Part 14B – Leaving Behind The Cookie Cutter Missionary

The list of opinions that I hid from other New Tribers grew substantially when I went to the New Tribes Missionary Training Center (MTC). I learned not to talk about women in leadership, how I choose to parent, the hurt I received at the hand of a staff member at MTC, and my changing outlook about New Tribes in general.

For example, in our course syllabus for our parenting class, we were informed that the

One of our required reads at the NTM MTC

reason for the class was that there was a lot of conflict on the field surrounding parenting; missionaries can’t get along with their co-workers who discipline differently than they do. Instead of teaching a class on giving others the freedom to parent differently than oneself, they lumped everyone together—singles without children and married couples with or without children—to teach us all the “right” way to parent children.  Sitting in class, I heard day in and day out about the importance of spanking my daughter. If you’ve read my older blog posts, you’ll know that I was abused through spanking. I personally can’t use this discipline method because of my past. Timeouts were criticized in our homework assignment one day, and I marveled at the idea of the organization dictating my life down to this minute detail of how I could and couldn’t discipline my child.

Sadly, if I did get the courage to speak up about any of my problems, I was met with one of three answers.

1.    “A ship takes a long time to turn around.” This analogy was often used to excuse inaction. When I or my classmates brought an issue to staff, this was the typical response. I witnessed and experienced it many times. Sure, it takes a while to turn an organization around, but they will never get there if they simply quip this line at people who want to be the voice of change.
2.  “If you think this is bad, consider it as preparation for the field. You’ll have conflicts much worse overseas and you need to learn to submit here and now.” This answer, given by both students and staff, usually meant ducking your head and ignoring problems as well. The correct response to conflict seemed to be to have a “godly attitude” which meant to suffer in silence and be unrealistically positive. I should have seen that conflicts that were much worse on the field meant that I didn’t want to be part of this organization. Sure, there’s no perfect organization, but there are organizations with leadership structures that don’t invite abusers in and protect them, then expect a “godly” response of submission and positivity from their workers.
3.  “If you think this is bad, you should have seen MTC 20 years ago.” I think it’s great that MTC has improved, but again, this is not a reason to stop improving and silence those who want to see more improvements.

Unfortunately for New Tribes, I discovered the Fanda Eagles forums and became irreversibly informed about how patterns like these played out on the mission field. I’ve written before about a report that was released when I first arrived at MTC. When the GRACE report (If you follow that link, please understand that it is full of accounts of graphic child abuse. This is your trigger warning!) was released, I believed NTM leadership really had the desire to come alongside the MKs their organization had physically, sexually, emotionally, and spiritually abused. I braced for change and expected everyone to care long enough to change NTM from the inside out. The devastation for the MKs seemed to die down, though without sufficient action. Someone even said to me, “How sad that this report might bring down our organization,” without any mention of how sad it would have been for a missionary’s child to be molested night after night at boarding school. It broke my heart.

One of the main contributing factors to the callousness was that NTM’s work was seen as vital. New Tribers believe that all people who never hear about Jesus will burn forever in Hell after they die because they didn’t get a chance to believe in him. They believe their organization is especially critical because they insist on teaching chronologically through the Old Testament, while other groups typically start in the Gospels. In that system, some people (not all!) seem to subconsciously land at the conclusion that the abuse of MKs ends up being the lesser of two evils, because NTMers are being specially used by God to rescue lost people from eternal fire. I no longer believe that people who don’t hear about Jesus have no choice but hell, but some who do believe that operate in a way that values both MKs and minority people groups at the same time. I believed NTM would make it right and work to discourage the remaining callousness.  As the school year progressed, less students and staff members at MTC were discussing the Fanda survivors (excepting Andy Kline and the fabulous Child Protection department—which has since been totally relocated and restaffed with new people), and it seemed assumed by the general student body that NTM was on the right path. I continued to follow up and found the opposite. New Tribes did not follow all the recommendations from GRACE. They even kept a statutory rapist on staff.

New Tribers and the churches that support NTM, if you’re reading this, what have you done recently to hold NTM accountable? Do you feel helpless? Is your leadership set up in a way that any abuser in your organization, from anywhere in the world, would be fired for their actions? These are the types of questions you need to be asking. The reputation of your organization is not your primary concern. Do the right thing, continue to push back on this, and your reputation will take care of itself anyway. And in the end, you may even refuse to line yourselves up with an organization that does not prioritize protecting their own children. Wage war on this or your inaction will cause further devastation.

Dale and I at a Soulation retreat

By the time graduation came, it was clear that my husband and I needed to take a break and think things through. The more I lived a normal life (outside of the missionary community for the first time since early childhood), the more I realized I couldn’t go back. At first, it was scary to think what people would say about us and to completely start over with our lives, but the thought of continuing on under an abusive system was far scarier. Then, it was a sweet relief to know that I didn’t have to dedicate my life to a work that I simply wasn’t gifted for. I relished getting out of a community where scoffing at my beliefs was acceptable and started to taste healthy relationships where I was offered the dignity and love of being different from my new friends. One such friendship was with Dale, who eased the pain of leaving fundamentalism with great skill, because he once navigated those waters and lived and healed to tell his tale. Last summer in the Rocky Mountains, Dale brought together a group of us who had all been spiritually abused and named us “glass warriors." Dale told us “If we do not think we are loved, we cannot be open to the truth. We cannot trust. That is why mistrust reigns in abusive communities.” 

