I was reading Cludgie's post on the dangers faced by missionaries in the Democratic Republic of Congo. I recalled the blog of a missionary couple from my former ward who served there, so I pulled up the photos. It was shocking to see the conditions in Lusuku.

And I thought meeting in a room above a Karaoke bar in Nonoichi, Japan was awful! Investigators would always ask me after seeing the location of our meetings in Japan "Are you sure this is the true church? I was expecting stained glass windows!"

The church building

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-oR2nvuU4ixw/VJG2bfqfyBI/AAAAAAAAEyM/88lgAcTzPl4/s1600/IMG_2230.JPG

The chapel

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-xgqZzyyoMH8/VJAJa_PckcI/AAAAAAAAEnI/D8GcrlIP8l8/s1600/IMG_2235.JPG

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-GMZAdJswfH0/VJAJ2n3BlJI/AAAAAAAAEnY/ME2z8eMiFWc/s1600/IMG_2237.JPG

The Relief Society room

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-hiZEmVBl2eI/VJAJuNZteKI/AAAAAAAAEnQ/oV7uQNs77mA/s1600/IMG_2239.JPG

The bathroom

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-8iMs5qIFDDc/VJALbd7aWRI/AAAAAAAAEnk/_HG8IK48A8A/s1600/IMG_2242.jpg

The roof looking up

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-eqXwjni6bag/VJAL3iqx27I/AAAAAAAAEns/rLXJ4r6ZL8Y/s1600/IMG_2246.JPG

Here's a link to the blog:

http://draperscapersinthecongo.blogspot.ca/2014/

And Cludgie's original posting:

https://www.exmormon.org/phorum/read.php?2,2091064

With my eyes, what I see in these photos are people working [obviously] extremely hard, and doing the best they can (for their families, and themselves, and their communities) with what they have, or possess the potential to have.

I see many of these photos, and many individual details within single photos, as triumphs...because every piece of everything possible (wood, metal, old nails, human muscle) has been put to optimum use for the betterment of everyone who lives in that area.

If I were there in person, I would be thinking constant (silent) kudos to the people I encountered, because they have taken EVERYTHING they have access to (no matter how "used" or, by OUR standards, "useless" those materials may be) and constructed, or re-constructed, the necessities (and some of the frivolities, like benches to sit on) of what we (the most fortunate people on this planet) consider civilized life.

To me, these photos are not shocking, but kind of wonderful because I know how much WORSE things can be, but these people have--to the outermost utmost of their abilities--done the best they could with what is available to them.

As cludgie pointed out in another post on another thread, these people are the descendants of those people, and a [now] country, that Belgium ruined, as the Belgians stole and raped and killed...

...as these people were intentionally made helpless to protect themselves, or the land they had been born into. (If you are interested in the details and the statistics, Google: Belgium atrocities in Congo)

What I see in these photos is human accomplishment, and a kind of triumph...a triumph of people working incredibly hard and doing the very, very, VERY best they can with what they have available to them.

Yes...it would be a WHOLE lot better if they had good lumber, fresh metal for nails and new roofs, good fresh concrete to rebuild and repair, fresh and unpolluted water, insect nets, and contemporary waste management facilities...not to mention ordinary-to-us things like minimal nutritional supplements for pregnant women and growing children, plus some kind of basic medical and dental care, as well as contemporary sanitary products available for menstruating women, available at a price these women could potentially pay.

But given that they do NOT have these wonderful things that we take for granted and can easily find and pay for at our nearest Home Depot, supermarket, or Walgreen's, I think these people are doing wonderfully well.

I have often thought that I am not sure I could do the same, if I had been born where they were, and in the circumstances they were born into. (My default image is always of the little kids in South Africa, like five-year-old kids, who are "heads of families," fully responsible for their younger siblings in every way, because their parents and other relatives have died from AIDS, or accidents, or being murdered, and if these five year olds don't figure out a way to get the necessities of life for themselves and their siblings, they will ALL die.)

My question to everyone who looks at these photos and reflexively reacts with something like "Ick!!" is: If you were them, could YOU do better?

