Later, after he went on to Rift Valley Academy, the staff member in charge of his dorm was over worked in the extreme, and he had no idea that Timmy's dorm had become a virtual suburb of Sodom. I was told years later that virtually every boy in that dorm of fifth and sixth boys was experimenting with sodomy. I fear that Timmy is not the only. Rift Valley Academy Kenya is a Christian boarding school that has been in existence for more than a hundred years. It is located in central Kenya and serves about 500 students representing about 80 mission organizations from 30 nationalists across the world.
:InformationTypePrivate boardingMottoOmnes ChristoEstablished1906Faculty53GradesK–12Enrollmentover 500CampusRuralColor(s)White, red and blackAthleticsrugby, soccer, basketball, volleyball, women's field hockeyMascotRivalRosslyn AcademyYearbookKiambogoWebsiteRift Valley Academy (RVA) is a Christian located in, founded in 1906 by.Rift Valley Academy was ranked 2nd out of the top 100 best high schools in Africa by Africa Almanac in 2003, based upon quality of education, student engagement, strength and activities of alumni, school profile, internet and news visibility. Contents.History and overview Early years Having met with in the in 1905, visited Kijabe shortly after leaving office four years later. During this visit, in 1909, Roosevelt laid the for Kiambogo, the main school building that remains the centerpiece of RVA's campus.For much of the early history of the school, it was difficult to find teachers. Most missionaries had come to Africa to preach the gospel, not educate white children. The primary concern of most missionaries was not the academic achievements of the students, but their spiritual life. After Miss Hope, the next teacher who truly felt called to teach at RVA was Miss Muriel Perrott. She introduced RVA to several British sports such as Rounders and Rugby and instituted the two house system.
The two houses, Stanleys and Livingstons, were named for the two explorers and served as an organizational tool for the school. The two houses competed against each other academically and on the sports field. For many years the main goal of students was to win the house cup. Miss Perrott went on furlough in 1931 and was unable to return to Africa, but her influence was invaluable to the development of the school.Just as World War I broke out, Miss Hope, who was by now Mrs.
Westervelt, was forced to leave the field due to poor health. The years during World War I were very difficult because it was hard to get staff to come due to the dangers of sea travel during the war. It was during these years that there were a number of epidemics that forced the school to close periodically as well.In 1933, Herb Downing was called to head RVA. He was uniquely prepared for the job since he was one of the first Americans born in East Africa and an alumnus of the school.
He came to the job with several years of experience both as an educator and administrator, which was handy since both he and his wife Muriel needed to teach as they were the only staff at the time. Downing's goal was to establish a lasting and positive culture so that parents would feel comfortable leaving their children at RVA.
It was during his time as principal that the school became much more deliberately academic, although it retained a mixed European and American curriculum. Another Downing innovation was the introduction of Rendezvous or Mutton Guz, a party to reward those students who had not misbehaved too badly over the term.Herb Downing went on furlough in 1938 and was prevented from returning by WWII until 1947. Following his return in 1947, Mr. Downing was convinced that the school was necessary to the future of missions. He made a plea for teachers and funding because he recognized that without the school, many of the parents would not be able to stay on the field and that the school was in a very real way training the next generation of missionaries. His desire was the school would be able to go all the way to 12th grade since prior to this students had to return to their home countries for their high school education.
In 1949 his dream was realized with the graduation of Paul Smith, and the first class was graduated in 1950. The 1950s saw a huge expansion in the school as a whole with many new buildings going up.
At one point the school even closed for a term to repair the roof on Kiambogo.During Kenya's struggle for independence In 1952, at the beginning of the Mau Mau emergency, a contingency of the African Home Guard under the command of a British officer named 'Chipps' was stationed on campus along with a barbed-wire fence. Saturday, 28 March 1953 is the date of one of RVA's greatest legends. It was clear the Mau Mau were raiding in the area, several days before the town of Lari had been burned and RVA was the next target. All went to bed sure they would be awakened by gunfire in the night. The staff prayed for God's protection, and the attack never happened.
Months later when several Mau Mau were captured they said they were on their way to attack the mission station but were prevented from doing so by a large number of soldiers that surrounded the campus. Historical record shows that the only British soldier anywhere near Kijabe that night was Chipps.With Kenya's independence in 1963, the population of missionaries grew considerably.
