Indoctrination and Intellectual Abuse

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Indoctrination and intellectual abuse can and do happen anywhere, even in secular institutions. Iona and Crasner (2016) describe the difference between education and indoctrination by stating, "Education means critical thinking with regards to the content of ... received information. Indoctrination is intended to influence targets to believe in what they are told without questioning the veracity or authenticity of the conveyed information." The authors go on to relate the dangers of religious indoctrination particularly in the Muslim faith in the Middle East.

Joshua D. Reichard (2013) wrote in the Journal of Education & Christian Belief, "'indoctrination' may be defined as deliberately teaching beliefs without supporting rationalization, deliberately falsifying evidence contrary to stated beliefs, censoring and omitting particular beliefs, or teaching beliefs coercively." He goes on to quote McDonough (2011),

"...indoctrination occurs when all aspects of learning are ‘overshadowed or subsumed by the assumption of a given set of truths’ and students are coerced to speak and act in only one way that is deemed ‘meaningful’” (McDonough, 2011, p. 708). 

This last definition is particularly relevant to our context as our “distinctives” and “core values” certainly overshadow all learning at EBI. Also, we exert overt and covert coercion in an attempt to get students to agree with a certain, narrow doctrinal perspective before they get “recommended on” to the one place that will accept all EBI credits toward a Bachelor’s degree.

Note that the definition of indoctrination from McDonough applies to the overall culture that educators foster as well as to the subject matter that they teach. The ways that students speak and act toward each other are, in many cases, the most important part of the indoctrination process. A general climate full of narrow-minded, bigoted, and opinionated students (as an example) will tend to perpetuate itself and contribute to the indoctrination of future groups of students.

A Historical Perspective


Looking at our history, our school, and our organization, we should be especially wary of and sensitive to the dangers of reducing people to mindless automatons through religious indoctrination. One glance through the G.R.A.C.E. report (2010) from Senegal shows us the devastating effects spiritual indoctrination wrought in the 80's and 90's:

"The unspoken rule on the Senegal field became 'do not challenge authority on anything.' Dissenters were ostracized and eventually came into compliance or left the field and sometimes the Mission. Former missionaries from the Senegal field described such treatment by the Field Committee as 'abuse' and 'cultic.'" (page 8) 

and

"For all the damage done by the sexual, physical, and emotional abuse of  children, perhaps the saddest legacy of Senegal is the pervasive spiritual abuse that took place. All the perpetrators damaged the children spiritually." (page 24)

A careful reading of the report reveals that Ethnos360 (NTM) has a heritage of practicing spiritual indoctrination in the name of accomplishing one ultimate or overriding goal: reaching lost people with the gospel. In practice, the perspective of someone who would indoctrinate another person is, "I value you (can work with you, will talk to you, like you) IF and only IF you think, believe, and act like I do." Please read the entire report if you haven't already. Also bear in mind that Ethnos360 continues to uncover evidence of abuse and indoctrination via the ongoing IHART investigations.

Intellectual Abuse

Intellectual abuse is related to indoctrination and furthers its goals. For the purposes of this discussion, I will simply define intellectual abuse as "the practice of presenting, covering, and/or assigning so much material that the student's capacity to digest, process, and think critically about the subject matter is overwhelmed". Intellectual abuse can happen at both the individual course level and at the program level.

This definition is, admittedly, an oversimplification because there are other contexts and situations in which "intellectual abuse" is a good label. Intellectual abuse comes primarily from educators who misunderstand or ignore pedagogical concerns such as information load or educators who undervalue independent reflection, critical thinking, and/or summarizing in the learning process. Presenting too much information too confidently will overwhelm student's normal capacity to think for themselves and undermine their autonomy.

I should note here that all-consuming involvement in other types of activities such as social activities, intramural sports, dorm duties, work detail, and leadership functions can further the goals of intellectual abuse and indoctrination. Cults use a myriad of such seemingly benign activities to "hook" followers and then "intensify" involvement in the cult until it becomes inescapable. I am far from the first member of our organization to compare our practices to those of a cult, so take that for what it's worth.

Biblical Concepts

Critical thinking and self discovery are Biblical concepts, not human ones. Proverbs 14:15 says, "The simple believes everything, but the prudent gives thought to his steps." This verse points out that gullibility and credulity come naturally to humans. Humans must learn the skill of thinking for themselves in order to plan their steps carefully. At EBI, there's nothing easier than going with the flow and following the herd to the next phase of training. Why? Do most people "believe everything" or carefully plan their steps?

2 Timothy 2:7 "Think over what I say, for the Lord will give you understanding in everything." This verse frees teachers from the need to indoctrinate others, particularly other adults. It is not our job to convince other people of truth or to make them understand what we believe. Instead, our job as teachers is to say our piece and get out of the way, confident that the Lord gives understanding. Does our program evidence the Apostle Paul's posture of rest and confidence in the God who gives understanding?

Of course there's the example of the Bereans in Acts 17 who faithfully "searched the scriptures daily."

Recommendations

My strong recommendation: examine your professional teaching practice carefully for signs of indoctrination and intellectual abuse and eliminate it. This does not mean that educators are to have no perspectives or opinions on spiritual matters. Instead, I recommend we approach students with kindness and humility, acknowledging the limitations of our understanding and respectfully admitting that other wise, intelligent, godly men and women disagree with our personal perspectives.

Consider placing more emphasis on student's rational autonomy and critical thinking skills than on their ability to regurgitate precisely the language we've fed them. Consider valuing student's ability to surprise us with their learning and their ability to teach us something over an educator's importance as the center of the classroom. Consider valuing others not for the fact that they think just like we do but for the areas in which they challenge our thinking and spur us on to be better people.

At a program level, I recommend that we consider information load and student needs above teacher preferences and past precedent. A simple fix here involves aligning our program with other Biblical Studies programs with course transfer equivalencies in mind. I recommend crafting prescriptive learning objective statements that inform and guide course development rather than descriptive ones that restate what has been done historically in a course.

Most importantly, we cannot restrict the desired product of our institution simply to productive members of one organization. To do so is to undermine student autonomy and to demean the beauty and importance of God’s work in and through His chosen instrument: the church.

Thanks for your time!

Works Cited:

"GRACE Report" (2010).

IOANA, I., & CRACSNER, C. (2016). EDUCATION vs. INDOCTRINATION. Proceedings Of The Scientific Conference AFASES, 2561-574. doi:10.19062/2247-3173.2016.18.2.11

Reichard, J. D. (2013). From Indoctrination to Initiation: A Non-coercive Approach to Faith-Learning Integration. Journal Of Education & Christian Belief, 17(2), 285-299.