My own, personal, answer to that question, when I ask it of myself, has always been:

No.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/17/2018 03:57PM by Tevai.

These photos of an LDS church, of course, COULD be different (in much improved ways) if the LDS church would pay for repairs and improvements, but this may not be either desirable or practical.

"Desirable": IF the LDS church made these improvements to their church facilities, then they would be creating buildings and facilities much nicer and healthier than the people who used them could aspire to in their personal lives, and (even if this happened, which it would not) this kind of improvement would, inevitably, kick off a long-term series of events which would likely not be in anyone's best interest.

"Practical": The LDS church, even were they to devote something akin to mall money to improving LDS church facilities either "just" in the Congo, or in Africa as a whole, could not effectively change the larger picture, and even though they might attract a huge number of new converts, the whole process would be financially unsustainable.

If the LDS church was devoted to improving people's lives (rather than attracting tithe-payers), then there are countless projects which could potentially benefit from LDS monetary contributions and missionary work projects...but since the LDS church has, on a corporate level, essentially NO interest in "improving people's lives" any kind of LDS-type "Peace Corps" effort(s) is unlikely in the extreme to ever happen.

Take all of these points into consideration, and the condition of the LDS church facilities in these photos is in sync with the "better" living conditions of the people they are attempting to attract as new members, and I (personally) think it would be a mistake on all levels to improve or upgrade.

Tevai, I agree with both of your perspectives in the above postings. IMHO, I think that the LDS church does not have the capacity to bring a people to a higher spirituality without some minimal focus on the membership's most basic needs. I am thinking about "Maslow's hierarchy of needs."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow%27s_hierarchy_of_needs

Perhaps criminals would target the church if they built nicer chapels. Or the membership may become disillusioned by joining a rich American church thinking that there will be many handouts. I don't know. It may also be the aspect of fairness, meaning they would have to build equal buildings throughout the country for all to enjoy. Regardless, how expensive could it be for the church to spend USD on somewhat better chapels that the membership could be proud of?

It really sickens me how the church runs their affairs. Those photos tell quite a story.

paisley70 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Tevai, I agree with both of your perspectives in
> the above postings. IMHO, I think that the LDS
> church does not have the capacity to bring a
> people to a higher spirituality without some
> minimal focus on the membership's most basic
> needs. I am thinking about "Maslow's hierarchy of
> needs."
>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow%27s_hierarchy
> _of_needs

I agree about the basic needs...which begin with the conception of new children, who--still unborn--need adequate nutrition...good and sufficient water...and no, or relatively no, parasites in the mother's body (or HIV, either).


> Perhaps criminals would target the church if they
> built nicer chapels.

This isn't generally a problem with white African churches/synagogues/mosques. In some circumstances, individuals might be targeted, but I have never heard of a church (for example) desecration that was intentional.

> Or the membership may become
> disillusioned by joining a rich American church
> thinking that there will be many handouts.

This might happen initially, but if it did it would also stop fairly quickly when word got out that joining that church would not lead to an improved standard of living in whatever ways were most important in that particular place.


> It may also be the aspect of fairness,
> meaning they would have to build equal buildings
> throughout the country for all to enjoy.

Which leads to a really interesting question: Before I went to South Africa myself, I actually wrote a letter to the Mormon temple in Johannesburg asking for info about Mormon missionaries there. I received a heartfelt and very touching letter back, written by a male American missionary who was SO GLAD (he really was!) to be able to "converse" with me about what they were doing there, and how incredibly difficult it was to interest South Africans (of any race, I assume, though he didn't say this) in Mormonism.

My question today is: I wrote my query to Johannesburg during the transitional period when apartheid was still the law of the land, but was being widely ignored because everyone South African WAS involved in making that common, nationwide, transition...but if a black convert-to-Mormonism had shown up in the closest LDS chapel, would that person have been admitted for services? Were those missionaries attempting to convert only visibly "white" South Africans only, or "South Africans" as a group? Did those missionaries have any Afrikaans? ...or any of the other South African languages like Xhosa or Zulu or Sotho. [I think I can guess the answer to this. ;) ]


> Regardless, how expensive could it be for the
> church to spend USD on somewhat better chapels
> that the membership could be proud of?

