Exchange Rates Directly Affecting Mission Work
by Allie Martin
January 22, 2004
(AgapePress) - The devaluation of the U.S. dollar overseas is having a big impact on missionaries.In recent months, the Euro has increased in value while the dollar has lost about 25% to 35% of its value. Jim Burdick is with Indiana-based Evangelical Baptist Missions, a ministry which helps independent Baptist churches sponsor missionaries. He says the devaluation of the U.S. dollar could have far-reaching implications.
"According to [our] policy, we send many of our missionaries to the field right at the support level that they need," Burdick explains. "And then if they lose [some of that support] in an exchange rate, then all of a sudden they start to lose the money to live within that economy -- and then mission agencies have to start [considering whether] to bring missionaries home."
Burdick says if the trend continues, some missionaries may have to be called home to raise more money. "When you have somebody who went to the field when a hundred dollars was a hundred dollars, and all of a sudden that hundred dollars can only buy sixty dollars' worth of goods, you can imagine yourself if you took a 40% hit in your living expenses," he says.
Meanwhile, he says, Christians in America are being asked to give more to help offset the devaluation of the dollar. "We have an immediate, urgent need that we need to be thinking about. We need to take care of those people who are already out there," he says. "I think also we're going to have be looking at this longer term and be thinking differently about some of our exchange rates."
