The Missionary Kids - by Holly Berkley Fletcher (Hardcover)

About the Book

What do we learn about white evangelicalism from those raised by its heroes? Written by historian Holly Berkley Fletcher, The Missionary Kids is a first-of-its-kind look at how the experiences of children of missionaries illuminate currents in American Christianity. For a long time, few people sought out MKs' voices. Now they are ready to talk.

Book Synopsis

"Historian Fletcher incisively explores the dark underbelly of American evangelical missionary work via the experiences of missionaries' children." --Publishers Weekly, starred review

"Insightful and hard-hitting." --Library Journal

What do we learn about white evangelicalism from those raised by its heroes? From historian Holly Berkley Fletcher, herself a missionary kid, comes this first-of-its-kind examination of how the experiences of missionary kids illuminate broader currents in American Christianity.

As sidekicks to their parents' and churches' ambitions, missionary kids (MKs) face questions many white Christians eventually ask: about God's calling, sacrifice, faith, privilege, racism, abuse, and what belonging means. In The Missionary Kids, Fletcher reveals how MKs have intimate access to the movement's logic, longings, and ideals.

With penetrating research, sly wit, and an empathic gaze, Fletcher lays bare complicated emotions and troublesome truths. She investigates how calling, multiculturalism, saints, and indispensability can distract white American Christians from their own tradition's sins and failures. Drawing on her experience as a Southern Baptist MK in Kenya, on conversations with other missionary kids, and on the work of psychologists, historians, missiologists, and researchers, Fletcher paints an intricate portrait of family life on the front lines of the missionary movement. From boarding school to war zones, and from sexual assault by adult missionaries to fending for themselves so as not to distract from the work of the Lord, MKs bear the weight of their parents' choices and their churches' ideals. Fletcher delves into the "missionary industrial complex" that shapes the lives of missionary families, listening to MKs speak of the vexing, wordless longing for the places they've lived.

For many years, few people sought out MKs' real voices. God had called their parents to do great things, so the kids were beside the point. But the children of missionaries are beneficiaries of evangelicalism's rewards and victims of its failings.

And now they are ready to talk.

Review Quotes

"Historian Fletcher incisively explores the dark underbelly of American evangelical missionary work via the experiences of missionaries' children. . . . Robustly researched and sharply analyzed, it's an illuminating exposé with important implications for evangelical Christianity." --Publishers Weekly, starred review

"Fletcher engages readers in a poignant, disturbing, and complex conversation about the impacts that the history, institutions, theologies, and culture of white American evangelicalism have had on the children standing in the shadows of those religious apparatuses and narratives. . . . Insightful and hard-hitting." --Library Journal

"It's long past time for the church to grapple with how we do 'mission work' across the globe, and The Missionary Kids is a good wake-up call. Holly Berkley Fletcher, herself a missionary kid, exposes a relatively unpublicized underbelly of mission work--the children taken to unfamiliar locations, disconnected from their parents, and left to fend for themselves all in the name of God." --Nancy French, author of Ghosted: An American Story

"Dr. Berkley Fletcher's very personal look into the experiences of white evangelical missionary kids (MKs) will leave few readers unprovoked. Many will be provoked to shock and further disillusionment with the white evangelical subculture. Many others will be provoked to defensiveness, protesting about all the people missionaries serve or the many MKs who've cherished their experiences. (I found myself provoked in both directions as I read.) Most importantly, however, this book will provoke serious discussion about the blind spots of American Christians and what it really means to love God and love people, within our homes and abroad." --Samuel L. Perry, professor of sociology, University of Oklahoma, and author of Religion for Realists and coauthor of Taking America Back for God

"The Missionary Kids mixes sensitive retellings of what happens to children when parents place spiritual calling above the obligation to protect and care for their own kids, within a system of white evangelicalism that holds itself above and often apart from those abroad whom they say they are called to serve." --Sarah Stankorb, author of Disobedient Women

"This sad, aching, beautifully written book is part memoir, part investigative report, part exposé--not just about what it is like to be a missionary kid, but about the distorted, misguided white US evangelical imagination that has produced the missionary enterprise as it now exists. The discussion of sexual predation in overseas missionary contexts is stunning and horrifying. This book is a must-read, and a crucial addition to the post-evangelical literature that is rapidly growing these days." --David P. Gushee, professor of Christian ethics, Mercer University, and author of After Evangelicalism and Defending Democracy from Its Christian Enemies

"Through the keyhole of missionary kids around the globe, Holly Berkley Fletcher provides keen insights not just into evangelical Christianity, but also into America's political morass in the twenty-first century. A highly readable and enlightening analysis of the intersection of church and politics." --Mona Charen, syndicated columnist, policy editor of The Bulwark, and host of The Mona Charen Podcast