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It’s been an overwhelming and emotional experience for all of us. Where we were prepared for a possible backlash we were instead flooded with an inbox full of Fanda MKs telling their stories, “I thought I was the only one…I thought I must have been so bad that I forced my dorm parents to abuse me… I thought I was just weak…my emotional responses are dysfunctional to this day…I no longer believe in God…I know God exists but He must hate me… I thought something was seriously wrong with me… I have panic attacks and abandonment issues…I cry knowing what we were forced to endure, when someone could have stopped it.”
First, it’s hugely on my heart the need to express that this blog is not borne out of vindictiveness or a need for revenge. It breaks my heart to think of the people who will be hurt by this information being exposed. Those who hurt me by their inaction and silence. Those who called me a liar. Even those who abused me. My heart aches for you.
I guess the question is, do we want to know the truth at any cost? Or is it our responsibility as MKs to bear the pain and the shame of this, alone? We have been doing that for 20 years. I know many of us willingly would sacrifice ourselves for our parents, and many of us have done so our entire lives. At Fanda we were trained to take care of our parents emotionally from an early age, to not tell them things at boarding school were horrifically bad since it would pull them away from the Lord’s work. Combine that with a child’s natural desire for their parent to be the strong one and the moral compass and you have a perfect recipe for denial. I think we could go on living in that half-life until we grow old. But if we face the truth now and find healing, then a real, full and vibrant life is waiting for all of us, we the MK’s and our parents. God’s redemptive power and forgiveness and grace is flooding out to all of us. I pray that we all reach out and grasp it.
This blog follows 8 months of direct communication with NTM with a sincere hope that they would be as outraged as we by the facts that have been uncovered, and would finally and whole-heartedly champion us, the victims, after all these years. Unfortunately the recent communication from NTM showed us that NTM is not interested in finding out what really happened at Fanda. After 20 years of not being given a voice, now we are finally speaking. This is our voice.
What happened at Fanda is not our shame to bear, and what good comes of keeping things buried? The silence and secrecy only ensures the victims feel dirty and shameful, while it covers the perpetrators. That and that alone is our motive for bringing this to the light. We have several times gone to NTM seeking repentance, I can’t imagine anything helping the victims more than true repentance. Unfortunately NTM refuses to acknowledge their deep sin in this.
Matthew 18 says “If your brother sins against you, go and show him his fault, just between the two of you. If he listens to you, you have won your brother over. But if he will not listen, take one or two others along, so that ‘every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.’If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, treat him as you would a pagan or a tax collector.
I have gone to NTM alone. I have gone with two or three witnesses. I have flown from West Africa to Florida with witnesses to meet with NTM face to face. It is with deep sorrow that now after 20 years and eight long months we are telling it to you, the church, the body. We hope you will hear our heart.
The Fanda Eagles
“God wants us to relieve suffering, pursue justice, facilitate reconciliation, and free the heart to love, but He desires for us to do so in a way that reveals His Character. It is not enough just to do well for others or to do things well. We must do well in our unique way in order to reveal the vast creativity of a God who loves to bring change through the most unlikely channels.” ~ Dan Allender
My first post was today even though I have been reading the website with interest, and with sorrow for the victims of the abuse, for some time.
I was with NTM during most of the time period in question and of course in the dark about the abuse like so many. I want to express my heartfelt and spirit felt appreciation for all of you who have come forth despite the pain to tell your stories, in order to remove the darkness covering the abuse.
Thank you for being a conduit of information, too. I hope that either through this site or NTM we will learn of the actions taken in fact by NTM based on the GRACE report. I’m rather disappointed that information is trickling out through NTM. A report doesn’t guarrantee accountability, and from the history of this situation, it certainly demands both accountability and transparency.
@Bridgette
I would suggest you ask the admins to start a forum in the discussion boards for the WEC school. We will try to publicise it. If there is a discussion started already, other visitors to the site might realise theirs was not an isolated case and can contribute evidence.
I would suggest probably not including names, but maybe include general information that helps other potential victims from the WEC school to identify what you’re talking about.
I am also a NTM MK I attended a WEC school in West Africa. After reading the Grace report I am horrified at the horrible things that were done to children at the Fanda school. I believe there was abuse going on at the WEC school I attended as well, if anyone has information please reply. I am not sure I should say the name in the event that I would be accused of slander.
