The Missiological Challenge of the Anonymous Missionary in the Nordic Context

Situating my context

First, a word about my personal, theological, and ecclesial contexts. The reason I am especially attuned to the problems raised by the “anonymous missionary” is that my life experience, personal identity, professional service, and missiological studies have intersected with the missionary phenomenon in many ways. Professionally, I am a Lutheran pastor, former missionary theological educator, and mission theologian. My doctoral work at Fordham University elaborated a Lutheran proposal for mission, in conversation with the Roman Catholic missiology of Jacques Dupuis. Dupuis’s proposal, of course, is firmly anchored in Rahner’s theology. In October 2021 I became executive director of the Finnish Lutheran Overseas Mission. Theologically, I represent the historic, classic Christian tradition and believe it has rich, untapped resources for mission.

Personally, I am a “missionary kid” and “global nomad.” In January 2019, as a forty-four-year-old man, I moved to Finland, the country of my nationality, for the first time in my life. Prior to that, I had lived twenty-five years in Taiwan and nineteen years in the United States. Thoroughly tricultural and trilingual, I speak Mandarin Chinese, English, and Finnish fluently and am equally comfortable, and uncomfortable, in Chinese, North American, and Finnish contexts. I am used to navigating ambiguity, since my life experience has been one of both belonging and not belonging, being an insider and an outsider, at the same time. Understandably, my boss at the church’s Office for Global executive expressed the hope that I would “see the Finnish context with fresh eyes and raise questions we have not thought of.” One of these questions is the issue I explore in this article: the phenomenon and challenge of the “anonymous missionary.”

As mission theologian, I have reported to the national church mission board on various issues. When I raised the dynamic of the anonymous missionary to the archbishop at a roundtable forum, you could hear a pin drop. The “straight talking American import” had touched a raw nerve. Either that, or I had, as a global nomad, seen and named a reality that others had not yet seen.

I have been charged with being not Lutheran enough, not Finnish enough, not Finnish Lutheran enough, and so forth. Mixed allegiances and multiple perspectives are both the gift and burden of global nomads. My generous, yet critical, reading of Rahner has been both appreciated and criticized. As one who is allegedly “not enough” in many respects, it is with utmost sensitivity, yet also with deep devotion to the church’s mission and Christ’s gospel, that I deem “anonymous missionaries” as “not missionary enough.” In our age of contested, multiple identities, clarity regarding both missionary identity and the nature of authentic mission partnership is of utmost importance for the missionary enterprise.

In terms of ecclesial context, the concerns raised and suggestions offered in this article are anchored in and intelligible within my Nordic, Finnish, national church context. For example, most Finnish mission agencies engage in development projects, with virtually all development work being funded by Finland’s Foreign Ministry (equivalent of the USAID), rather than church donations. As the largest funder of such projects, granting over 20 million Euros per year, the Foreign Ministry has strict regulations prohibiting development funds being used for religious purposes. This means that, while mission agencies only send missionaries, some of these missionaries are engaged in development projects, while others are engaged in specifically “church work.” The dual sources of funding (ecclesial and public), as well as the dual nature of missionary work and mission agency organizational structures (“church-related” and “development”), have resulted in missionary identity becoming an increasingly ambiguous, contested matter. Citing privacy and antidiscrimination laws, some mission agencies refrain from asking future employees, during the recruitment process, anything relating to their personal faith. While this is, technically, not the case, these agencies seem to consider, almost exclusively, the applicant’s professional qualifications. This has led to the curious case of the anonymous missionary.

“Anonymous Christian?” “Anonymous missionary?”

To sufficiently elucidate this Protestant, national church problem, we turn for help from a surprising source: the Catholic theologian Karl Rahner. Rahner’s category of the anonymous Christian serves as indispensable background for articulating the nature of the “anonymous missionary.” For Rahner, “the ‘anonymous Christian’ . . . is the pagan after the beginning of the Christian mission, who lives in the state of Christ’s grace through faith, hope and love, yet who has no explicit knowledge of the fact that his life is orientated in grace-given salvation to Jesus Christ.” ¹ While one may deem Rahner’s category presumptuous, insensitive, or offensive, Rahner himself viewed it as the honest, inescapable implication of Christian self-understanding.