It was during the 1960s that many of the programs that RVA is still recognized for today began. By this time the school had expanded enough to begin an interscholastic sports program. The first team fielded was basketball, followed soon after by rugby coached by the South African, Dave Reynolds. The choir and band programs were nationally recognized, and RVA was producing very good drama. Students began taking college entrance exams, the National Honor Society's chapter of Elimu Bora was founded and a spirit of educational excellence was begun to be seen. The biggest boost to academic excellence was the push for accreditation in the 1960s. In 1967, under Roy Entwistle, the school was the first school in Africa to receive American accreditation.Since independence In the 1970s it was realized that the school was much too crowded.
By 1974 the school had nearly 400 students enrolled. Students were sleeping on the floor because there were not enough beds, and the student to staff ratio was much too high, leaving large numbers of students without adequate adult supervision. A building program was begun that continues to this day.
In 1976, Roy Entwistle took the job as principal at RVA. He began the process of breaking down the us vs. Them barriers between students and staff with programs like Caring Community and building more, smaller dorms.The 1980s was another time of growth for RVA.
New buildings were going up and more staff were arriving. Under the leadership of Roy Entwistle, the school was gaining recognition worldwide for its academics and nationwide for its sports. During this time the school reached its full complement of students, and the school board put a cap on enrolment at 550. In 1981, the RVA rugby team won the inaugural Prescott Cup under the coaching of Colin Densham, and in 1994 they won the trophy for the 10th time in 14 years.In 1998 Roy Entwistle handed over the reins of RVA to Jim Long who served as superintendent for 5 years before turning it over to Tim Cook (no relation to Apple's ) in 2003. Cook served until (date missing) when he turned his position over to Tim Hall. The current superintendent is Mark Kinzer, who began his reign in 2016.
During the 1990s and early 2000s, RVA has continued its march towards academic excellence. In the 80s and 90s, the school made great steps towards standardizing of curriculum, prior to this the curriculum left with the teacher and new teachers were forced to start from scratch.Having survived the of the 1950s and terrorist threats in the late 1990s, RVA has continued to grow. Today it enrolls roughly 500 students, from up to grade twelve, and allows both American and British to be followed by its students. Students hail from North America (roughly 60% of the student body), (20%), (15%), and other countries (10%). Graduates frequently attend college in their home country. The class of 2007 had graduates go to Harvard, Yale, University of Pennsylvania, M.I.T., Stanford, The US Air Force Academy, and the US Naval Academy.Many RVA students, whose parents are typically North American, European, or Asian Christians working in East Africa, consider themselves, in that their is neither that of their parents' home country nor that of East Africa but rather is a hybrid of the two.Sports The Rugby First XV has won the Prescott Cup multiple times as well as the Black Rock tournament (most recently in 2017).
The sports teams are known as the RVA Buffalos. In 2007 Rift Valley Academy varsity sports swept nearly every championship, including men's and women's soccer, basketball, and volleyball. In 2010 the Men's Varsity Soccer won the ISL Championship undefeated and even won the sportsmanship and character award.RVA sports teams and termsTermBoysGirlsSoccer, TennisBasketball, TennisBasketballSoccer, Field HockeyRugby, VolleyballVolleyballTheatre RVA has a theatre program, with productions ranging from 'The Matchmaker' and 'Arsenic and Old Lace' to 'Get Smart' and 'Up the Down Staircase'.
Welcome to this blog for SIM MKs, survivors of abuse from other missions and anyone else who knows and loves these people. I believe SIM should be taking a more active role in helping their MKs who were abused at Kent Academy and other boarding schools. I also talk about developments at other missions related to abuse, and sometimes just post things that might lift our spirits. Please visit the pages above to find out more about the history of SIM and their response, or lack thereof, to abused MKs. It has been a while since I wrote on this blog, so I decided to do an update of the mission organizations that I have been following, and what is happening with SIM.Ethnos360, formerly called New Tribes Mission: Wonder why they changed their name?
To go back about 10 years, MKs from other boarding schools within this mission field petitioned the administration to investigate their schools as they had with Fanda in Senegal. New Tribes was not willing to do another round with GRACE, so they hired an outfit called IHART, headed by Pat Hendrix. IHART stands for Independent Historical Abuse Review team. This organization was created exclusively to investigate New Tribes boarding schools.Three investigations were done: East Brazil, Panama and Bolivia. To read all the details about these investigations and their findings, please visit the None of the reports were released to the public, but all of them have been shared by survivors. All three of the investigations found numerous instances of sexual, physical and emotional abuse. In East Brazil, there were four sexual abusers and one physical and emotional abuser.
