MWR : Change for better

Last updated May 03.

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Oct. 12, 2009 issue

Change for better

By Marlin Jeschke Goshen, Ind.

As Janet Plenert says in “Ashamed, But Hopeful in Christ,” there are more than enough shameful things missions to indigenous peoples have done in the past — and may be doing still today — that need to be repented of. But my reading and observation indicate that what the Mennonites of the Paraguayan Chaco have done is commendable. They are permitting the indigenous peoples to acculturate at their own speed, offering help as it is wanted or needed.

Cultural change has been around as long as human history, and it has been wanted as often as it has been resisted. There is a romantic National Geographic mentality in some quarters that would like to keep “primitive” cultures unchanged so that they can be studied by anthropologists or observed by tourists. But to deny such cultural groups the changes offered by medical science or literacy when they want it is also shameful, even though those two things in themselves bring cultural turbulence. Mennonite immigrants to Canada and the United States will remember the difficulties of the cultural challenges even that migration entailed.

It can be ironic to lament changes in other people’s culture when we actually want cultural changes ourselves. Christianity seeks cultural change, not only to do away with infanticide and headhunting in so-called primitive cultures but in U.S culture as well, where headhunting (Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida leaders) and infanticide (abortion) is still alive and strong. The Christian message considers such cultural change a bringer of joy and peace.

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