Just as Rahner, in his day, dealt with the theological controversy and problem regarding the anonymous Christian, analogously, contemporary missiology is increasingly faced with the growing phenomenon of the anonymous missionary. I will argue that, in terms of the intelligibility, credibility, and reputation of Christian mission, Global North mainline Protestant missions must recognize and resolve the dilemma posed by sending anonymous missionaries. What do I mean?

Anonymous missionaries are secular professionals who, while affirming the development values and goals of justice, peace, and human rights, are increasingly employed and deployed by Protestant, national church mission agencies as missionaries. Christian mission agencies, by virtue of these professionals’ international work, designate them as missionaries, despite their self-understanding. Similar to the Buddhist whom the inclusivist Christian designates as an anonymous Christian, contrary to the Buddhist’s self-understanding, secular professionals are designated missionaries by their employer, contrary to their self-understanding.

The anonymous female missionary, for example, in terms of her complex, contested identity, poses an emerging theological and practical challenge for Christian missions. In her personal identity, she identifies as secular. In her professional identity, she assumes a dual identity of both missionary and development specialist. This professional identity is further complicated when it comes to the dual sources of funding for her work, ecclesial and governmental. Her identity among ecclesial stakeholders, church mission supporters, is that of missionary. However, her identity in relating to governmental authorities, the international development community, and societal stakeholders is strictly that of development specialist.

Historical context: The growth of religious alter-globalism

How did we arrive in a situation where secular, development specialists increasingly seek to fulfill their professional aspirations through Christian mission agencies as missionaries? To better understand this phenomenon, we need to briefly sketch the development of the alter-globalist movement.

At the same time as the holistic mission movement was gaining traction, a parallel movement, alter-globalism, aka antiglobalism, was coalescing. Actors within this coalition prefer “to self-identify as alter-globalist, i.e. not against globalisation per se, but against a purely economic brand of globalisation.” ² Francois Gauthier describes the key features of this movement:

[Undergoing] a process of “NGO-isation” as well as a profound recasting of their social and political engagements within the global justice movement . . . the alterglobalist movement aims to reclaim the meaning of globalisation in the name of a global civil society. . . . In so doing, “religious alterglobalism speaks with a ‘secular’ voice, combining academic theology and appropriations of social scientific discourse to produce a second order religious reflection on world affairs and social struggles.” . . . [It] has turned towards everyday life and issues of “economic justice, environmental protection, sustainable livelihoods . . . based on empowered civil society participation.” . . . [It] participates in a common immanentization process—salvation in this world, here and now. . . . [Its religious identity is] absorbed within worldly concerns (social justice, environmentalism, etc.). ³

While this work is inherently valuable, its identity as distinctively Christian mission is increasingly contested. A marked shift in language signals a significant development in mission agencies doing development work. Development terminology such as beneficiaries, projects, advocacy, impact, results, and sustainability is replacing biblical terminology. ⁴ Central objectives include advocacy on behalf of the marginalized and most vulnerable, providing psychosocial support for victims, creating conditions for sustainable peace, and resourcing local peace and justice initiatives. Theologically, the decisive turn to the human subject has flattened missiology’s vision and imagination in many agencies, confining it within the “immanent frame.” ⁵

Postmodern, hybrid identity

In noting “a new kind of missionary” as one of today’s new trends in the World Christian movement, I doubt F. Lionel Young III meant the anonymous missionary! ⁶ While the phenomena of missionary identity and hybrid religious identity have been explored theologically and sociologically, the anonymous missionary accents aspects of hybrid identity in ways whose implications mission agencies have not yet sufficiently recognized or begun to grapple with.

