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| Book cover for "When Helping Hurts", 2014 edition. (This is not the one I have- the one I have is the 2012 edition.) |
So I started reading the book When Helping Hurts: How to Alleviate Poverty Without Hurting the Poor . . . and Yourself [affiliate link], by Steve Corbett and Brian Fikkert. (I have the 2012 edition.) And... I read about one third of it, and decided I'm going to stop there. And I want to just blog about my reaction to this book real quick.
What I was expecting
So, I first heard about this book back when I was in college- and I was very evangelical. I knew this was an evangelical book.
Since the title is "When Helping Hurts" and it's about charity, I assumed it would be anecdotes about how rich Americans sent a bunch of stuff to some overseas tsunami victims, and it was stuff the recipients didn't need, so it was all a waste and the recipients had to deal with the problem of how to dispose of it. Or about how rich Americans make genuine sacrifices to do these things, and therefore there's an emotional component to it, which makes us unwilling to objectively evaluate if the results were actually beneficial or not. Things like that.
I feel like... I don't really have a good perspective on what my approach should be for giving to charity- from an ethical standpoint, and as a Christian. I mean, John the Baptist said that anyone who has 2 coats should give 1 away. Does anybody do that? Can anybody do that? I really want to have a better framework for thinking about this- but also, maybe that's just impossible because no matter what I do (even moving to China), I'm complicit in the massive economic inequality in this world. But anyway, I shouldn't just be paralyzed by lack of certainty and do nothing- and so, a few years ago I picked some charities and set up automatic monthly donations to them. That's my current approach, and that's what I recommend to people who have a high enough income that they have a responsibility to give some of it away.
Anyway, yeah I knew this book is coming from an evangelical perspective, so there would be parts I wouldn't agree with, but I thought it would be good to see what it has to say. Especially since it's a book I had heard mentioned many times in evangelical spaces.
Okay let's get into what the book says, and my reactions to it.
The preface
The preface of the book is good. Basically it says this book is about how to help without hurting. ie, it's not just "here's all the ways that charity can go wrong" but it's about how to actually do it right. Great! The authors recommend that churches use this book for small group discussions, and every chapter has discussion questions.
In the preface, there are discussion questions about how your church would go about planning a trip to Indonesia to help tsunami victims. You can discuss it in groups and write down your plans, and in a later chapter you'll revisit the plans. I mean, personally, my take on this is, maybe don't plan a trip to Indonesia? Probably not worth it to spend so much money on plane tickets to get your untrained volunteers to go there and, uh, do what exactly? Before you make any plans, you should talk to people who are actually there about what they actually need and what would actually be helpful.
I'm guessing that's the direction the book's going to go with it. But I gave up on this book 1/3 of the way through, so I guess I'll never know. But anyway, I felt like the book was off to a good start here.
The introduction- a story about a "witch doctor"
In the "Introduction" section of the book, there's a story from one of the authors, about when he was in Uganda teaching classes for refugees about small businesses, at a church. The curriculum he used was "biblically based," ie, I guess this is about telling people they have to be Christians, and also giving them training about running a small business.
One person in the class, Grace, says that she is a witch doctor, but she decided to quit that and follow Jesus instead. The local church leader, Elizabeth, tells Grace to bring all her witch-doctoring herbs and burn them right there in the church, and Grace does this. Later, as Grace continues attending the classes, she seems to have changed for the better since becoming a Christian (and this is a big sacrifice for her, because she was making a lot of money as a witch doctor selling questionable products to women to get their husbands to not cheat on them). But then Grace gets sick- and the author of the book talks about how he went to her home to find her, and the appalling conditions she lived in- and he saved her life by buying her penicillin. So, overall it felt like a happy ending, but later the author had some feelings about whether he had actually done more harm than good toward the refugees he was teaching in that class.
As I was reading this, I had 2 main thoughts:
- Is "witch doctor" the right term here? I'm thinking it's probably not. "Witch doctor" sounds like the kind of incredibly skewed and biased term that an evangelical would use, to make this sound very negative and bad. Perhaps there's a whole religious system, with meaningful culture around it, and perhaps it serves some beneficial function in their society. I personally don't know, but using the term "witch doctor" just reduces it to a one-dimensional "this is obviously bad" sort of thing.