In Panama, 63 allegations were considered to have preponderance of evidence, mostly severe physical abuse, but also sexual abuse. In Bolivia there were numerous allegations, with 13 offenders found to have committed sexual abuse.
This is by no means the extent of the problem, as Pat Hendrix received files from New Tribes about historic abuse in Papua New Guinea, Indonesia, Mexico, and Venezuela.Midway through these investigations, Pat Hendrix was removed as coordinator of the project, and replace by an attorney named Theresa Sidebotham. How can New Tribes Mission replace the coordinator of an independent organization that does not have connections to the mission, you ask? It turns out that IHART always had connections to New Tribes, so it wasn’t really an independent investigation to begin with. I got this information from the, where you can find many more details. I have about the three law suits filed by New Tribes MKs.
The general consensus following all of these events is that New Tribes found some perpetrators whose names they did not reveal, and they may or may not have disciplined them, since we don’t even know who they are. These perpetrators have likely been involved in churches, youth groups and children’s organizations for decades, with nobody suspecting their abusive tendencies. There is very little closure for the MKs involved, and still a deep distrust of the mission which prevents many of those who have been abused from coming forward.Association of Baptists for World Evangelism (ABWE): MKs from this mission launched their blog in 2011, after they had been trying for nearly 10 years to have Donn Ketcham, a mission doctor, investigated for sexual abuse of his young female patients. You can read an account of this on my blog.
After the story broke on social media ABWE hired GRACE to investigate, and then fired them and hired Pii (Professional Investigators International). After an extended battle with the ABWE administration at the time, Pii published a report, which was favorably received by survivors. ABWE actually made the report public,. It is long, detailed, and deeply disturbing.
In 2018 Ketcham was charged with sexual assault of a young female patient in the United States. He was ordered to stand trial, but ultimately the judge decided that he was not physically able to undergo a trial because of his dementia.Serving In Mission, formerly called Sudan Interior Mission (SIM): To my knowledge, there have been no new developments with abuse investigations at SIM, although I continue to hear accounts from other MKs about their personal experiences. I did notice something new when I was perusing the SIM website recently.
SIM has always remained silent about the very existence of past abuse on their mission field. Now, if you look at the on their website, they say the following:“Therefore, SIM USA recognizes its responsibility to minimize the risk of harm, and to respond to Child Safety concerns regarding:. the children of SIM USA personnel. any child who may have been harmed by any SIM USA personnel, ministry or project, occurring in the past or present.” (Bold accents are mine.)I take it to be a good sign that there is an acknowledgement here of a possible need to address abuse that occurred in the past. I wrote to all three of the child safety officers who are listed on that page, asking for more details about what the response might be of a report of past abuse, and whether there is a written policy for this. I got the following response from one of them: “Any person who has been harmed, and who contacts us directly, will be welcomed to share their story and will be listened to with compassion.
In each situation we seek wisdom and counsel as to the most appropriate and helpful response.” You couldn’t possibly be less specific about how you would handle a complaint, and there is clearly no policy here, but at least they have put the possibility out there that abuse existed in the past.In 2013 It is interesting to compare the response I got 7 years ago to the one I got recently. Ms Decker replied “ Each situation must be responded to on an individual basis, and my sense is that it’s best to work through these in person and not via media where so much misunderstanding is possible.
Recognition and concern for people who have suffered in years past strengthens our desire to prevent further harm to children in days ahead.” At that time the focus was on preventing any new instances of abuse and not addressing past abuse, but you can see that the vague response that each situation must be handled individually is still the same.How should an organization respond appropriately to allegations of past abuse? MKSafetyNet has decades of experience in advocating for abused MKs.
I won’t go through all of their points, however I do think the very first one highlights a problem with the way that SIM is responding to this issue. The first thing an organization should do if they truly want to respond to abused MKs is to Cast the Net Wide.Cast the net wide.
As MKSafetyNet notes, it is inadequate for an organization to only respond to the spontaneous reports that come up from survivors. Casting a wide net means contacting all MKs to offer them a chance to report any stories that they might have, or as MKSafetyNet puts it, the complete universe of abuse survivors. Don’t forget that SIM is an organization that specializes in outreach, so they certainly have the capabilities to put this message out.I believe this was one of the shortcomings of the AMK task force, which you can read about under the “SIM and Abuse” menu on this blog.