While Christian missionaries have always navigated the ambiguity and tension at the interface of their various roles and identity factors, a broadly shared consensus regarding the nature of partnership between sending church, mission agency, missionary, and local partner church had existed, up until recent times. This broad consensus, in my estimation, was characterized by the following features: a shared faith tradition of historic, creedal Christianity; a shared language for expressing that faith and articulating the nature of mission; a shared understanding of the missionary vocation as a spiritual calling (vocatio); and the corporate worship service as integral to missionary practice and identity. While allowing for local, cultural, national, and denominational diversity, I would argue that, broadly construed, missionary identity and discourse were largely identifiable and consistent between senders (church and agency), missionaries, and receivers (mission field, local partners).

In our postmodern context, this broad, shared consensus has fractured. One of the many reasons for this is the anonymous missionary’s hybrid identity and self-understanding. The shared sources of identity—historic, creedal Christian faith, a shared language for expressing and transmitting that faith through the missionary endeavor, shared expectations regarding missionary identity, and a shared spirituality lived out in corporate worship—can no longer be assumed. While formerly the situation could loosely be described as “unity in diversity,” today the great plurality of missionary self-understandings makes it increasingly challenging to find unity, even within a given agency. This challenge becomes especially evident in the reception of the anonymous missionary by ecclesial senders and international, ecclesial partners. I will address this specific challenge shortly.

While the traditional missionary’s hybrid identity was centered on cultural factors (culture of origin vs. host culture), ecclesial tradition factors (sending church tradition vs. mission field church tradition), and varying roles (employee, supervisor, national representative), the anonymous missionary’s hybrid identity is firmly anchored in and defined by our postmodern ethos.

I contend that, whereas a traditional missionary was, by and large, a holistic missionary, whose missionary identity was both all-encompassing (even in unhealthy ways!) and enduringly stable, today’s postmodern, anonymous missionary can be, and often is, a missionary in places. The sense of self of a male missionary, for example, is as a fluid, buffered, changing self. He is comfortable with belonging to the mission, without believing in all of the mission. ⁷ He views partial compatibility with, sufficient overlap in, his employer’s values as normal, to be embraced, instead of a problem. This new identity is more project-oriented, temporary, and thus unstable. Rather than a divine calling to be fulfilled, missionary service is increasingly viewed as a means for self-fulfillment and personal satisfaction, an interesting international option for enhancing one’s resume. ⁸

What makes this approach to self-identity possible within the mission enterprise is the sufficient overlap in language between Christian and development terminology. Terms from Christian theological discourse are extracted from their biblical, narrative framework, transmuted within an immanent framework, and “baptized” for use in development work. For instance, divine love becomes human, boundary-crossing love; the gospel becomes good news of hope and love; divine mercy becomes empathic compassion. Christian terms are transposed into a secular key and applied to transforming human societies.

How ought the hybrid identity of the anonymous missionary be missiologically evaluated? My claim is this: Only the Christian church and professing Christian individuals can be engaged in Christian mission as missionaries. Well-meaning professionals, of varying or no religious persuasion, are engaged in inherently valuable work, but this should neither be considered nor called missions, and these professionals should neither be considered nor called missionaries. While I realize this posture poses missiological, organizational, and financial challenges for some national church mission agencies, I argue this stance for three reasons: (1) The Christian missionary endeavor has always arisen from Christian faith and created conditions for the possibility of Christian conversion. The Christ confession, albeit not always publicly feasible, has been the driving force and goal of Christian mission. (2) My approach fosters collegiality and cohesion within the mission agency work community. (3) It avoids, or minimizes, problems of incomprehension on the part of local, ecclesial supporters and ecclesial partners, thus strengthening authentic partnership in mission. I will now illustrate my third reason in the following section.

