Today two gift shops were having their Christmas sales. As soon as I got home from work at the commissary, I went to the first one, at the Sahel. The Sahel is actually a missionary family's house just a few blocks from us. The store is only open twice a year, once in May and once in December, both sales well-timed for people who are about to head home on vacation and in need of gifts.

I guess the rest of the year the missionaries are busy spreading the good news.

In addition to the gifts I bought (which I can't tell you about because everyone on my shopping list reads my website), I picked out a bracelet for myself ('tis the season!) and a small hardwood sculpture of a baobab tree for our house.

As I was checking out, I picked up a Bambara phrase book on impulse. It starts off with greetings and practicalities ("Is the head of the house here? My name is ____."). From there it moves into work-related phrases ("What seeds should I plant? They are making bricks. This afternoon you should go out and dig out gravel. I heard a gun go off."), phrases useful for the market ("How much meat should I buy? Do you like pineapples? That is a high price."), and housework ("Kill a chicken today. Poke the fire and fan it. Drinking water should boil until it jumps.").

After the cooking terms are covered, the phrases move smoothly into Christian dogma. "God loves us all." Um ... OK. "They are Muslims." Fair enough, and useful too. But "His blood was shed as the sacrifice for our sin"? Huh. I'm not sure I agree that "We have all sinned against God." And wait! "Islam cannot save you, the fetish cannot save you, only trusting in Jesus can save you."

Yikes.

I have really mixed feelings about missionaries. So many of them do such good work -- the vegetable farm I visited in Timbuktu, a clinic for street children and a language-learning center here in Bamako, for example. And they're impressively hardy and intrepid.

But the good works I see are not their real work as they see it. The Baptist woman running the Timbuktu farm reminded me of that rather pointedly during our tour: The farm is only her second work. She is a missionary first, and teaching the Bible is her true work.

And that's where I have a problem with missionaries -- you know, the part when they start proselytizing. Of all the troubles plaguing Africa, is it really crucial that they convince Africans that "All believers should keep Sunday"? By telling them "Unless you are saved in this life, you will not be saved in the hereafter," are they doing anything to improve Africans' lives?

And yet, and yet ... They are there, in hot, dusty (or muddy), mosquito- (or termite- or tick- or blister-beetle-) infested, miserable parts of the world no one else wants to go, putting down roots and really helping people. Does the (incidental) good work outweigh the questionable preaching?