The Task Force cherry-picked their participants, who were specifically invited to visit SIM and tell their stories. There were severely wounded MKs who never even knew the task force existed.
If the net had been cast wide for this endeavor, I think the results might have been much different, with more and messier situations uncovered.Why not cast a wide net? In the first place, the mission loses a lot of control, as people begin to come forward.
It also becomes more expensive, because instead of just having a child safety officer listen to one story, suddenly they have to devote more time and personnel to this project. If they really want to make amends, they are going to have to provide funds for things like meetings, investigations, counseling for the survivors, and more. And that isn’t even counting the cost of the publicity that will take place, and possible loss of support. SIM is all about being in control, and particularly of their funds.
They have never provided the resources for anyone to properly minister to wounded MKs, and I suspect that is both because they don’t feel it’s a valid use of their funds, and because they are worried about what might come to light if they really start digging.There has been a false narrative going on for so many years, from the days when children at boarding school had their letters censored when they tried to tell their parents about how they were treated, to the absolute denial of bad experiences and the pressure on MKs (often by other MKs!!) not to complain. We are starting to see a breakthrough as more of us tell our experiences publicly and truthfully on blogs and social media.
I have to disagree with Mary Decker about the media being an inappropriate place to discuss these things. A public forum is very appropriate because it lets survivors know that there are others out there who had their same experience. I look forward to big changes in this new decade, and a light shining down on the past for MKs from all missions.Posted inTagged,. “You see, dear reader, the past is never far from any of us. Its presence has a way of growing as more and more time goes. Like a continuous but imperceptible whisper, the past is always there.
”In his book Missionary Kid: How I Learned to Say Goodbye, John Haines gives a humorous and heartfelt account of his early life and adult journey as a hobo jetsetter, also known as a missionary kid. I found it to be so entertaining, filled with dry wit and humorous descriptions, as well as some photographs and John’s original sketches. At the same time John poignantly captures the sorrows, regrets and longings that we have all experienced.John’s parents served with North Africa Mission.
Today this organization has incorporated two other missions – Southern Morocco Mission and Algiers Mission Band – changed their name to Arab World Ministry and joined with Pioneers. He was born in Morocco, moved to Marseilles for most of his childhood, and eventually attended Black Forest Academy, the international Christian boarding school in Germany.After high school John was steered towards a Christian college, as is the tradition for many missionary kids. During his journey as a young adult he learned to question his beliefs, and constantly felt the urge to move on, from a couple of Bible colleges, to a State University in Minnesota, to graduate school in Toronto, with several stints of employment along the way. The sadness of the goodbye is described so eloquently in this passage:“Have you ever had to say goodbye to a house or country, to a lover or friend whom you knew you would not see in a long time, possibly ever again? If you have, then you know that this goodbye is the hardest goodbye in the world, because when you come back, if you ever come back, this person or place will have changed beyond recognition. You too will have changed. And so, whether you know it or not, this goodbye is the last goodbye.”And yet, like other MKs, John uprooted himself by choice many times during his adult life, moving like a nomad between schools and jobs, states and countries.
After a childhood of being uprooted and forced to leave people that we love, you might think an MK wants nothing more than to settle down and live in one place, but for many of us the reality is very different. The constant urge to move on creates more necessary goodbyes, which seems to create a vicious cycle.The book is addressed to three groups of people: Believers, Unbelievers and Innocent Ones. If you feel like you definitely don’t fit into any of those categories, you are probably a member of a fourth option, the Missionary Kid.You will recognize many common features of missionary life, no matter which country you grew up in. The housekeeper and babysitter, whether man or woman, who would be a luxury to an American family, was commonplace among African missionaries. The prayer letter, which as John explains had a primary goal of fund-raising, was how missionaries kept in touch with their supporters, family and friends before the days of facebook, email and blogs.
Recently an MK contacted me to tell me about a situation that has been going on with his family and SIM USA. The story is written out in detail on the blog. This is basically a story of a man who served with SIM for 25 years, suddenly being accused of child abuse by a new wife of a couple years, who I don’t believe was an SIM missionary herself.