- This story assumes that it's self-evidently a good thing that Grace decides to not be a "witch doctor" anymore and be a Christian instead. (Also, very manipulative of Elizabeth to tell Grace to burn up all her herbs immediately. Not cool!) Okay, well, I understand this book is coming from an evangelical perspective, I understand that evangelicals think everyone should convert to Christianity, I understand that evangelicals see that as so self-evidently true that they wouldn't even think to question it. So I'm reading this, and thinking, "well, maybe the authors just never even thought about how they have this unquestioned assumption that everyone should convert to Christianity. But as long as that's not something the book focuses on and consciously tries to argue for, I'll let it slide."
(Unfortunately, later the book focused on and argued for that...)
Chapter 1 has some very good things to say about Jesus (but also some red flags)
Chapter 1 starts out with these discussion questions:
- Why did Jesus come to earth?
- For what specific sin(s) was Old Testament Israel sent into captivity? Do not just say "disobedience." Be specific. For example: "The Israelites were constantly robbing banks."
- What is the primary task of the church?
Yes! Love this! These are questions that ABSOLUTELY need to be addressed when trying to talk to evangelicals about poverty. I'm really happy with how the book handles this section.
See, evangelicals would answer the question "Why did Jesus come to earth?" with something like "to die for our sins so we can go to heaven." Like all the things Jesus did during his life don't matter, it's all about the crucifixion. (Also, in this ideology, the Resurrection may or may not matter- which is BONKERS.)
This is a big deal to me, because my answer to these questions has changed SO MUCH, now that I'm not evangelical. I now believe Jesus came to bring the kingdom of heaven to earth- and that means we need to work on bringing the kingdom of heaven to earth. We need to fight for justice, for equality, for a world where everyone is able to live a flourishing life, each as a unique and amazing person created in the image of God.
And yes, the book agrees with me on that. It cites chapter and verse, about how Jesus came to "preach good news to the poor" and "proclaim freedom for the prisoners", and how "in him all things hold together." It's not about the abstract far-away idea of going to heaven when you die; it's about renewing this world we live in right now.
Love that!
And yeah, I know a lot of evangelicals would be very resistant to this idea, because it sounds like "watering down the gospel" or it sounds "liberal" or it sounds like "putting too much emphasis on social justice instead of the gospel." That's why it's SO IMPORTANT that the book makes a case for this, right here in chapter 1. This part is very well done. It's absolutely necessary to challenge this evangelical idea, that all that matters is getting people into heaven. This is definitely a very major obstacle in getting evangelicals to care about people in poverty.
Next, there's an anecdote about a pastor named Reverend Marsh, who lived in the South during the Civil Rights Movement. He believed the KKK was bad, and racism was bad, but he never talked about it in his sermons. (I conclude that he must be white...) Those were political questions, and he thought the church should only preach on the personal, spiritual aspects of people's lives. (The book portrays this as being very wrong.)
Instead of speaking out against actual lynchings that were happening, Reverend Marsh preached a sermon called "The Sorrow of Selma," which was about "the lack of personal piety and unbelief of some of the civil rights workers."
The book says this:
In one sense, Reverend Marsh was right. Many of the civil rights protestors longed for the peace, justice, and righteousness of the kingdom, but they did not want to bend the knee to the King Himself, which is a prerequisite for enjoying the full benefits of the kingdom. In contrast, Reverend Marsh embraced King Jesus, but he did not understand the fullness of Christ's kingdom and its implications for the injustices in his community. Both Reverend Marsh and the civil rights workers were wrong, but in different ways. Reverend Marsh sought the King without the kingdom. The civil rights workers sought the kingdom without the King. The church needs a Christ-centered, fully orbed, kingdom perspective to correctly answer the question, "What would Jesus do?"
Umm.
Uh.
Umm.
