It’s now officially hip to love Africa. Over the past several years, Christians have heard the rallying cry about rampant poverty in Africa and have responded in remarkable ways. Churches are talking about AIDS, hunger, education, and micro-enterprise. Thousands of American Christians travel to Africa each year to love and serve people who have been forgotten and marginalized for decades.
And I think it’s great. I believe that the church has stepped up and recognized that caring for the poor and oppressed is core to our calling as followers of Jesus. I applaud the church for hearing the call and responding.
My first trip to Africa was in February 2006. I visited a town called Goma on the eastern edge of Congo. This trip changed everything for me. I describe it as the most difficult place I have ever experienced, and yet one of the most beautiful and hopeful places I have ever been.
On returning home, I decided that I needed to educate myself about issues of poverty and development. I started an MBA program oriented around international development. I read everything I could get my hands on – Jeffrey Sachs, William Easterly, Jean Vanier, Paulo Freire, Ron Sider, Paul Polak. I talked to everyone that could give me insights about development and Africa.
I started thinking through and developing programs that would connect our church community (the Upper Room) to the people of Eastern Congo. We built homes for women who had no homes. We began a sponsorship program for 65 children. We provided bed nets to 500 children, and food to children who suffer with HIV/AIDS. We made lots of mistakes, but also were able to do some really good things.
Over the last 2 years, I have learned many lessons. One lesson in particular has been the most challenging for me…
I have come to realize that many of the things that we do to help ‘the poor’ may actually do more harm than good. In our efforts to love and serve people, it is easy to create unhealthy dependency, and even to hinder people’s ability to work and provide for themselves.
I am learning that there is a place for mercy – giving help to people for immediate needs. But mercy is not enough. We must also seek after justice – to help create systems and structures that allow people to live with dignity and provide for themselves.
Let me share a story that may help illustrate. The first time I visited Africa, I was amazed that just about every man that we passed on the street was wearing an American t-shirt. I saw football jerseys, t-shirts from golf benefits, college t-shirts, and countless other shirts that had been made in the US, worn a couple of times, and then donated to charity.
My first thought was that this was a great and simple way for Westerners to provide help and support for folks in Africa. We didn’t need the shirts, and apparently people here did. Then I had a conversation with a friend who had lived in sub-Saharan Africa for many years. He told me that the endless donations of shirts had actually severely damaged the textile industry in Africa. Business can’t compete with free shirts. So, an industry which could employ thousands of people in this part of the world simply doesn’t exist.
Mercy says that we should give clothes to someone who needs them. But justice says that we must not take jobs away from people who would make clothes. Justice says that we should invest in textile businesses that would employ people and provide clothes at a reasonable price.
Justice looks at systems that cause oppression and poverty, and tries to develop long-term solutions. Justice is not just concerned with meeting immediate needs, but with creating dignity. Justice says that ‘helping’ people sometimes causes more harm than good.
At the risk of damping the enthusiasm that has begun to develop, I would suggest that the way Christians in which engage with issues of poverty must mature and change. While affirming the desire to reach out and help people, I propose that there is a next step to be taken.
What is the next step? It is a movement from addressing immediate needs toward addressing systems and structures that cause poverty. It is a movement from doing things ourselves to equipping people to live. It is a movement from mercy to justice.
Over the past several years, I have worked with a variety of different development organizations and church communities and have seen examples of aid and development that have truly transformed the lives of individuals, families, and communities. But I have also seen countless examples of Westerners coming to Africa with ideas that foster dependency, create tension and jealousy, and provide little lasting benefit. In some cases, our attempts to help can actually keep communities from developing and prospering.
The reality is that it is much easier to address immediate needs than systemic issues. It’s much more gratifying to point to a specific problem – a lack of water and food, or needs for an immunization or a malaria bed net. We can then respond and feel good that we have ‘solved a problem.’ Churches and development organizations have gotten really good at packaging videos and marketing stories move us to respond to these immediate needs.
Yes, these are good things. I don’t want to demean these types of investments. I am so thankful that the church is building wells, packaging food to ship to famine zones, and buying bed nets. But I believe that this is a starting point, not a finish line. I love the first steps that the American church has taken, but we cannot stop at the first step. As communities of Jesus followers, what we ultimately need is not quick fixes, but long-term investment that empowers people.
The reality is that some of the next steps are much less fun – they don’t give us the same sense of accomplishment. And, to be completely honest, these next steps don’t feed our egos in the same way. We feel good when we package meals and ship them to a poor community. It’s much more ambiguous to invest money in an agricultural co-op in an African village that provides seeds and drip irrigation technology to farmers that enable them to grow new types of crops.
And yet, these complicated and slow investments are what will ultimately transform communities.
So, where might we begin? What does justice look like for churches and Christians who want to help? Let me suggest 2 practical starting points for movements of justice.
First, we can begin to invest in administration, staffing, and infrastructure for locally run development organizations. Virtually every development organization that I have spoken with says that it is much easier to get program money than money for staff and infrastructure. We love the idea of ‘saving a child’, but ultimately we may do even more by helping to pay the salary of a talented individual who works for the development organization. These people often know what is best to help lift a community out of poverty. They are able to provide programs and resources that will help people build their lives.
Second, we can seek to invest in programs that promote long-term community development. Education, new industries, and micro-enterprise are all great ways to empower individuals to build their lives. There are lots of organizations who do these types of activities. You can jump online with an organization like Opportunity International or Kiva and help support an entrepreneur in a developing country to build a small business. Just a couple of hundred dollars can transform a family.
It’s my hope and prayer that the church will continue to invest in caring for those who live on the margins. I want us to continue to provide for the very real immediate needs that millions of people have. But I also hope that we look to be agents of justice, helping to provide opportunities to empower people to live with dignity. For those who have little or no opportunity, these movements of justice have the potential to build lives in ways that movements of mercy never can.
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This post was written by admin on September 16, 2008
Over the past year, I have been working on a new venture called Forgotten Shirts. Forgotten sells t-shirts that are made in Uganda (from 100% organic Ugandan cotton) and are printed by at-risk teens here in Minneapolis. I love the idea that by purchasing a shirt, we can create opportunities and dignified employment for people who have been marginalized and Forgotten. And, at the same time, it helps us here in the United States to think about what we are buying, how our purchases impact others, and how we can say no to the messages of consumer culture that tell us that buying more and more for less and less is the secret to happiness./arthemia/scripts/timthumb.php?src=/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/Everyday-Justice-3628.jpg&w=200&h=250&zc=1&q=100 "Everyday Justice")
I just finished reading a new book by Julie Clawson, called 
I had the privilege of contributing to a new Bible that is being released this week. It’s called ‘Holy Bible: Mosaic’. What makes this Bible unique is that it contains incredible artwork from the 3rd to 21st centuries from every continent across the globe and has thought-provoking writings from the 1st to 21st centuries from every continent and branch of the Church around the world. The artwork and writings follow the Church calendar throughout the year starting with Advent.