missionary ban

Aboriginal elders want to ban missionaries (Christian missionaries) arriving in a community and trying to convert the locals. What an excellent idea.

If a missionary wants to help, that's great. If they want to convert, that's bad.

Mind you, "help" is not always good. A few years back a group of do-gooders taught New Guinea tribespeople to bake good European-style food. Soon enough the locals were dependent on imported floor and sugar, overweight, suffering tooth decay.

I support people's right to practice their own religion -- within the laws of whatever country they are in. But keep it to yourself. Religion is a belief not a truth. You may believe that your religion will help you in an afterlife, the central tenet is normally, What can it do for *me*? Other people must be free to select their own beliefs.

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My sister is a member of a strange religion. Not Christian, as far as I understand it. They go into a community to convert "by example". By being there... just in case the locals ever want to speak about religion. So I have been told.

I also read a paper by one of that religion's "experts". He relied entirely on one book written by another "expert" in the religion. It was worse than embarrassing -- it was frightening.

The paper said that missionaries should go to poorer communities. To those suffering misery and oppression. Why? Because people in those communities will clutch at any straw. They will try anything -- even a weird religion -- in the hope that it will be better than their current misery.

These missionaries don't care about the "benefits" of their religion. All they want -- in the words of the "expert" -- is the numbers. The growing numbers of converted and brainwashed followers.

Missionaries often do great work. They just need to remember that their beliefs are not a universal truth. If the aim is to change the local belief system -- go away.

Nick Lethbridge  /  consulting dexitroboper
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