Without ever asking for this man’s side of the story, SIM tricked him into returning to the United States, reported him to authorities, forced him to sign documents (still a thing missions do, apparently), supported his wife financially and with SIM lawyers as they took him to court, and eventually fired him. They fired him after first refusing to accept his resignation.The important thing is, in all of this he was never found guilty of child abuse by the DSS, who conducted forensic interviews with the children, his story was confirmed by a lie detector test, the police and sheriff’s office closed the case and ultimately a judge threw out all the abuse allegations and told his wife not to bring any future allegations. Yet SIM doggedly backed and supported the accusing party, even when other SIM missionaries appealed to the International Director.
This is a crazy story and I urge you to read it for yourself.Why would SIM have such a knee jerk reaction to an accusation of child abuse that they would go to those lengths without even asking the accused to tell his side of the story? Should SIM provide financial support and legal help to an accusing party, essentially taking sides in a court case?
If you support SIM financially, did you imagine this might be where some of your money is going? At one point an SIM leader even testified against this man in court. Why would they dictate how often this man was allowed to see his children, and throw themselves into the middle of a child custody battle?This is an organization that has been accused of looking the other way and ignoring abusive behaviour, and I have seen them spend many resources trying to prove that one of their missionaries was NOT guilty of abuse. They have now swung to the other extreme and cannot even seem to consider the idea that an accusation might be wrong, at the expense of a missionary and his children.This man’s family, who wrote the blog, are pretty clear about how this situation should be rectified. The people responsible for this abuse of an SIM missionary used terrible judgment, and should step down from their positions. The former missionary should be reimbursed for his legal costs and travel expenses, and be provided with counseling. Clearly there is something wrong with the new child abuse policy at SIM if an innocent man can be accused and victimized in this manner.SIM has not so much as apologized to this man.
When the family protests this, SIM USA leadership tells them that they will pray for them. (Does anyone else hate that response? I have nothing against prayer, but in this situation, and many others I have known, it is used in a condescending way. Oh, and by the way, it’s the only thing they are willing to do to help you.) If anyone from SIM who was involved in this, even MD, would like to give their side of the story they are welcome to do it here.
A dear friend and fellow MK who attended Kent Academy messaged me the other day to see if I had seen this letter. It came to her from [email protected]. As you can see it is addressed to all SIM Mks. I never received a copy even though I thought I was on the Simroots mailing list.
Have you seen it? I decided some of the SIM MKs who read this blog might not be on the distribution list either.At any rate, you can read the letter below. There is an email address where you can send comments, [email protected]. Katrina is an executive assistant at SIM International Inc. I encourage every one with an opinion to write to Katrina. It is rare that we get a contact from SIM who will actually communicate with us about this subject – believe me I have tried over the years. Bogunjoko is willing to do this it is a gift!
To all SIM MKs:Please take time to read this special message of gratitude from Dr. Joshua Bogunjoko, International Director.Celebrating You 5 December 2016 Founders’ DayDear children of missionaries past and present,On December 4th, every year, the SIM community worldwide celebrates as a Day of Prayer the arrival of the first Sudan Interior Mission (SIM) missionaries in Lagos, Nigeria. This year I am calling on all of SIM, in accordance with our Founder’s Day practice, to set aside Monday, December 5, to give thanks, to celebrate and to pray.This letter is for you if you are a child of missionaries past or present, from any of the missions which flowed into SIM over the years, whether your parents served during your adulthood or childhood, and for any duration of service.
This year’s thanksgiving, celebration and prayers is for you. Your personal contribution to the making of disciples, indeed, to the emergence and growth of the church in all corners of the world, is as incalculable as it is invisible. Therefore, on this Founders’ Day, the SIM worldwide community is pausing to affirm and acknowledge the remarkable role you have played. We celebrate and give thanks for you.Perhaps you have not been privileged to glimpse the result of your parents’ work, to experience the joy of seeing the fruit of their labour. I assure you that their labour and your sacrifice have never been in vain. That I am the one sending this letter to you gives testimony to that fact.
I committed my life to Christ while attending a mission school established by SIM, where I was discipled by a missionary. As a product of SIM ministry over many years, and now not only serving in SIM but leading SIM globally, you can rejoice that your contribution and your experiences have never been in vain. Christ has the victory. I, and millions of others like me, bear testimony to this victory. Because of you and your family, many more, like myself, can understand God’s good news. Thank you.You were born into a family that, in the course of your life, carried the gospel to others, and this necessitated personal sacrifice, which I acknowledge by this letter.