Love is why I can share who I am now. 

Our Colorado Soulation Gathering

Part 14A – Training To Be a Cookie Cutter Missionary

Free and full of life, one year after
saying goodbye to my parents. This
was taken in the Rockies, at a
Soulation retreat for survivors
of spiritual abuse.

I’m struck, as I write about yet another institution, how many abusive environments I’ve been in. People who are abused go back to abuse. It’s been shown over and over. Each institution I’ve joined since I’ve left my parents’ home has been gradually less and less abusive as I’ve tasted and loved freedom in increasing amounts. I just turned 24, and I’m happy to say that I just finished my first full calendar year with no abusive treatment from my parents. Cutting contact continues to be a beautiful thing that I treasure and celebrate. I’m hoping 2014 will bring my first full calendar year without allowing abuse from anyone. It’s been hard, painful work to cut toxic people, institutions, and communities out of my personal life. It’s even been lonely here and there, but I’m slowly building my life around people who love health. May New Tribes be the last installment of my long list of abusive institutions to process and write about. I’ve found a church, and I think my eye will be on the door for a long time, keeping in mind that no one can trap me in there. I might have too strong an instinct to bolt, but my short time there has taught me much about health, about God, about healing, and forgiveness. 

Now, on to NTM.

I chose New Tribes Bible School (NTBI) because my high school education was so sloppy that I was afraid of going to a regular college and Moody Bible Institute didn’t accept me. It was affordable, which was another big perk. I didn’t know ahead of time that they didn’t accept loans, and they blatantly stated (more than once!) that finances indicated who was supposed to be there and who wasn’t. If God provided, that meant the poor kids got to stay. If not, then it wasn’t meant to be. The rules were easy for me to navigate. They were a breath of fresh air, actually, after my upbringing. I had choices! I could go out when I wanted. I could study whenever I wanted. I could sleep in on Saturdays without being called lazy. Heck, my roommates were doing all the same things, and I quickly felt a deep sense of belonging. I didn’t understand the select few who left (or got kicked out) because they stumbled over rules because, to me, the world had opened up in a way I had never experienced. Of course, now I wonder why college students were given a curfew, not allowed to dance publicly or drink alcohol unless they were married (Yes, single people were really the only ones who couldn’t have it!), and forbidden from physical contact beyond holding hands with the opposite sex!

It wasn’t long before I knew that I was going to be a “tribal” missionary, because New Tribes teaches their students that it’s not an individual calling—it’s a commission. I was already strongly leaning towards this work already, thanks to my church in South Africa and uncountable hours spent listening to John Piper. I learned shortly after getting to school that they weren’t Calvinist. I didn’t exactly hide it at first, but by my second semester I was doing damage control since I’d told a few people about my beliefs. I tend to be bent toward the unfortunate belief that, if people could only understand me, they would be ok with me, so I tried to explain myself one too many times and started getting burned by people’s reactions.

One teacher in particular, Dave, taught classes intended to cover God’s sovereignty. I felt like he severely misrepresented Calvinist beliefs, and he seemed to have a particularly good radar for picking out and picking on Calvinist students in the class. He made my sophomore semester rough, and I was trying too hard to be submissive and avoid “gossip” to get help. I wore a t-shirt about God’s sovereignty one day, only to have its slogan ripped apart in class the next day as I worried about my classmates noticing that it was my shirt he was shouting about to the point that he was red in the face. I never even directly challenged him, and it crushed me one day when I raised my hand to ask a question, but was told to put my hand down. He humiliated me by taking a question from another student moments later. Immediately after class, he approached my table and told me in front of the surrounding classmates that “now was the right time” to ask my question. He even told our class once that we weren’t allowed to discuss a concept about Jesus outside of class, because he was so afraid of the students disagreeing. I did secretly go against that rule. Gladly. And angrily. That was a matter of conscience, too, and I valued my conscience over being penalized further. The day that he wounded me most, he wrote in reply to my honest test answer, “Does [your boyfriend] know?” as his only reply to my beliefs, as if no one could want me in their life unless I held Dave’s beliefs.

That teacher combined with the stigmas around Calvinism were the first things at NTBI that made me feel unacceptable and only conditionally loved, but for so long they were the only things! Remember, I was coming from an atmosphere where the list of things that made me feel unlovable was long and I was more allowed to be myself than ever at school.