Really not comfortable with how this is framing it like both Reverend Marsh and the civil rights workers were equally wrong. See, Reverend Marsh had the correct religious beliefs, but he didn't actually do anything about racism, and the civil rights protestors didn't have the correct religious beliefs, but they fought for justice, so, see, both had it partly right and partly wrong. Uh. Umm. (Just gonna drop the parable of the sheep and the goats here- Jesus pretty clearly takes a side on the question of whether it's more important to have the correct religious beliefs or to do actual things that help people, and it's NOT the side that "When Helping Hurts" takes!)
But, as I was reading this, I thought, I'll give them the benefit of the doubt... maybe they didn't really mean both of these things were equally bad. Maybe they meant like... like if someone has different religious beliefs than I do, then of course I am of the opinion that they are wrong about those religious beliefs. It's just objectively true that I disagree with them. Maybe the authors just meant that they disagree with people who have different religious beliefs than they do, but they weren't necessarily saying those differences in religious beliefs are important.
(But, unfortunately, later the book makes it clear that those religious beliefs are dealbreakers...)
The next weird bit is when the book is talking about how the early church cared for the poor. This is in contrast with the pagan culture of the Roman Empire:
[Sociologist Rodney] Stark explains that the Christian concept of self-sacrificial love of others, emanating from God's love for them, was a revolutionary concept to the pagan mind, which viewed the extension of mercy as an emotional act to be avoided by rational people. Hence, paganism provided no ethical foundation to justify caring for the sick and destitute who were being trampled by the teeming urban masses.
WHAT.
What. What the what.
Christians were the first ones to come up with the idea of helping poor people? Really? They expect their readers to buy that? "Paganism" just couldn't comprehend the idea of caring about poor people?
Seriously?
This is a very one-dimensional, oversimplified view of the pagan worldview in the Roman Empire. (Like, I don't even know anything about paganism in the Roman Empire, but I know it must be more nuanced than that.) Really these authors should stop trying to make statements about other religions- they're just embarrassing themselves.
(Unfortunately, they did *not* stop making statements about other religions...)
Continuing on. This chapter has a lot of really good stuff to say about how evangelicals wrongly believe they don't have a responsibility to care about the world. Yes, lots of very good stuff, which evangelicals really need to hear. Makes me want to say "I definitely recommend this book to evangelicals" but ... well... the Christian-supremacist stuff gets so much worse, so, I don't.
Chapter 2 is about what poverty really is
I like how chapter 2 starts. The discussion question is "What is poverty? Make a list of words that come to your mind when you think of poverty." Next, it has some quotes from "Voices of the Poor," a project in the 1990s where actual poor people around the world were asked for their views on what poverty is. A lot of these quotes are about feeling helpless, feeling shame, feeling inferior, being dependent on other people. It's not just about not having material things; it's about being trapped in a situation where you can't control your own life, you can't make your own choices, you can't live the life you want to live.
I think this is an important exercise- contrasting the reality of poverty with what well-off Americans *think* poverty is.
The book says that, when you want to help poor people, it's very important that you understand what their real needs are, rather than acting on what you *think* their needs are. Otherwise, the "help" you give them won't help. Yes! Very much agree with this.
But I don't feel good about this example:
Similarly, consider the familiar case of the person who comes to your church asking for help with paying an electric bill. On the surface, it appears that this person's problem is the last row of table 2.1, a lack of material resources, and many churches respond by giving this person enough money to pay the electric bill. But what if this person's fundamental problem is not having the self-discipline to keep a stable job? Simply giving this person money is treating the symptoms rather than the underlying disease and will enable him to continue with his lack of self-discipline. In this case, the gift of money does more harm than good, and it would be better not to do anything at all than to give this handout. Really! Instead, a better-- and far more costly-- solution would be for your church to develop a relationship with this person, a relationship that says, "We are here to walk with you and to help you use your gifts and abilities to avoid being in this situation in the future. Let us into your life and let us work with you to determine the reason you are in this predicament."
I'm reading this, feeling really uneasy about how it veers extremely close to conservative Republican talking points about how those lazy people need to just take responsibility and get a job, and therefore we shouldn't do anything to help them.
But, I thought, maybe the authors don't realize that it's going to read that way to their Republican readers. Just taking this section at face value, it may indeed be true that there are some situations where a person is capable of getting a job, but they don't want to, and they need a little push to get them to actually do it. (Republican folklore says that's the situation for *most* people on welfare, and that's just NOT true- but okay, maybe it is true occasionally, so, okay, this example from the book isn't necessarily bad...)