Upgrading the chapels would not cost much, certainly not by American standards. In most cases, a few thousand dollars could produce seeming "miracles" in buildings and in ambience...

...but here I am going to change gears radically and flip to Eliyahu (the Israeli, of Yeminite heritage, who was our group leader when I went to Israel as part of a group of American Hebrew school teachers), and he had one specific opinion that I found kind of confusing on each of the different occasions it was reiterated: "Sticks and rocks" (said with enormous disdain).

Eliyahu's intensely-held personal opinion was that buildings were peripheral and of little importance within Judaism (with the obvious exception of the Temple, of course), and that money spent building "beautiful" synagogues was a contemptible waste of resources that could be MUCH better spent elsewhere (in other words: helping people who needed help).

He kept reminding us that Jews (assuming that the minimum ten Jews are present, which constitutes the required minyan) ARE [already] a congregation all by themselves---and this is true no matter what kind of building (or tent, or canopy, or cave) they are clustered in or under. (There is a Maccabeats video on YouTube called "Minyan Man," and the "synagogue" in that town in Alabama is located in the back of a hardware store. Eliyahu would DEFINITELY approve!!! :D )

When people are in need, I just realized that I have--without conscious awareness and somewhere along the line--joined with Eliyahu in the "sticks and rocks" perspective. A congregation needs protection from the elements (including both extremely hot and extremely cold temperatures) and safety. After that, the priorities are getting people in need properly fed, properly clothed, properly housed, properly taken care of by medical and dental resources, and schooled to the limits of their individual abilities.


> It really sickens me how the church runs their
> affairs. Those photos tell quite a story.

Although I am coming from a different philosophical direction, I agree with you. A couple of thousand dollars, plus free labor provided by members, could transform LDS chapels throughout Africa into pleasant and life-affirming places of refuge and renewal (both physical and spiritual).

This kind of cleaning, repair, and gentle upgrading would make life better for everyone, even if they were only passing by.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/17/2018 11:27PM by Tevai.

Sub-saharan Africans are not capable of advanced civilization. They benefited from European presence for too long, now that that presence is waning, Africa will shortly return to its prior undeveloped condition, unless endless streams of European/American money is poured into it (to no avail.)

Blacks are recognizing these circumstances and are trying to address the problem. I watched this video sometime last year entitled "Africans Have Never Built a Major Enduring City in 3,000 Years."


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZkE3xB8o8A

xxMMMooo Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Sub-saharan Africans are not capable of advanced
> civilization.

Nonsense. (And I am making the assumption that you are restricting the term "sub-Saharan Africans" to black Africans, and totally ignoring all of the "sub-Saharan Africans" who are white, who are of Southeast Asian and Muslim descent, etc. "Sub-Saharan Africans" come from most all of the human groups which are on this planet, with not that many exceptions.)

[EDITED TO ADD: According to Google, as of 1989 (thirty years ago--so, now, there would be many more), there were six million white Africans in sub-Saharan Africa. I know for a fact that, in South Africa and in other southern Africa countries, white Africans are vehement that they are "Africans"...period. Many of them have white ancestors who go back five centuries in Africa, and to them, the suggestion that they are "European" instead of African is taken as a strong insult to them personally, and also to their ancestors who lived and died as Africans.]


> They benefited from European
> presence for too long, now that that presence is
> waning...

For the most part, and until the twentieth-century CE was almost over, "sub-Saharan Africans" did not "benefit" from European presence so much as they were victimized by it: slaves...gold...diamonds...precious metals...ivory...rhino horns...chocolate...(etc.)


> "Now that that presence is waning...":

Africa, as a whole, is trying to create the same kinds of beneficial societies as exist elsewhere on the planet, and they are well aware of "European presence" in their lives, via their own histories and mass global media.


> ...Africa will shortly return to its prior
> undeveloped condition...

There is no reasonable basis for saying this in a general way. There are problems in specific areas, but they ARE (mostly) being dealt with. It is well established that history on this planet does not generally proceed smoothly forward and upward, but instead, that there are intermediate advances and retreats---such as we Americans have dealt with throughout our short history, and such as the various European countries and nations have dealt with for over the past three thousand years.