To be continued…

Part 13 - Birds of a Feather

My father and I in Cape Town

When I first started writing this blog, I thought it would be great to have my story all in one place. I could just send the link if I needed someone to know about this part of me and I could remember the order of certain events years down the road. I didn’t think I would need to keep adding to my story of abuse after writing the installments 1-10, but the more I unravel and dig through my history, the more I see abusive organizations and individuals that I need to process. I wrote about my parents first because their abuse affected me more than any other abuse, but along the way, I unknowingly suffered from constant institutional abuse. Any abusive institutions my parents chose for our family were chosen because they reflected our family. We were not drawn in and changed as gradual brainwashing occurred. Instead, we very easily jumped into the deep end and my father would always quickly gain access to leadership wherever we went because he chose places that were exactly like him. Even where minor (very, very minor) theological differences were present, the spiritual competitions and lack of boundaries made us all feel right at home. This was very true of our church in South Africa.

Healthy churches exist everywhere. It’s something I’ve been astonished to learn as an adult, actually! I always saw the other churches in the States as less-than because I was trained to think that way, but when we arrived in South Africa, my parents’ church selection confused even me! It felt odd, but I chalked all the uncomfortable moments up to cultural differences. I could see that other churches in town seemed more vibrant, though, and a visit to another youth group had me longing for that type of community.

To this day, I have no clue how my parents found this church. It’s tiny and meets in a garage. There’s no sign out front and no church website. My introduction to the church was a Girl’s Retreat in the gorgeous green mountains, within two weeks of arriving in the country. I noticed right away that the pastor’s wife would get within inches of my face as she spoke to me, hugging me in a very matronly way, and I felt like she would be hurt if I told her to respect my space. I could see that she treated everybody this way and it was a new culture so I went along with it. Multiple times, she forced me and my sister to sing for everyone. By forced, I mean insisting over and over until I gave in. She had huge problems when people said no to her, asking until it became clear that it was a demand—all done with a smile. Sometimes during the retreat, the pastor’s wife discovered that me, my sister, and one other girl on the retreat had no problems with contemporary Christian music, so she concluded the retreat by having us all watch a ridiculous and inaccurate movie called, “What’s Wrong With Christian Rock?” I had no idea it was such a big deal to her before then, because the very songs we were singing in our songbooks were contemporary Christian music. We only lacked the instruments. From that point on, I began to hide myself and my opinions out of fear of being called out.

By the time I came home from the retreat, my parents were set on their decision to stick around, and within a month, my dad was preaching on Sundays. They loved him. I consider this a great example of how, in the fundamentalist mindset, it barely matters what you believe—it matters how you believe it. The pastor’s wife once told me, “There are no gray areas,” and I think my dad would agree. He at least behaves like he does. Unlike the rest of the church, my dad was secretly a staunch Calvinist who loved Christian rock and smoked an occasional cigar. It makes sense as I think about their similarities. The church leadership and my dad were both appalled that people would sin differently than they did. They both shamed people who disagreed. They were both male worshippers. They both made me feel like I couldn’t be me and had to be them. I could go on, but you see my point. They got along fantastically, since my dad wasn’t necessarily open about his true beliefs or behavior.

The pastor at this church obsessed over two things—“dying to self” (a phrase that he used so frequently and in a way that eventually made me feel like I wasn’t a person anymore) and tobacco. I remember him sharing from the pulpit on a regular basis about a new convert’s battle with giving up cigarettes, asking us all to pray as he shared specific weekly instances about the man’s failures. Once, during a sermon, he turned to me and asked, “Savannah, is it ok for a Christian to work for a tobacco company?” I’d been doing quite well at flying under their radar, but I felt flustered as I chose between honesty and feeling safe. I care as much about smoking as I do about fast food—both are terrible for you. Where are all the sermons railing against the evils of McDonald’s?  I don’t get angry at the McDonald’s employee working for minimum wage. With ALL those thoughts running through my head, I didn’t answer fast enough. Shocked, the pastor turned to my father and exclaimed, “Allen? Is it ok for a Christian to work for a tobacco company?” My dad paused long enough to take a deep breath, pursed his lips, and answered,

“It would be hard.”

“Absolutely not! Absolutely not!” the pastor indignantly cried, launching into a rant that I barely remember as my mind worked through what had just happened.

In Tugela Ferry

As I reflect back on my years in South Africa, this is the time that I feel like I became a robot that cried a lot.  My parents had just made the biggest move of our family’s life, one that was obviously not in my best interest, and justified it by saying that God wanted them to treat me that way for the sake of the greater good. I was very lonely for months, I couldn’t be myself in church, and I lost myself in John Piper sermons about giving up what you want now so that you could get rewards in Heaven. Really. I was listening to John Piper on an almost daily basis and I kept thinking that if I could just get through this life making every sacrifice I could possibly make and bending myself into submission, I would eventually find sweet, sweet relief when I died. I don’t know that person anymore. She finally had her behavior, if not her will, totally in obedience to the idea of being a missionary for the rest of her life in a remote location, not because it was her gifting to be away from modern conveniences, but because she thought that sacrificing her desires meant God would be pleased.

It was through this church that I first heard of New Tribes Mission, an organization that deserves its very own blog post! When I was barely 18, I packed up and left my parent’s home in South Africa to attend New Tribes Bible Institute in Waukesha, Wisconsin.

With the exception of a few friendships, I wasn’t very sad to leave the atmosphere of “my” South African church behind.