missionary organizations, which operationalize this outreach. Yet, religion and religious organizations have long been invisible in the discussions of development (Marshall and Van Saanen, 2007). This apparent invisibility though should not be mistaken as non-existence. More correctly, their invisibility reflects a blindness of the development sector itself in failing to recognize the importance of religion within the development sector. This may be partly explained by religious organizations—including missionary organizations—being embedded within communities and being less external agents and more ‘organic’ to the community. It can also be explained by organized religions choosing to position themselves outside the development sector when working to improve the material lives of their congregation (Clarke, 2008).

The invisibility of religion and religious organizations in development work, however, has recently begun to diminish. There has been recognition both within the development sector and by religious organizations themselves, that there is importance and synergy to be gained by being aware of one another and incorporating an understanding of religion more purposely into the development domain (Harb, 2008). As participatory community-focused models of development have become increasingly dominant in recent years, religious organizations have become increasingly ‘attractive’ as agents or key stakeholders in the development process due to their strong links to local communities. Moreover, religious bodies themselves have also begun to initiate contact with aid donors to seek increased involvement (and funding) in community development interventions (Clarke and Jennings, 2008). Over the past decade, a number of international forums have been developed, which have brought together religious leaders and large international donors to explore how to leverage the experience and expertise that both groups can bring to improving the lives of the poor (see reports emanating from these events, such as Marshall and Keogh, 2004).

Religious and missionary organizations are uniquely placed within communities to operate outside the mainstream local, the national and the international structures that constrain activities and networking of other civil society groups. Unlike secular non-government organizations, they have a natural constituency at the local level but also have organizational networks both nationally and internationally. Utilizing the networks that exist at these different levels supports their ability to undertake effective community development. Feeny and Clarke (2009) describe the different roles that non-government organizations can play at the micro, messo, macro and supra-macro levels in both advocacy and programming. Religious and missionary organizations are also able to operate in these levels by piggybacking on the pre-existing structures their associated religious organizations have in place. This therefore aids their efficiency and provides advantages over secular aid agencies.

Contents of This Book

This book considers the implications, consequences, opportunities and constraints faced when mission and development endeavours coincide. This is explored from various perspectives, including that of history, theology and professional practice of those involved in mission work and missionary organizations. This book is broken into three parts. Part I introduces the concept of Christian mission and how it relates to the secular notion of development. Part II considers three historical case studies of mission and development interconnecting, before Part III delivers a number of case studies on a number contemporary faith-based organizations grappling with the mission/development nexus. In this sense, Part I lays the groundwork for the analysis that follows—both historical and contemporary.

As Ryan points out in Chapter 2, the concept of mission differs widely within Christianity. Ryan argues that various biblical stories are used to provide authority for a range of engagement approaches. Mission though should, according to Ryan, set itself apart from simply focusing on imparting God’s word, but consider the full purpose of God’s plan for human life. In this sense, mission closely mirrors that of development objectives in terms of seeking a flourishing of human well-being. Ryan distinguishes the secular development practitioner from missionary though by pointing to the biblical concept of servanthood—specifically, servanthood modelled by Jesus when he washed the feet of his Disciples during the Last Supper. This model inverts traditional concepts of power and redefines the relationship between those who are often the ‘object’ of development. This great challenge of mission, therefore, sets a paradigm in which partnerships and mutuality are preferred over authority and expertise. As Ryan finally notes though, such a view of mission is a challenge that is compounded when mission and development objectives conflated.

Kavunkal’s Chapter 3 examines the biblical basis of human development as well as the Catholic teaching on it in the context of the church’s missionary service. Kavunkal argues that at the heart of the whole theology of involvement in development is the Christian faith in the truth that humans are created in the image of God. Analysing the Exodus event and the Jubilee Institution, this chapter sets out to show how Jesus’ own ministry was a proclamation of the Jubilee as good news to the poor and its spin off for the church’s mission in today’s context of dehumanization and exclusion. Finally, Kavunkal argues how mission today has to be a manifestation of the human person, all women and men enjoying the rights befitting human dignity, for humans fully alive is Divine glory.

In the first of the three chapters considering the historical role of missionaries in Part II of this book, Close examines the rhetoric and action of Methodist missionaries in Fiji in the lead up to the church’s independence. Focusing on the 1930s, Close looks at important junctures that affected the Fijian, Indian and European branches of the mission and how these periods affected schools and hospitals established by Methodist missionaries. The missionaries aimed to produce ‘productive citizens’ through religious education, teaching literacy and numeracy, and encouraging agricultural enterprise. In fact, being a successful farmer was considered by some missionaries as equivalent to being a successful citizen. From its establishment in Fiji in 1835, the Mission began constructing schools, hospitals and orphanages throughout the islands. Close’s Chapter 4 builds on histories written by Harold Wood and John Garrett, focusing more on the services the Mission delivered to the community rather than personalities within the Mission. The Mission emerged from the 1920s from a heavy argument over the degree to which the colonial administration would interfere with their schools. The 1930s was heralded by the financial strain of the Great Depression, which compelled the Mission Board to decide which projects were the most valuable and most productive. Missionaries in the field as well as at the Davuilevu base and the Mission Board of Australasia in Sydney all weighed in on these deliberations. Though their attitudes varied, all those involved agreed on the importance of the Mission’s delivery of both education and health care to the community. Another important juncture was the 1935 centenary of the Mission’s establishment in Fiji. The way in which achievements in education and health care were celebrated was equally telling. This chapter thus highlights the goals of the Methodist Mission in Fiji, which were so heavily focused on the creation of useful citizens and the entrenchment of modernity through infrastructure. It will also incorporate the concept of the industrial mission and examine the development of this philosophy in the community.

In Chapter 5, Clarke looks at the role of the churches in Melanesia’s Independence. Following decolonization in the 1970s, it was clear that welding multiple languages and diverse cultures into unified nations would be difficult within Melanesia. Indeed, nation-building still remains a key challenge across Melanesian societies, including Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea (PNG), Vanuatu and the more recently independent state of Timor-Leste. Yet, despite these challenges, some success has been achieved, much of it as the result of the role that the Church plays in these countries. The role of the various Christian churches has been pivotal in the development and sustenance of the Pacific nations prior to and since...

Table of contents

• Cover-Page
• Half-Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Notes on Contributors
• 1   Introduction: Good and God—Development and Mission
• Part One: History and Setting
• Part Two: Theology of Mission and Development
• Part Three: Case Studies: Mission Organizations and Development
• Index