Precision-Engineered Evangelism? The Camel Method

For the most part, I restrict my research on evangelicalism's outreach techniques to the US context. But the question of proselytization--its propriety, its status as a human right, its place in a regime of pluralization and tolerance--has taken on a new charge in international venues.

Case in point: Robert Wright's "Opinionator" blog in this week's New York Times online, "Christian Soldiers." There Wright riffs on a Times article chronicling increased resistance to (US-based) Christian proselytizing by Islamic nations. In particular, some of these nations object especially to a tactic innovated by evangelist Kevin Greeson known as "the Camel Method." Aside from its cringe-inducing racist overtones (which appear to be unintended), the "camel" here functions as both an acronym (Chosen Angels Miracles Eternal Life) and as a reference to the proverb that once a camel gets its nose under or into a tent, the rest of the camel is sure to follow.

Geeson's technique is basically in line with the worldview apologetic approach I've written about previously. It involves getting to know the "Islamic worldview" and equipping Christians to engage Muslims on their own terms, in non-threatening ways. The key? Greeson recommends highlighting the commonalities between Christianity and Islam, primarily that, as Abrahamic faiths, they worship the same God. From there it's a matter of appealing to Muslims' reverence for Jesus ("Isa"--whose story the Qur'an relates and parallels the Christian gospel narratives in some respects) and suggesting that, if they really revere Isa/Jesus, then they should take a look at just how unique he was. Moreover--eventually--the evangelist will suggest that Muslims investigate the claims Jesus made about himself, i.e., that he wasn't merely God's prophet but God's son, the Messiah.

This isn't a unique approach, certainly not as unique as the Times pieces suggest. Greg Stier's Dare 2 Share program, for example, espouses a similar technique for talking to Muslims (as well as Hindus, Mormons, Wiccas, Atheists, and anyone else not Bible-believing evangelical). It's grounded in the worldview assumptions that traditional proclamation simply won't work for people living within whole other worldviews. Christians have to meet people where they are, resisting the urge to "close the deal" in the first five minutes by hitting people over the head with Hell-Sin-Salvation (contra Ray Comfort's Way of the Master). Additionally, the trans-worldview conversation techniques encouraged by the Camel Method direct Christians not to attack Islamic beliefs but rather to "raise up Jesus."

For many Muslims whose countries and populations the Camel Method targets, however, the Camel Method seems dishonest and exploitative. Many Muslims scoff at the idea that their Allah is at all the same as the Christian Godhead. Critics quoted in the Times article point to instances of evangelicals "going undercover," effectively pretending not to be Christian, so as to make having a theological conversation easier.

The article dwells especially on resistance by other Christians--other Baptists, to be specific--to this method. One prominent Baptist theologian, Ergun Caner, recently and publicly called out another, Jerry Rankin, for Rankin's support of the Camel Method. Caner is just as resistant as some Muslim critics to the suggestion of identity between the Christian God and Allah. Wright seizes upon this critique from Christians, lamenting that it stems not from a conviction that undercover proselytizing is wrong but from a proprietary shock that their God could be confused with another faith's deity.

Wright, in his opinion piece, warns that the Camel Method and other such Christian proselytizing techniques often get taken by Muslims in other countries as "cultural aggression." Muslims do not proselytize in the same way as evangelicals do, he argues, and they view leaving Islam as a very serious affair. Wright goes on to suggest that such proselytizing may contribute to heightened tension between Christians and Muslims in places like Nigeria, Southeast Asia, and the Middle East. "[M]y guess," he writes, "is that [proselytizing] pretty consistently falls in the 'not helpful' category from the point of view of world peace and, ultimately, American security. And some of it — e.g., the 'Camel Method' — is particularly antagonistic."

As I've written on here before, while as a researcher I find proselytizing fascinating, as a Christian I'm turned off by it. But Wright's suggestion that proselytizing constitutes a form of cultural aggression seems, at least, tendentious. At what point does any focused (dare I say "precision-engineered") mode of persuasion that seeks to create converts from one worldview to another cross over into "aggression" towards the original worldview? If I devote focused energies to convincing you to change your mind about something, I do so because I disagree strongly with your original opinion or stance on that thing. But calling such an act "aggressive" in the absence of forced coercion seems unwarranted.

It's seems--again--that the "cultural aggression" argument holds different rules for how religious beliefs may operate versus how political or cultural convictions may operate. I wonder what Wright would think of a "precision-engineered" technique that aimed to get Muslims in certain countries thinking about, say, adopting Western-style attitudes towards women's rights? What about CIA operations to encourage Western-style liberal democracies in countries whose cultural and political traditions resist democracy? Or what about the US culture industries who actively seek to create interest in and markets for Western commodities and the lifestyles/values that go with them?

What renders these acts of attempted conversion allowable (invisible, necessary, or even laudable) while designating acts of attempted religious conversion verboten? I have no interest in apologizing for "the Camel Method"; I have considerable ethical and theological qualms with it.

But I dislike this growing sense that of all the various ways that people holding one set of values attempt to influence people who hold different values, religious modes of persuasion somehow cause unique or special harm. Bolstering such a belief is the present-day assumption that faith is ultimately a private affair, a feature of identity that can and should be compartmentalized away.

It's this assumption, I argue, that really promises to exacerbate Islam/Christian tensions. Because right behind the gripe Can't those Baptists just keep it to themselves? is the gripe Can't those Muslims just keep it to themselves? Do they have to pray in public five times a day? Do they have to insist on the exclusivity of their faith? Do they have to build those minarets?--and so forth. Misconstruing faith as an I-can-keep-it-to-myself affair hinders a clear-eyed understanding of how and why faith cultures produce fields of tension in the first place, and it certainly puts us at a disadvantage for suggesting ways to ameliorate that tension.

More later,

JF