We celebrate with gratitude your service alongside your parents. Often the focus of mission work is on your parents and their cross-cultural ministry. However, at times you bore the weight of the calling of God on your parents’ lives; thus you have made sacrifices that may have gone unacknowledged by anyone. All children are impacted by their parents’ vocation, whether in missions or not.
Yet the impact of a missionary vocation on a family is unique.We acknowledge your own commitment and contributions to the work that was done or is being done by your parents. Perhaps you were active in the work in tangible ways, or you accepted situations into which you were entrusted that allowed your parents to do their work.
You may be one who has experienced suffering or adversity, perhaps from separation from your parents at an early age. Some have had close encounters with diseases, natural disasters, civil unrest, or other hazards.
We acknowledge the price that you may have paid so that the gospel of Christ’s saving grace can be preached to a dying world.We celebrate your victories. While growing up in cultures that were not your parents’, many have gone on to use those experiences as stepping stones to greater things. Many of you have achieved remarkable things for yourselves, your families, your communities, for the church and for the gospel.
For some, growing up in another culture was not always positive; for others, it is one of the greatest gifts from their parents. I hope this is your experience, and even if not, I am thankful that you are still with us to see the result. We celebrate your accomplishments and the accomplishments of MKs all over the world.Many of you have gone out as missionaries, taking your own children along. Many more have contributed to ministries or to the local communities into which God has placed you.
We celebrate your contributions, your resilience, your grace, your hope. Your unique experiences are almost impossible to explain to those who never walked in your shoes. You are often misunderstood in both your host culture and in your parents’ home culture. Yet this you have endured with determination, a sense of humor, and ultimately with renewed grace. We celebrate you today as one of “our” MKs, as one of our masterpieces created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for you to do. “O waste of lost, in the hot mazes, lost, among bright stars on this weary, unbright cinder, lost! Remembering speechlessly we seek the great forgotten language, the lost lane-end into heaven, a stone, a leaf, an unfound door.
O lost, and by the wind grieved, ghost, come back again.”― Thomas Wolfe, Look Homeward AngelCarol Polsgrove was born Carol Claxon in Kentucky, in the 1940s. When she was three years old her parents signed on with the Southern Baptist Foreign Mission Board. They applied to go to Hawaii, but God had other plans and they were invited to Africa. Carol’s story begins as the only child aboard a Norwegian ship on the vast ocean, bound for the Gold Coast.I should tell you right here that this is not a story about abuse, even though I am featuring the book on my blog about abuse. It is, however, a story about loss and grieving and sacrifice, things all of us MKs can relate to.MKs often feel like fractured people, with many different lives somehow stitched roughly together. Very often the pieces can’t fit at all, the edges rub painfully, and one or more of them must be cast away completely. This way we lose a part of our life and a part of ourselves.
This book shows a journey that begins to fit those parts back together to make a whole person.Carol has a fantastic memory not just for events but for the underlying feelings and sensations she experienced as a child. This is supplemented by letters written by her parents to their families in Kentucky, and by her own letters written from boarding school. It wasn’t until after her mother’s death that Carol really began to explore these memories. Until then she had played the game so many of us missionary kids know, fitting into American society as best we can and not mentioning “that part” of our story.The Claxon family started out living in the Gold Coast, a British colony that would become present day Ghana. From there they moved to Nigeria, and then frequently around that country, living in Iwo, Oyo, Ibadan and Lagos. Carol also went school in Oshogbo, and every three years they traveled back to spend time in the United States. It is the familiar story of a nomadic existence that doesn’t allow attachments or friendships to form.You can feel the richness and beauty of Carol’s life as a young girl growing up in Africa.
This was a country full of rocks to slide on, trees to hang from, fairy pools, bright flowers and foliage and tropical fruits ripe for the eating. Many of the hardships that bothered her parents, like dust, insects and snakes, were just considered a part of life, and the way things were. Many find this concept hard to grasp. I still get people today remarking on how strange and wonderful it must have been to grow up in Nigeria. Nope, not strange at all.
It was normal life for me.It took years of experience, an adult viewpoint, and a look at the correspondence of her parents for Carol to realize the veins of sadness and sometimes desperation underlying their lives. Each of her parents on separate occasions received letters from home telling them one of their own parents had died. The family suffered chronic pain with a lack of health and dental care. Superhuman demands were placed on them by a workload that seemed like enough to keep several families busy, and by their account was placing them at times under “terrible strain.” Trade offs had to be made in order to survive on a very limited amount of money in a world that kept getting more expensive.