> ...unless endless streams of
> European/American money is poured into it (to no
> avail.)

Money, judiciously spent, can help a great deal...especially in educational facilities, parasite and disease control, and nutrition (especially for pregnant women and growing children). These kinds of investments lead to an educated and skilled workforce, which will (and often does) support a decent, middle-class lifestyle for most of the population, along with a highly-educated professional class of specialists, and this benefits not only that country, but the planet as a whole.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 03/18/2018 04:30PM by Tevai.

Sub-Saharan Africans are every bit as capable as anyone else. But each culture does so under its own terms, whether parliamentary democracy, tribalism, or whatever. What really derailed Africa was not the Africans. Primarily the French, the Belgians, the Portuguese, and the Brits are guilty for making Africa what it is today.

You don't seem to know how inventive and clever Africans are for just surviving, for just finding ways to get water and food. It's something I'm sure that you could never do. You may not be clever enough. You may also not know that there are some real decent places down there. It's not all Congo.

Well, that is most certainly how church felt for me.

I was involved in 1 'member=build' church before Morg, Inc. put a KIBOSCH on those;


I remember that SLC wouldn't let us locally-source ANYTHING, that would have strengthened ties to the community... NO!

See how 'smart' the brethren are? They ALWAYS KNOW BEST!

"Draper's Capers"

What hilarious, vacation-type fun!

Professional cult-promoting website, to use for PR.

What a "beautiful building" for the missionary couples to live in. I wonder how much rent money they are paying to the church.

Why didn't they show where the missionaries lived?

Thumbs up! Kudo's to the Drapers for trying to collect tithing money from people who need FOOD, water, medical care, and shoes.

My friend's son is on a mission to Africa, and the missionaries have no bathroom at all, and a dirt floor. Their most "fun" missionary thing to do is to have mass weddings. Many of the new African converts are couples who are living together outside of wedlock, so the missionaries marry them first, and then baptize them. The women love wearing the donated white wedding dresses. It's worth the baptism, to have a good meal and a party.

I think the cult should feed these people, anyway, no strings attached. Just.Give.Them.Food.And.Water.

The church has a bad problem with local African boys (many of whom are full-time missionaries right where they grew up) who get some $40-50 per month during their missions, deciding to get married, because now they have some steady cash. I thought it was funny to hear how pissed off the white-guy mission president would get every time he learned that one of his missionaries had got married to his girlfriend, often under the uncomplaining eye of his African companion.

Other churches and Christian organizations go into areas like this and focus on things like wells for clean drinking water, nutrition, and medical care. Even if they can only do a little to help, it is better than doing nothing. As far as I can tell,the LDS come in and mostly just teach that God commands a full tithing from people who can't even feed their children or provide any medical care. Occasionally the LDS team up with the Catholics to provide food relief, but they never contribute nearly as much as they are capable of.

If the very wealthy televangelists such as Joel Osteen teamed up with the LDS (the Catholics have been sued so much that I don't think they have a lot of wealth anymore) they could literally solve world poverty and still have enough left over for a comfortable life. Their excuse is the teachings of the Prosperity Gospel, which proclaims that God blesses and prospers all those who who are faithful and righteous.

My first thought on seeing these pics was to wonder how anyone would like to clean that "chapel" and bathrooms every Saturday?

Egads.

Bathrooms? Ha. Unless the missionaries built one...

How would U feel if U lived there, but only see white missionaries, no local leadership?

Numbers, please. How many people in that group, how many attend?? How many (%) actual Africans, What is SM like?

is there ANY focus on local activities, or all SL oriented?

The photos form a good reminder that those of us who live in the developed world are very, very fortunate. Even most of the poor among us are fortunate by third world standards.

It would be nice if the Mormon church made a commitment to help its members and the wider community in material ways instead of draining them of their meager resources.