I'm just... really really suspicious of people (evangelicals, Republicans, etc) saying "oh these people are asking for money, but actually that's not the right way to help them, the right way to help them is [some other thing that we're also not going to lift a finger to do]." It's just a way to sit around feeling superior for having the "correct" opinion about what poor people really need, without doing anything that actually helps.
But I thought, maybe the authors don't realize this is coming across that way. I'll just let it slide.
Then the authors lay out their "biblical framework" of what poverty is. They say that when God created the world, humans were made to have good relationships in the following 4 areas:
- Relationship with God
- Relationship with self
- Relationship with others
- Relationship with the rest of creation
But, because of the Fall (Adam and Eve's sin), all 4 of these relationships are broken. All of us have "poverty" in these 4 areas of life. (For example, "poverty" in one's relationship with God would be something like, not believing God exists. "Poverty" in the area of relationship with self would be low self-esteem, or, alternatively, having a God-complex and feeling like you're superior to the poor people you're trying to help. And so on.)
The authors use the word "poverty" here, to describe the situation that all people are in- but they also say that material poverty is a whole different thing. Like, we all experience "poverty", so you shouldn't act like you're better than anyone else- but also, if you haven't experienced material poverty, then you don't know what it's like, it's so much worse.
I don't really think it's useful to define "poverty" in this way. It muddies up the definition. But okay, whatever, let's keep reading.
Then there's this equation:
And also a few anecdotes to show how "poverty" in the 4 different relationship types can all come together to make it more difficult for the "materially poor" to improve their lives.
Yeah, this "equation" makes sense, and I think it's useful that the book presents it like this. If rich people think the problem is simply "they don't have [thing], so let's give them [thing]" then it's quite possible that the rich people don't realize how they're coming across (ie, treating poor people like they don't know anything, can't do anything for themselves, etc)- and this can do more harm than good.
Chapter 3 is where I noped out of this book
Chapter 3 starts out with this anecdote:
During the 1990s, Alisa Collins and her children lived in one of America's most dangerous public housing projects in inner-city Chicago. Alisa had become pregnant at the age of sixteen, had dropped out of high school, and had started collecting welfare checks. She had five children from three different fathers, none of whom helped with child rearing. With few skills, no husband, and limited social networks, Alisa struggled to raise her family in an environment characterized by widespread substance abuse, failing schools, high rates of unemployment, rampant violence, teenage pregnancy, and an absence of role models.
From time to time, Alisa tried to get a job, but a number of obstacles prevented her from finding and keeping regular work. First, there were simply not a lot of decent-paying jobs for high school dropouts living in ghettos. Second, the welfare system penalized Alisa for earning money, taking away benefits for every dollar she earned and for every asset she acquired. Third, Alisa found government vocational training and jobs assistance programs to be confusing and staffed by condescending bureaucrats. Fourth, Alisa had child-care issues that made it difficult to keep a job. Finally, Alisa felt inferior and inadequate. When she tried to get vocational training or a job and faced some obstacle, she quickly lost confidence and rapidly retreated into her comfort zone of public housing and welfare checks. Alisa felt trapped, and she and her family often talked about how they couldn't "get out" of the ghetto.
So, in the first paragraph, the "started collecting welfare checks" was a bit suspect to me because, again, it veers uncomfortably close to Republican mythology about how "those lazy inner-city [black] people are freeloaders living easy lives on welfare." I quoted two whole paragraphs here to show you that overall, this anecdote is not like that- I think the second paragraph is very fair, showing that getting out of poverty is much more difficult than the simplistic Republican mythology of "they need to just get a job." The authors clearly show that there are a LOT of factors trapping Alisa in a system of poverty, and that churches have a responsibility to help people like her.
This chapter of the book also makes it clear that poverty is partly about individual choices, and partly about systems that are stacked against people. It's very good that the book is talking about this! Evangelicals are likely to buy into the idea that if people just worked harder and stopped being lazy, they could pull themselves up by their bootstraps, etc. Evangelicals are likely to not believe in any kind of systemic injustice, taking away people's opportunities and setting them up to fail. It's very good that the book is explicitly pointing out the ways that systems trap people in poverty.