Her brother Billy fell ill at the early age of four months, and suffered with severe illnesses for the rest of his childhood.I think many of our missionary parents suffered similar hardships of an overworked schedule, constant travel, lack of health care and the stress of adapting to a tropical lifestyle. It is a credit to them that many of us kids had no idea what they were going through. They managed to create a stable and worry free home life for their children, in spite of their own duress.Carol spent two years at Newton, a Southern Baptist boarding school in Oshogbo. On the surface her time there seems full of activity and enrichment, packed with lessons, plays, music, boyfriends, sports, and an active social life. It took some digging into the memories to uncover the hidden feelings of confusion, over-stimulation and loss of control.
I can relate so much to the whirlwind of going from a solitary life as the only child on a mission compound (my sisters were both older so I was left at home for two years) to a highly structured school with hundreds of classmates and lots and lots of rules.If you are from a Southern Baptist mission, or are in any of the Nigerian MK groups on social media, you will recognize many of the names of Carol’s playmates and classmates.One of the casualties of the lack of health care was that Carol was not properly treated for an eye condition called strabismus. Because her brain is unable to fuse two images coming in at different angles, she has no depth perception. As an adult she reflects that this is “an appropriate disability for a girl growing up on two continents.”The majority of MKs will go on at length about how fortunate and blessed we all are, and how rich our experience as children. This is true, but it denies the other side of the story, which is that every missionary and every MK necessarily experienced great loss and sadness, and sometimes worse. It is a tough journey to fuse these parts together.
I appreciate Carol so much for her truthfulness and transparency as she tells her story.Posted in Tagged,. Today (Saturday May 14) I added some information to the. I realize it was a long post to begin with, but if you scroll down the page you will find the new paragraphs are in italics and easy to spot. They are in the section titled “The Timeline of Abuse”.Have you read the report?
If you are a woman, if you have a daughter, if you are an MK who ever had to negotiate medical appointments alone or submit to the authority of other adults when your parents should have been there, this will hit you close to home.While I was reading I felt fear, anger and heavy grief washing over me. Fear for the girl who begged her family not to make her go see Dr. Ketcham for an appointment. Grief for all the girls trapped and overpowered by this man in examining rooms and bedrooms over decades. A burning anger at the grownups that didn’t open their mouths, and protected an abuser. Anger at the men who humiliated the 13/14 year old victim by forcing her to travel to Bangladesh and confront her abuser, forcing her to sign a confession, and telling people she was a willing partner.How much more must the victims themselves be feeling these emotions as they reread their stories? It is a necessary thing to tell these stories publicly, but I can imagine it reopens doors which these women have worked very hard to keep closed.We don’t hear a word from the abuser at the center of the story, who refused to be interviewed by Pii and to my knowledge has been silent on the matter.
Another silent group are the missionaries of ABWE. None will be a public advocate for these MKs. Are they still afraid of what the mission will do to them if they speak out? Can anyone possibly still believe that the ABWE leadership has the authority to tell people what is right and what is wrong?I have commented in the past about the same thing with SIM missionaries. When the subject of abuse comes up in social media, MKs always have a lot to say, but the missionaries are quiet. Is this the group of people that is tasked with boldly going into the world to spread the good news in foreign countries?
And you can’t even weigh in or give support to your own children in a grave matter of sexual, physical, spiritual abuse? All of you silent missionaries, are you sure that you are in the right profession?Fellow MKs, now is the time when our sisters from ABWE can really use a kind and encouraging word. One way to start is by visiting and liking their, and leaving a message or comment.Sisters, I pray you will have a deep peace, and feel these wounds begin to heal. You have done your part to tell this story, and it is told. What happens next depends on ABWE. What they decide to do about this matter is no reflection on you and your worth.
It is only a reflection on them and only they will now be held accountable.Claim the promise in Joel 2: 25-26.“I will repay you for the years the locusts have eaten –the great locust and the young locust,the other locusts and the locust swarm–my great army that I sent among you.You will have plenty to eat, until you are full,and you will praise the name of the Lord your God,who has worked wonders for you;never again will my people be shamed.” Posted in Tagged.