Most of the Mormon buildings in the DRC are rather nice. I was in the Kinshasa Kasavubu ward, where they built a nice building right around the corner from my house during the time I was there. Before that, we had church in a sketchy part of town in a run-down old villa. I think that Lusuku is in the Lubumbashi mission, which is good news, because Lubumbashi is SO MUCH BETTER than most places in the Congo. The people are also Swahili speakers, making their culture totally different from those in the Kinshasa/Brazzaville region. Although Lubumbashi is accessible by road from Zambia--a good country--Lusuku is way the hell in the bush, a total backwater, and I would wager that the main road through is rutted dirt, and inaccessible during the 8-month rainy season. I'm thinking that this may contribute to them having an awful building. But senior missionaries eat this stuff up, and love to show pictures like this to family and friends back home. They feel purified and validated.

Rant follows: I mentioned that the Lubumbashi region is culturally different and speaks Swahili; Kinshasa speaks Lingala, Chiluba, and Kikongo. It disturbed me that the missionaries dismissed Africans as all black and backward, looking and acting the same. This refusal to learn anything about Africa, and the fact that the senior missionaries had no desire or mandate to learn any foreign language, and their total dismissal of the locals, infuriates me to this day. Blacks in different regions look pretty different from each other. By the time you travel from Senegal to South Africa, you are seeing an entirely different people, albeit normally black-skinned. God, the ignorance of the missionaries pissed me off so bad.

Entertaining story follows: LDS senior missionaries are so out of touch that they forget they had to get a visa to live in the Congo, and that the visa is only good for the Congo, or Cameroon, or wherever. Many, however, told me that they had an "African visa," something that doesn't exist. They always mix Africa up with... Africa. In their wilfully ignorant minds it's more of just a giant country. So it's not surprising that, when the senior missionaries and local members in Cameroon (part of the Kinshasa mission) organized a temple week to the Nigerian temple, the senior missionaries just tagged along with them, enduring terrible roads and slow transport in bad cars through muck and mire (that part was printed in the Church News). But when they got to the border with Nigeria, they had no Nigerian visas, of course. The Americans spent hours waving their arms and shouting, "But we're AMERICANS!!", and, "We have African visas!!",expecting that their American passports alone should get them over the border. The members from Cameroon were forced to drop the Americans off in at an awful local hotel on the Cameroon side, where they were forced to stay until the members came back through. It was a good comeuppance for them, I thought. That part was not in the Church News.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/18/2018 06:49PM by cludgie.

Oh, yeah!!

This is SO generally true about SO MANY Americans!!

A great story, cludgie...Thank you!!

Original Broadway Production (2011)
The Book of Mormon: the Musical - I Am Africa Lyrics

ELDER MCKINLEY:
I am Africa...
I am Africa.
With the strength of the cheetah,
My native voice will ring...

ELDERS:
We are Africa!
We are the heartbeat of Africa!

ELDER SCHRADER:
With the rhino-

ELDER THOMAS:
The meerkat-

ELDER CHURCH:
The noble lion king-

ELDERS:
We are Africa!

We are the winds of the Serentgeti,
We are the sweat of the jungle man,
We are the tears of Nelson Mandela,
We are the lost boy of the Sudan.

ELDER CUNNINGHAM:
I am Africa!
Just like Bono! I am Africa!
I flew in here, and became one with
This land!

ELDERS:
Ha na heya! Za ba neyba!

ELDER CUNNINGHAM:
I'm not a follower anymore,
No, now I'm frickin' Africa!
With my Zulu spear,
I run barefoot through the sand!
I am Africa!

ELDERS:
Ha na heya za ba ney...

We are Africa
We are the, the only Africa
(The one and only Africa)
And the life we live is primitive
And proud!

(Let us smile and laughrica!)

We are Africa!
We are the deepest, darkest Africa!
(So deep and dark Africa)
We are the fields and fertile forests,
Well endowed!
We are Africa!

ELDER MCKINLEY:
We are the sunrise on the Savannah...

ELDER ZELDER:
A monkey with a banana...

ELDER CHURCH:
A tribal woman who doesn't wear a bra....

ELDERS:
Ahhhhh
Africans are African,
But we are A-
Frica!

I always enjoy your stories, cludgie.