Then the authors start talking again about healing the 4 key relationships, and how, to put it bluntly, you have to be a Christian or else it doesn't work:
Ultimately, the profound reconciliation of the key relationships that comprise poverty alleviation cannot be done without people accepting Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. Yes, people can experience some degree of healing in their relationships without becoming Christians. For example, although it is typically more difficult, unbelievers can often stop drinking, become more loving spouses, and improve as employees without becoming Christians. And as these things happen for unbelievers, they are more likely to earn sufficient material things. However, none of the foundational relationships can experience fundamental and lasting change without a person becoming a new creature in Christ Jesus. Furthermore, simply having sufficient material things is not the same as "poverty alleviation" as we defined it above. We want people to fulfill their calling "to glorify God and enjoy Him forever" in their work and in all that they do. Again, this requires that people accept and experience Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.
What the actual ****.
"although it is typically more difficult"- what on earth?
And then saying that if people improve their lives so they are no longer poor, but they don't become Christians, it doesn't really count as "poverty alleviation"- WHAT?
This right here, this is called Christian supremacy. The idea that only Christians can live life the correct way, and everyone else is automatically living inferior lives because they don't know Jesus or whatever. This idea is EVERYWHERE in evangelicalism- you can't have a good marriage if it's not centered on Jesus, you can't live a meaningful life without Jesus, everyone has a God-shaped hole in their heart, etc. (And full disclosure, I definitely believed it when I was evangelical. I had no idea how offensive it was, because evangelicals view it as a completely normal thing to believe.) This idea is EVERYWHERE, and it's WRONG. It's WRONG. I want to be very clear here, this is WRONG.
Let me be very clear about what I believe: I am a Christian. I believe that all people are made in the image of God- our creativity, ambition, compassion, conscience, all of that comes from God. And God made this world- all of the potential this world has for good things, for growth, for enjoying your life, for finding meaning and joy, all of that is from God. All of it is from God, and is accessible to people regardless of whether they agree with me about it being from God. Regardless of their religious beliefs (or lack thereof).
I believe those things are from God, but if other people don't believe that, I won't argue with them about it. It's fine if people don't believe the same religious things as I do. Whatever. Okay, so we disagree about it, but so what? What actually matters is how you live, how you treat other people.
(And also, my husband is not a Christian, so this is personal. When Christians say non-Christians just can't be as good as Christians- this is personal to me.)
Okay... so... moving along with the book. Basically, I want to share 3 anecdotes from chapter 3 which show how incredibly Christian-supremacist this book is, and made me decide to just quit reading it. Each of these anecdotes is about how, when you help poor people, if you're not also getting them to convert to Christianity, you're "hurting" rather than helping.
Anecdote 1: Pachamama and the llama fetuses
A Christian relief and development agency attempted to improve crop yields for poor farmers in Bolivia's Alto Plano. Although successful in increasing output, the impact on the farmers' incomes was far less than hoped because of the farmers' deep reverence for Pachamama, the mother earth goddess who presides over planting and harvesting. Seeking Pachamama's favor, farmers purchased llama fetuses, a symbol of life and abundance, to bury in their fields before planting. At the time of the harvest, the farmers held a festival to thank Pachamama. The larger the harvest, the larger the celebration was. In fact, a large percentage of the farmers' income was being spent on the fetuses and on the harvest festival, thereby contributing to the farmers' material poverty. Furthermore, by increasing agricultural output without worldview transformation, the development agency realized it was actually adding to these farmers' idolatry, as the farmers were giving increasing levels of praise to Pachamama for her benevolence.
Okay, this sounds to me like a case where the relief agency didn't get the results they expected because there were some key things they didn't know about the culture and society of the people they were trying to help. They didn't know that even if the "science" part succeeds- ie, even if the agricultural output is increased- it doesn't necessarily cause an increase in the farmers' incomes in a straightforward way, because of these societal/religious factors about what the farmers would then spend the money on.