To all the survivors of the Fanda scandal I hold you in my thoughts and prayers.
Hi Gene Long,
Not sure if you remember me and Donna. Anyway, we spent 3 years in Senegal (1980-1983). Our 2 boys lived in Fanda at the MK School. While we never personally knew of or experienced sexual abuse during our time there, we are vitally interested in all that’s been said, documented, and investigated.
There are some things that at the time were pretty much a mystery to us while serving in Senegal, especially attitudes and tendencies, but now they have become crystal clear in the light of all the information on this site, the forums, etc. Looking back, the overall general attitude/relationship between leadership and missionaries left much to be desired. In hindsight it is obvious that underneath even that chasm between leadership and missionaries, there apparently was something far more sinister festering, and has now come to light.
I just read the Final Report by Grace. Donna and I know personally many of those mentioned in that report, and our hearts are broken. What a shame that these things happen, yet even more tragic that they are ignored or covered up for “the sake of the ministry.”
I do want to thank all of you who have been brave enough to share your tragic experiences and thank you for your courage. We are grateful that the Lord has evidently led you in this work. The last days truly are upon us, and times are definitely waxing worse and worse. I know the Lord’s heart must be in much pain, yet He also is able to bring comfort and heal all the hearts that have been wounded. Perhaps these very painful stories and testimonies that have been shared will help to protect future MKs and bring a certain amount of awareness to the hearts of missionaries throughout the world.
There have been countless numbers of parents who were flat out deceived; they had trusted the most precious thing they had, their children, to others, never imagining that the whole subject of child/sexual abuse could be an issue in the setting of a school for MKs that was run by fellow believers/missionaries. It was assumed that these dorm parents would love and protect the MKs entrusted to their care; how horrible to find out that just the opposite occurred.
By the way, guess what my real name is!
@shadowspring
Dave Martin doesn’t tell us what he means when he says he is “successful.” That is a regrettable omission, since it leaves open the very real possibility that he is “successful” in ways that are not pleasing to the Lord. Just saying.
I admire the people who started this website, and all those who have contributed to it. I guess I don’t share Dave Martin’s opinion that they are losers. It strikes me that they are brave, honest and exceptionally kind people. The word “successful” comes to mind.
Dave Martin is himself abusive- telling victims to just “get over it”, implying that the wounds they have and the pain they feel are there because they are too weak, and if they were better people they would just leave the past behind and be successful *like him*.
Well, if God is going to take care of everything, then Dave better watch his back, because he has spoken arrogantly to God’s precious flock, the ones abandoned by the pastors and shoved around by fat sheep like him. Ezekiel 34
Even the final jibe, implying that those who use pseudonyms are inferior to Dave Martin- his real name!- just highlights his arrogance and willful ignorance. Being a victim of abuse is shameful exactly because people like him shame victims!
I use a pseudonym to protect my husband’s anonymity. My husband is not weak, but wounded. He shows his strength by being willing to stop pretending it was no big deal and get the help he needs! I do not believe Dave’s protests that he was abused and it was no big deal. If that were true, he would show compassion here, not arrogance.
By the way Dave martin is my real name.
Wow. Please do not tell me that I did not get over it. I am very successful in my life. I know many other folks that were abused that do not hang on to the past. The truth should be told but will that help you guys cope? I will not enter this site anymore. U guys have fun.
I do not hold it against my parents. I am proud of their contributions and sacrifice many missionaries have no clue of.
David in the guestbook section you stated you DID hold it against your parents, now here you are saying get over it. What do you mean? You haven’t gotten over it. Why because it is not something you get over. You may think everything is OK but that is because you are not facing reality. We form thought patterns, emotions, evaluations of people when we are children.
I keep finding out the lies I believe about life, others, and myself even now. I am not to blame for the things that happened to me. I am not an evil person,yes I need Christ’s forgiveness for my sins, but the things I did as a child will not automatically condemn me to hell or you. Our childhood emotions will always be with us if we acknowledge them or not. I am a happy person because I learned to know the lies and start telling myself the truth.
I am not from Fanda but another missionary boarding school in another mission. But don’t you condemn the Fanda MKs for asking for the truth to be told. They are not evil or wishing evil on anyone. They are seeking to stop child abuse because some of the abusers are still out there abusing children. They are not a bunch of liberal democrats. They are strong courageous people who were not afraid to take on a whole mission. Like someone else said if you don’t want to help or be helped just keep quiet.
