The first image that comes to mind when one pictures a missionary may be a white middle class suburbanite volunteering in developing countries, but many break that mold. Missionaries of color from diverse backgrounds are working to impact the local community and beyond.
The Face of a Missionary
Mercy Karanja is planning to move to Eurasia to serve as a missionary.
Growing up in a village in Kenya, Mercy Karanja formulated an idea of what a missionary looked like.
“The village I grew up in, we had an issue with water. There were missionaries who came to help out,” Karanja explained. “They were all white. That’s what I grew up seeing, so I never knew there was any other background of missionary.”
As a pastor’s kid, Karanja felt called to serve God but wasn’t sure what that would look like in practice. When Karanja was a teen, her family moved to the U.S. and her calling was cemented at a conference in Indianapolis.
“I saw Sean Smith, an evangelist who is African-American,” Karanja said. “When I saw him on stage, I was like, ‘Wow.’ I knew God had called me to serve, but for the first time I was like, ‘Oh my goodness, I can do this.’ It changed my whole perspective.”
For the past eight years, Karanja has worked as a campus missionary with Chi Alpha Christian Fellowship, where she builds relationships with and teaches students about Christ on campuses across the Midwest. Karanja is part of Chi Alpha’s Diversity Task Force, which engages minority college students to help them grow in their faith. After building friendships with Muslim students, she decided to move to Eurasia as a missionary and is currently raising financial support.
African-American campus missionary Raydon Haskins has a similar story. Haskins grew in his faith as a college student. After graduating, he wanted to find a way to serve others. As a Black missionary, Haskins noticed differences in how majority and minority cultures approach mission work.
A different approach
Mercy poses with students at Chi Alpha’s fall retreat.
While sending missionaries overseas has long been a custom of white Christian churches, advocating for justice on American soil has historically been of upmost importance to Black Christian leaders and the Black church as a whole.
“The Black church has always been at the forefront of social justice issues. I do believe that African-American churches have a focus on the struggles of African-American communities because they had to — because no one else had that focus,” Haskins said. “Through breaking down Jim Crow and gerrymandering and raising up our community, we have a heart for and a great understanding of what it means to have a faith-based lens on injustice, and that drive can be used globally.”
Karanja has seen a “radical shift” in recent years regarding the ways in which Christian leaders, both white and Black, advocate for the disadvantaged.
“Many have stepped up and said, ‘Hey, these things are happening in the world, what are we doing about it?’” Karanja said. “(The leaders) say ‘We empower you, we want to support you, we are coming around you.’ However, we still have people in leadership who are like ‘We don’t see the problem.’”
Spreading the gospel is Haskins’ and Karanja’s full-time job. To pay the bills, they rely on financial support from churches and individuals.
Haskins says the idea of raising support to enter the mission field is popular in white churches but was foreign to him.
“I didn’t learn anything about that until college, when I joined (a campus ministry). I think, for the local Black church, they focused on reaching the city… I think if more money is in one culture, it is a little bit easer for missionaries to raise funds.”
Karanja says the process can be slightly more difficult as a person of color.
“I think I encounter 90 percent of what everyone else encounters, be it rejection or success. There is an extra 10 percent of people I have encountered who have straight up told me, ‘I don’t think you’ll make it.’” Karanja said. “According to what I’ve heard, we are supposed to be helping out our own. So, I go to college, get a degree, I come invest in my family and my community. And now, the world thinks there is only white missionaries, which I thought for the longest time.”
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Diversity in missions
A local seminary is doing their part in supporting diversity and inclusivity. The staff at Christian Theological Seminary (CTS) feel equipping missionaries from diverse backgrounds is an important part of making sure all people have equal opportunity to fulfill their calling.
“For far too long, people of color have been seen as beneficiaries of giving, instead of benefactors and philanthropists,” said Aimee Laramore, the philanthropic strategist for the PhD in African-American Preaching and Sacred Rhetoric Program at CTS. “There is power in helping people to see the true meaning of philanthropy, love of humankind, expressed and demonstrated by people who truly reflect the world that we live in. The lack of cultural awareness has become increasingly more apparent as news stories and social media illuminate the tragedies that result from ignorance, fear and disregard for human life.”
Nathan Wilson, director of communications with CTS, says many mistakes are made on the mission field and beyond due to lack of cultural awareness.
“Missionaries, particularly from the west, too often go to other lands with a “fix-it” mentality,” Wilson said. “The assumption is that they have all the right answers, and if the others would just listen to them then their problems would be fixed.”
They both feel missionaries, no matter their race or background, have a responsibility to understand the cultures they serve.
“The best leaders lead alongside others,” Wilson said. “They don’t rush ahead and pull people. They don’t stay behind, stay clean and push people. They work alongside, modeling as they talk and talking as they model what it looks like to be a person of deep faith in disconcerting times.”
Contact reporter Keshia McEntire at 317-762-7853. Follow her on Twitter @Keshiamc12.
Raydon Haskins is a campus missionary at Indiana State University.