This sounds like the relief agency failed to do their research. They should have talked to someone familiar with the culture, who could address questions like "What would success look like for this program? What kind of outcome would have the most meaningful impact on people's lives?" and so on.
The book is framing it like the problem is the Bolivian farmers' religious beliefs, and the relief agency should have, I don't know, manipulated them into converting to Christianity???
Wait, wasn't there a whole section earlier in the book about how sometimes your perspective on people's needs and problems is actually wrong, and it will cause you to act in ways that don't really help them? And now the authors are saying what these farmers actually need is to become Christians- where are they getting that from? Just because that's what evangelicals believe about EVERYONE, not because there's any practical evidence for it. Kind of sounds like a case of COMPLETELY MISJUDGING OTHER PEOPLE'S NEEDS and then DOING MORE HARM THAN GOOD.
When I read that part earlier about having misconceptions about poor people's needs, I really thought what they meant was "this is why you need to actually listen to them, before trying to help." But maybe they meant it like... "as Christians, we KNOW what everyone's needs are- they need to have the correct beliefs about Jesus, that's the most important thing."
Ugh.
Also, the thing about the llama fetuses... Perhaps this is a case where the local religious leaders are manipulating the farmers for their own financial gain. Maybe they're jacking up the price of llama fetuses, and pressuring people to buy them. This sounds like it could be an unhealthy power dynamic- and you can find this kind of unhealthy power dynamic everywhere. It doesn't necessarily have to have any connection to religion.
But also, I can very easily imagine an alternative anecdote that would go something like this:
We tried to help these poor Americans, but it turns out that they are Christians, and they watch televangelists on TV, and these televangelists say "you have to give money to me, so God will bless you- the more money you give me, the more God will give you!" So even though we were able to increase people's incomes, it didn't actually help them, because they just gave the extra money to televangelists. See, this is why it's so important to get people to stop being Christians. Otherwise there's just no way you can help them.
Is this not the EXACT SAME THING that the book is saying about the Bolivian farmers' religion?
Yeah, I know at this point, evangelicals would take issue with me equating "Christianity" with "donating to televangelists." Someone will argue, "Hey, I'm a Christian, and I disagree with televangelists. I DON'T think people should give money to them. The people in your anecdote don't need to stop being Christians, they just need to learn that being a Christian doesn't mean you have to give money to predatory leaders."
Oh, so you're saying Christianity is a whole diverse religion, that has some predatory leaders but also has a lot of good in it? Don't you think the same thing could be true of the Pachamama religion?
Ugh. Anyway. On to anecdote 2.
Anecdote 2: Non-Christians don't know how to not let rats eat their food
For example, the Pokomchi Indians are some of the poorest people in Guatemala. Through the efforts of missionaries, many of the Pokomchi converted to Christianity. Unfortunately, the missionaries failed to communicate a biblical worldview concerning human stewardship over the rest of creation; hence, the Pokomchi continued in their fatalism, literally just waiting to die in order to be delivered from the horrors of this life. Over the years, a number of development organizations tried to help the Pokomchi by building schools and latrines for them, but these largely went unused.
Arturo Cuba, a pastor and community development worker, decided to confront the worldview that lay at the foundation of the Pokomchi culture. Arturo noticed that the Pokomchi failed to use adequate crop storage facilities, allowing rats to eat the harvest and contributing to widespread malnutrition. Artuo [sic] asked the Pokomchi farmers, "Who is smarter, you or the rats? Do you have dominion over the rats, or do the rats have dominion over your lives?" The farmers admitted that they were allowing the rats to get the best of them. Arturo then explained the biblical worldview that humans are created to have dominion over the rest of creation. As the Pokomchi began to embrace the biblical worldview, dramatic changes took place: better food storage facilities were created, children went to school, women learned to read, and the men adopted improved agricultural techniques.
Uh. Yeah I don't buy this.
The part about "schools and latrines" that "largely went unused" makes me think this is a problem where people building these things to "help" the Pokomchi Indians didn't talk to them first to find out what would actually be helpful. Very not cool how the book is blaming it on the Pokomchi "worldview" rather than outsiders' ignorance about what their actual needs were.
