Oh troubling waters of misguided humans and good intentions, how and when can we distinguish between the calling of God and the Sirens of Titan? In a classic modern tragedy, John Chau found himself drawn inexorably to proclaim the gospel to the last isolated tribe on earth, the North Sentinelese. His father, a psychiatrist, realist and pragmatist, warned him of this folly.
John Chau, raised in my hometown of Vancouver, Washington, attended the Vancouver Christian High School (then spanning grades 7-12 with 90 students – now closed) and graduated from Oral Roberts University. From early on, first inspired by reading Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe (1719), he was an adventurist and survivalist. He was also a fundamentalist Christian who believed Christ would return once all people in the world were reached with the Gospel.
So John prepared to be a part of this crusade. He identified where the last tribe who hadn’t ever been exposed to the message of Jesus Christ was and prepared to go there. He hiked, took a National Outdoor Leadership School course, trained as an emergency medical technician and worked three summers living alone in a small cabin as a ranger and emergency nurse.
North Sentinel Island, the name given to one island in the Andaman Archipelago that spans east of India towards Myanmar in the Bay of Bengal, is known to be inhabited and untouched by foreigners for at least the last 2,000 years. Other populations in the islands have been visited by slave traders and entrepreneurs and become decimated by social upheaval and diseases (Man 1932; Portman 1990; Temple 1903). But North Sentinel, prohibited by the Indian government to all travelers, became John Chau’s goal.
This is a National Geographic documentary film of adventure and religious obsession. It is an examination of what may drive explorers to adventure and danger as well as religious martyrdom.
Directors Jesse Moss and Amanda McBaine have extraordinary access to Chau’s diary and video archives. They take us through his life, his commitment to Christ and his preparations for survival in an indigenous society that lives as humans did in ancient times.
But Chau’s father’s words, countering both his son’s religious commitment and zeal for adventure, tremble with grief: “I failed to keep him from being drawn to radical evangelical extremes.”
“The Mission” is an extraordinary study from National Geographic about the psychology of the extreme adventurer. With interviews from writers and missionaries, it studies questions we also ask the great Mt. Everest climbers who have risked their lives. Why? Is it worth it? Is the true goal more about arrogance and grandeur or some inexorable call for something greater than the self?
Credits
Directors: Jesse Moss and Amanda McBaine
Producers: Jonathan Chinn, Simon Chinn, Jesse Moss, Amanda McBaine and Will Cohen
Co-Producers: Vanessa Tovell and Carolyn Sperry Lewis
Executive Producers: Carolyn Bernstein and Doug Bock Clark
Director of Photography Thorsten Thielow
Edited by Aaron Wickenden
Released: Dec. 8, 2023
Official Website and how to view: https://films.nationalgeographic.com/the-mission
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