@Dave Martin
God loves justice. It is our RESPONCIBILITY to speak out and do our bit to prevent these things from happening to more children. I never expected any support for speaking out but I have got a lot, so I will try not to let your comments bother or sadden me too much. And no one “gets over” child abuse. It makes you who you are and affects decisions you make, mostly in a negative way, even if you don’t see it. You could be using coping mechanisms you developed during the abuse instead of making positive decision. I have certainly found this in my life. I thought it had simply made me a stronger person for a long time.
“God keeps the books, and he will take care of things.”
Really? Well silly us, having all those courtrooms, judges, police officers, laws, prisons etc…If god keeps the books and will take care of things I guess we’ve been wasting our time with all that – lets let everyone do whatever they want criminally and just ignore it,K?
I’m so bloody sick and tired of people and organizations abusing people groups and individuals and telling them to bend over and take the shaft because “God keeps the books, and he will take care of things.”
@Dave Martin
Dave, while you might be right that mankind will always disappoint and the God will judge in the hereafter, we, at least the Christians here, are also called to be Christ to the lessers who are unable to protect themselves, and by that requirement, we should speak out and make a difference in THIS world so that other who have been through what you and others have endured might not have to be subject to those same abuses.
In other words, being a Christian in a fallen world does not mean giving up. It means the opposite. It means showing that fallen world the light and justice that the Kingdom of God promises through Christ, whether or not the sin and failure of His standard comes in the service of what people think God wants or not.
Additionally, if you are going to take a contrary position, it’s generally good to present oneself as well as possible, meaning not making broad generalizations and paying attention to standard grammar and spelling conventions. Otherwise, it can make one look a bit like someone who doesn’t feel that those on the board are worth the effort to type out “you” rather than “U”, and that makes it unlikely to gain any sympathy.
@Dave Martin
Dave M. To each their own. I Love the very same people you are insulting by replying like that..Do not visit this website unless you are supportive. I am happy you got over it. You are my hero. Now, please leave your mean comments to yourself in the future.
the problem is you put too much faith in man. And guess what no mater were you go you will be disapointed. I have learned that God keeps the books. And he will take care of things.
I am a MK also lived over seas for 17 years. was raised in a Mission school. There was abuse to me and my brother. But people get over it. U sound like abunch of liberal democrats. Every one is looking for an excuse of why ther losers.
@Chris Pritchard
Chris, I think it is important to clarify the past relationship between the NTM and WEC missions. I assume you must be referring to school years spent at the original mission school begun in Ziguinchor, where your parents worked as WEC missionaries. It is true that NTM and WEC ran a collaborative school in the 70’s but it did not last long. I remember being told by the adults at Fanda that NTM separated from this collaboration because WEC allowed “charismatics” (is this still a word in the Christian church?). Senegal, was then saddled with two missionary boarding schools within a 25 km. radius, despite a national protestant population that still remains below 2% of the country. The important point, in my opinion, is that a co-managed, nondenominational school has more potential for providing a balanced and positive education experience. The issues raised on this blog began after NTM became an autonomous entity as a school. If a person accepts that mission organizations should run boarding schools, and if continued existence is taken as a positive indicator, then the fact that the WEC school still remains might suggest that they have done a better job of it. Your parents chose to send you to the WEC school after the split, if I remember correctly, which may have been fortunate for your continued positive memories.
@Chris Pritchard
@Chris Pritchard
I am not sure what you hope to accomplish by your statement. At best it seems callous and disrespectful to me. If you have read here, you have read many statements from hurting people who suffered abuse at the hands of teachers/dorm parents of NTM boarding schools, and statements from others devastated by the abandonment of boarding school and the theology that supported that system. Your posting here about how great you feel about your life and your NTM experience is rubbing salt in other people’s wounds.
Typical of NTM brand of fundamental evangelical Christians to be more concerned with reputation than the hearts of the wounded. While your statement may be true (or you may simply still be in denial) posting it here is like going to a web site dedicated to adults abused by priests as children and telling all about how awesome you found your experience as an altar boy.