“Lost in translation”: Two case studies

In the 2003 comedy Lost in Translation, a former movie star (Bill Murray) experiences funny mishaps in Japan because of a disconnect in culture and language. I submit that when a secular professional, as an anonymous missionary, reports on his or her work to church supporters or arrives on the mission field, a similar, though much more serious, disconnect may well occur. In what follows, I will describe and analyze two case studies of “lost in translation.” These cases, I argue, exemplify twofold incomprehension, where both the professional/missionary and the recipient community talk past, rather than with, each other because of differing expectations and lack of a shared language.

First, the case of the secular professional reporting on his or her missionary work to supporting churches. According to long-standing practice, Christian congregations supporting missionaries expect their missionaries to visit and report on their work. Mission agencies also view such visits as relationally and financially important. When anonymous missionaries report to ecclesial stakeholders on their work, the discourse used can result in confusion, frustration, alienation, or incomprehension on the part of Christian supporters. Possible responses include: “What are they talking about? Why haven’t they said anything about the gospel, Christ, or the local church?” What’s the problem? As supporters of Christian mission, Christian believers want to send, support, and hear from Christian missionaries, not secular development specialists. Their expectation, justifiably, is that their missionaries will be conversant in Christian discourse and display evidence of personal Christian conviction and spirituality. Of course, anonymous missionaries do not share these expectations or hold such a self-understanding. Neither, though, can they understand the way their audience narrates Christian mission. This can result in them and their Christian, supporting congregations talking past, rather than with or to, each other: a twofold incomprehension.

Second, the case of the secular, anonymous missionary’s relationship to the local, Christian partner on the mission field. The historic expectation directed toward Christian missionaries, both by local, ecclesial partners and in the missionary’s self-understanding, is active participation and integration in the corporate worship community. Sunday, rather than being a “day off” or “my time,” is the day the Christian community gathers to be spiritually nourished by God’s Word, the sacraments, worship, prayer, and fellowship. The worship service is both an expression of, and a means for strengthening, Christian unity and identity. Secular professionals may think: “I did not sign up for this. This is not part of our job description. This is not our thing.” Should they participate in Christian worship, out of courtesy, curiosity, or a sense of obligation, they may very well have an experience similar to their ecclesial supporters listening to their reporting: confusion, alienation, incomprehension regarding Christian liturgical practice and discourse. “What are they talking about? Why do they do that? What does this mean?” In both cases—whether their reporting to ecclesial supporters or their participation in corporate worship on the mission field—there is twofold incomprehension, something significant is lost in translation, because of the lack of a shared language and faith discourse.

The credibility and future of mission

Faith matters. Missionary spirituality matters. While the Reformation sola fide emphasis has been the source of far too many, divisive theological arguments, with real-world missional consequences, for better or worse, contemporary mission thinking and practice runs the real risk, in some agencies, of downplaying the centrality of Christian faith in missionary identity. I concur with Scott Sunquist: “The missionary must not be diverted from ‘seeking God solely,’ even as she or he pursues justice, peace, and mercy.” ¹⁰ Rather than a Pietist peculiarity or sectarian view, this claim identifies the animating center, irreducible foundation, of ecumenical missionary identity and ethos, across the ages. Only a professing Christian can engage in holistic, Christian mission. ¹¹ While this truism should be self-evident, and still is across much of Global South Christianity, it is being increasingly contested in Global North mission agencies.

What is at stake, in missionary identity and practice, is the very possibility and future credibility of Christian mission. To put it bluntly: How is Christian mission discernibly distinct from the valuable work being done by the United Nations, EU, and innumerable NGO’s? If the answer is that it is not, then Christian mission has ceased to exist, morphing into something else. Why, then, should congregations continue to support such mission agencies? It seems that faith, missionary faith, is an irreducible criterion of mission. The practice of sending anonymous missionaries erodes, not only the credibility of Christian mission, but ultimately the conditions for its very existence. For the gospel of Jesus Christ to be incarnated, translated, understood, and received in today’s increasingly complex missional settings, a clear, bold, faith-full missionary identity will be essential, lest the entire missionary enterprise risk being “lost in translation.”