Also, yeah it is possible that there is a really pessimistic idea that's widespread in a certain culture, which stops people from trying to do anything to improve their lives. Sure, that can happen. (I could give a lot of examples from evangelicalism! Like, let's not do anything about climate change, because the bible says Jesus is coming back soon anyway so it doesn't matter.) I very much do NOT think the answer is "they need the bible." You need to talk to someone who knows that culture, to find out what can be done about it. Probably there's some reason behind this "fatalistic" worldview- maybe the Pokomchi have tried to change things before, but it never did any good. You need to do your research and find out what kind of thing would actually be able to create change, to inspire people to believe that they can improve their lives.
(Hey readers: If any of you are non-Christians, and also you don't let rats eat your food, you are welcome to leave a comment and explain how you figured that out without using the bible. Apparently it's a real tough one!)
The book presents it like, "oh the rats are eating our food" and then some Christian comes along and says "well the bible says you can stop the rats from eating your food" and then they're like "oh my goodness we never thought of that."
Come on.
Anecdote 3: Jobs training needs Jesus
For example, I once served on the board of an inner-city ministry that serves an African-American population. We applied for federal funds to pay for part of our jobs preparedness training program for unemployed people. As part of this program, our ministry was very committed to using a curriculum that communicated a biblical worldview concerning work, including the need for Jesus Christ to restore us to being productive workers.
The government's grant administrator, who happened to be a Christian, informed us that the law prohibited us from using the government's money to cover the costs of such an explicitly gospel-focused curriculum. He was doing his job in informing us of this law. No problem with that. However, he then said, "Brian, just remove the explicitly Christian material from the lessons. You can teach the same values that you want to teach-- responsibility, punctuality, respect, hard work, discipline, etc-- without articulating their biblical basis. These values work whether people see them as coming from God or not." [Note from Perfect Number: hey I agree with this guy!] In essence, the grant administrator was encouraging us to apply evangelical gnosticism, separating Christ from His world, encouraging us to use Christ's techniques without recognizing Him as the Creator of the techniques and without calling on Him to give people the power to employ those techniques.
We decided not to use the federal funds to pay for the curriculum. Teaching the values of a "Protestant work ethic" without teaching about the Creator of those values and about the transforming power of Jesus Christ is like giving out penicillin without ever explaining the source of the penicillin's power. [There was an earlier anecdote about how it's bad if people benefit from penicillin without being told that penicillin is from Jesus.] Yes, like penicillin, these values work. But how sad it would have been if we had ended up communicating to the program participants: "You can pull yourselves up by your own bootstraps. Become more disciplined, hardworking, and responsible, and you too can achieve the American dream of material prosperity."
Wow, I have newfound sympathy for all the atheists who just want to improve their lives by going to a job training program/ addiction recovery program/ therapy, without having Jesus pushed on them all the time.
The book is like, oh wouldn't that just be terrible if we improved people's lives but they didn't become Christians.
NOT COOL.
Conclusion: I quit reading there
This book is called "When Helping Hurts," and I thought it was going to be about when well-meaning donors have completely wrong ideas about what poor people need, so they end up butting in with their big well-meaning charity projects which do more harm than good. But after seeing how extremely Christian-supremacist chapter 3 is, I'm becoming very concerned that these authors actually think "doing more harm than good" would be if you help people but don't pressure them into changing their religious beliefs.
Where's the part about how you need to actually listen to people to find out what they need, instead of assuming you know what they need? That's what I thought this was going to be about. Really, that's the whole reason that charity efforts can do more harm than good. Has the book even mentioned listening to people at all, up to this point? Listening to them, and believing them? I thought it was so obvious, and I was so sure that would be what the book said, that I've been reading it through that lens, and now I'm like, wait, maybe they actually never said that at all???
Anyway. So that's my review of "When Helping Hurts." Hey maybe I'm wrong and it gets better from here, who knows. I decided it's not worth my time to read the rest of it and find out. The Christian supremacist stuff is so bad.
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Related:
Evangelicals Agree With What Chau Did (And It Makes Me Angry): Here Are The Receipts
"My Evangelism Isn't Working" is a Very Creepy Thing to Say
This is so normal. We just don't usually say it in front of other people.
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