Click here to go to the Home Page
Click to send us your comments and suggestions.
Click to learn about the publishers of BlackCommentator.com and our mission.
Click to search for any word or phrase on our Website.
Click to sign up for an e-Mail notification only whenever we publish something new.
Click to remove your e-Mail address from our list immediately and permanently.
Click to read our pledge to never give or sell your e-Mail address to anyone.
Click to read our policy on re-prints and permissions.
Click for the demographics of the BlackCommentator.com audience and our rates.
Click to view the patrons list and learn now to become a patron and support BlackCommentator.com.
Click to see job postings or post a job.
Click for links to Websites we recommend.
Click to see every cartoon we have published.
Click to read any past issue.
Click to read any think piece we have published.
Click to read any guest commentary we have published.
Click to view any of the art forms we have published.
Comment and read the comments of others at Readers' Corner
Road Scholar - the world leader in educational travel for adults. Top ten travel destinations for African-Americans. Fascinating history, welcoming locals, astounding sights, hidden gems, mouth-watering food or all of the above - our list of the world’s top ten "must-see" learning destinations for African-Americans has a little something for everyone.

Missionaries Doing What Missionaries Always Did - The Color of Law - By David A. Love, JD - BlackCommentator.com Editorial Board

 
 

When I heard that ten American missionaries are on trial for kidnapping 33 Haitian children and attempting to take them to an orphanage in the Dominican Republic, I, like most other people, was outraged. But I can�t say I was surprised.

To be sure, the thought that some people, whether missionaries or traffickers, would take advantage of an earthquake to steal children and place them in orphanages - or the sex trade, or the slave trade, or whatever - stirs the conscience. The Baptist missionaries, mostly from Idaho, would have us believe that they were trying to do some good, except that a number of the �orphans� had living parents. And so they were trying to do good deeds, as many of the other missionaries before them. We�ve been down this road before.

This would not be the first time that missionaries kidnapped Third World children in the name of God. A look back into history reveals the troubling role of religion and its practitioners in the colonization of black and brown countries. Now, I am not condemning those dedicated and committed people of faith who are helping poor communities throughout the world and saving lives. I am sure they are making a difference. But we would be deluding ourselves if we denied the sordid history of missionaries.

After all, missionaries served an important role in the conquest and taught them they were heathens and evil sinners who were bound for Hell. They convinced the so-called natives that their culture and customs were filthy and backward, and told them to abandon their ancestors and belief systems. The missionaries separated the conquered from their sense of self, a psychic conquest if you will, and replaced the old gods with a god who, not surprisingly, looked just like the conquerors. Now softened up, the natives were susceptible to alcohol abuse and other distractions, and ripe for physical conquest in the form of subjugation, enslavement, forced labor, genocide and the like.

Part of the cultural genocide was committed by white Christian missionaries in the name of Jesus Christ. Missionaries worked with the Australian government to rip thousands of half-Abroriginal children from their families and place them in government orphanages, where they were abused. The plan was to �breed� the Aborigine out of them and force them to conform to Western ways. The plight of these stolen children was dramatized in the film Rabbit-Proof Fence, in which three kidnapped Aboriginal girls who were to be trained as servants escaped from their captors, and roamed through the outback alone.

And as for the Native Americans, European missionaries tried to convert and �civilize� the so-called heathens from the first point of contact. When the U.S. divided the Native peoples� lands into reservations, they assigned the reservations to Christian missionaries. Reservation schools, both boarding and day schools, served the goals of Manifest Destiny by �killing the Indian� in order to �save the man�. Subjected to a regime of forced assimilation, Native students were prohibited from speaking any language other than English. And they were kept from practicing their traditional spiritual beliefs, and were indoctrinated with Christian teachings. Separated from their language and their culture, sometimes they were separated from their families by hundreds of miles. Supposedly, it was for their own good.

So, the kidnapping, exploitation and abuse of darker children by missionaries are nothing new. Haitian children, victims of a devastating earthquake, are also victims of an ancient game that is as old as colonization itself. It is a cold-blooded crime, but for hundreds of years the criminals were immune from prosecution and never saw the inside of a courtroom.

BlackCommentator.com Editorial Board member, David A. Love, JD is a journalist and human rights advocate based in Philadelphia, and a contributor to The Huffington Post, theGrio, The Progressive Media Project, McClatchy-Tribune News Service, In These Times and Philadelphia Independent Media Center. He also blogs at davidalove.com, NewsOne, Daily Kos, and Open Salon. Click here to contact Mr. Love.

 
 

If you would like to comment on this article, please do so below. There is a 400 character limit. You do not need a FaceBook account. Your comment will be posted here on BC instantly. Thanks.

Entering your email address is not mandatory. You may also choose to enter only your first name and your location.

 

e-Mail re-print notice
If you send us an e-Mail message we may publish all or part of it, unless you tell us it is not for publication. You may also request that we withhold your name.

Thank you very much for your readership.

Any BlackCommentator.com article may be re-printed so long as it is re-printed in its entirety and full credit given to the author and www.BlackCommentator.com. If the re-print is on the Internet we additionally request a link back to the original piece on our Website.

 

Issue 362
February 11, 2010

is published every Thursday
Executive Editor:
Bill Fletcher, Jr.
Managing Editor:
Nancy Littlefield
Publisher:
Peter Gamble
Est. April 5, 2002
Printer Friendly Version in resizeable plain text format
Comment and read the comments of others at Readers' Corner
click here to buy & benefit BC