I read these comments with interest as I was an MK at Fanada for many years when it was in its infancy.I was well disciplined on many occasions but that was because I needed to be.I have to credit NTM for a solid up bringing otherwise I wouldn’t be where I am now. I am now a sucessful systems engineer having worked all around the world for the last 15 years sometimes exposed to tough situations.NTM ,without knowing it,taught me how to manage risk,persevere and make choices for future years.Sure there were questionable methods in some cases and any individual exploitation I condemn but the majority of these missionaries where sincere folks.My email is christriedit@hotmail.com for anyone who wants to comment or touch base again.
Thanks for the encouragement, Highlander. I want to stay with him. Pray for me though, as so many, including our trauma therapist, are pushing me to separate. I just can’t abandon him again!
I would only consider it temporarily IF he were to become physically intimidating/abusive again, which I do not expect. I think it only progressed that far before I insisted on getting help, well because I let it. I thought I was being forgiving and supportive, a good Christian wife, when in fact I was not being very helpful at all. I know better now.
I found out that one of his three boarding schools was NTM. Does anyone here know anything about PQQ near Manaus, BZ in the 60s/70s? Any news is welcome, as long as it’s honest. Good/bad. I just want to know what I’m dealing with.
All I know for sure about so far is the animal cruelty that the boys all indulged in- a sure sign of suppressed rage. But it could be rage at being abandoned and shut down emotionally in the name of God, along with all that shame, shame, shame piled on such young children at the Christian school. ( “Jesus loves me when I’m good…”)
In other words, the abandonment of children to the care of ill-trained religious zealots as an accepted practice of the mission would be traumatic enough to create suppressed rage in children. I am not looking for fantastic stories of anything more hideous than business as usual for tribal missionaries. That is plenty bad enough.
I am not an MK or missionary but I did some training with them in 1999 they gave me my first bad experience. I wanted to join ntm but they told me I had to do “thier” Bible college after I had already been to a former Bible school! I was confused why I had to start over under “their” leadership. One day a group of leaders brought me to their office and emotionally abused me, they told me I would never become a missionary! They dropped me off at the airport and didn’t even say goodbye..The worst part was they wrote a bad letter behind my back to my paster about why I didn’t seem to fit in with there “community”. I had worked hard, studied hard, and did all the homework they told me to do but I felt something was not right. My paster knew nothing about their legalism so he believed them and my reputation ruined. It took me almost eight years to convince my church to send me overseas again. With a different organization of course..
@shadowspring
Stay with him, support him. He needs to know that you are listening. He can survive. I have. It was a terrible ride thru therapy, but I made it. PTSD is awful, but it doesn’t last forever, it will subside. Stay with him.
My husband is an MK. I thank you for this website that helps me to understand him.
I had no idea how upside-down “mission” work was, sacrificing the emotional/psychological/spiritual/physical well-being of children in order to save the natives.
The God I serve, maker of heaven and earth, is not so short of resources that children must be abandoned and used in order for anyone to serve Him. I look at such “mission” work as a work of the flesh and an abomination, the sort that “profits nothing” a la I Corinthians 13.
I don’t know what happened to my husband. He doesn’t remember. All I know is that he is depressed and abusive, alternating with the sweet, kind, gentle man I married. Please pray for him, and our marriages.
We are both in trauma therapy now, as his trauma has become mine. Pray he will remember and be healed, and not just tormented forever.
ps His parents were with UFM, now called Crossworld I think. I know for a fact that those in charge will not take seriously the damage they have done to children in the name of “mission”. Such hypocrisy.
@Chris Horgan
Hi Chris would love to get in contact sometime. Andy
I am not of Fanda missionary school, but from Mamou Alliance Academy which operated in the mountains of Guinee, West Africa.
I totally agree.. this and other like experiences are extremely UN-Christian,in fact,they are wickedness cloaked in ‘service to God”
I read this blog and know it is all true.
It was my experience too.
I left ntm in January 1992. Even today the shame I feel at allowing myself to be part of an organisation that is as controlling and abusive as ntm is haunts me.
I was told the ntm leadership were the holy spirit in my life, amongst many other things.
I was part of the leadership and a committee member in Australia. After I left I found as many people who suffered under ntm when I was a part of it, whether they were still members or not, and asked their forgiveness for my actions.
I know of people that have ended their lives, and some that have tried. I know of people who are so damaged by their experience they cannot speak of it. I know of people who cannot return to their faith.
This is not a christian experience.
c.