Stop Short Term Mission Trips for Youth Groups?

I remember taking my first short term mission trip with students nearly thirty years ago before they were a fixed annual project for most church youth groups.  I have many fond memories from leading several dozen of these "short term mission trips."  However, over the last seven or eight years I have engaged with many youth workers in a dialogue about the theological warrant for this concept. 

Christianity Today recently featured three views on this issue.  Brian Howell, believes that we should cease expensive "travel-intensive projects."  He states there are good reasons for Christians to travel but "projects" is not one of them.  I believe we should shift to an emphasis on missional activity in our local contexts.  The concept of pilgrimage also needs to be reconsidered as a valid faith-immersion formational activity in our churches and youth groups.

Here are a few thoughts from Brian M. Howell who is associate professor of anthropology at Wheaton College and author of Short-Term Mission: An Ethnography of Christian Travel Narrative and Experience (IVP Academic, forthcoming).

"Churches should not abandon travel, but we should abandon most travel-intensive 'projects.'

It is good for American Christians to visit Christians in other places to witness what God is doing around the world. It is good for American Christians to visit missionaries, learning firsthand about their work and how to pray for them. The opportunity to learn from all our brothers and sisters living and working around the world is a gift many of us have received due to our relative wealth, access to technology, and leisure time. We should accept this blessing gratefully.

When it comes to projects, however, the good we do is often outweighed by the warped impressions left on both sides. For example, sending high-school students to do construction in front of poor, underemployed adults furthers the humiliation of the poor as they see wealthy North Americans casually doing jobs they would happily accept, while it reinforces the views of many American Christians that poor people cannot help themselves.

Our projects further promote views of poor people as lacking personal agency, as short-term mission teams often spend most of their time interacting with children conducting Vacation Bible School or teaching games. Teams often leave with the impression that the whole country is childlike, vulnerable, and in need of our care. When short-termers do interact with adults, it is often in unequal relationships—cooks, drivers, and other employees of the American missionaries—where true fellowship is difficult. Those ministries run by nationals who host short-term teams frequently adapt their ministry to meet the needs of visiting foreigners first and local residents second. These hosts are reluctant to ask too much of powerful guests or to confront their visitors' views and risk losing material benefits.

Unequal social relationships and a skewed view of poor communities can affect service in the United States too. However, there is a reason why many churches have little problem getting 25 youths to sign up for a project in South Africa, while the trip to a nearby urban community goes unfilled. The dynamics of international travel make it easier to imagine that we in the West have no responsibility for the problems "over there" beyond our occasional charity. We can feel good about our service without being confronted by our responsibility for the injustices we witness. In nearby urban centers, or a local apartment complex, we are more likely to be confronted with the reality that our lives are bound up with theirs, and we cannot so easily turn away from what is going on in front of us when it gets difficult or inconvenient.

We should not abandon international travel, nor should we be less generous with our resources. But if we would spend less time building walls, painting houses, or digging ditches, we could spend our time learning how the problems there are part of the problems here. These trips should serve to teach us how we are bound up together, in our economics, in our politics, and, most importantly, in Christ."

The article continues with views from David Livermore and Robert Priest.  READ FULL ARTICLE HERE.

Comments

[Sam Werner]

I wouldn't stop short-term missions trips for youth groups. I'd just send them closer to home.

[archie honrado]

Short-term missions in the context of a liturgical calendar (year-round) spiritual formation, i agree is the emerging need today. We've been having conversation about pilgrimage with youth for years now, and again, in the context of a liturgical calendar it creates for a clearer journey into our interior life.

[Amanda Holmes]

the things I learned in Jamaica 93 and Hong Kong 94 were priceless I dont think I would be adopting 2 kids from Eastern Europe no wif I hadn't gone on those trips....just sayin'