African Christianity: The Stranger Within

1. African Christianity: The Stranger Within

African Christianity: The Stranger Within CHAPTER ONE African Christianity: The Stranger Within Introduction T here is a paradox at the heart of African Christianity. It is vibrant and growing but at the same time shallow and superficial. It struggles with nominalism, syncreticism, increasing secularism, and the ever changing social and political realities and the challenges of relevance that come with such changes. The present chapter probes probable historical reasons perceived to be largely responsible for the present state of African Christianity. To help us address this paradox, we propose two possible solutions: a rethinking of mission and strengthening of theological education, but these two are addressed in chapter two and three respectively. Let us first dispense with the question of the existing paradox. Christian but … What makesAfrican Christianity Christian? Is the distinction often made between ‘African Christians’ on the one hand and ‘Christian Africans’ on the other valid? In whatever ways one looks at it, the two expressions seem to carry different connotations. The debate over the question of ‘African-Christian’ vis-à-vis ‘Christian-African,’ draws out varied understandings and interpretations, and of course implications and emphases that arise with differences in views. A common way of looking at this debate is to use the yardstick of loyalty as the hermeneutical key to help distinguish between committed Christians and common nominal Christians; or the wheat African Christianity: The Stranger Within from the tare, as the New Testament puts it. When an ‘African Christian’ is faced by a cultural-religious demand that conflicts with Christian teaching, which of the two, most of the time will take priority over the other? Put differently, are ‘African Christians’first Africans and then Christians or just Christians, who also happen to be Africans? A simple observation reveals that the African person lives in a world referenced at every point by religious meaning, where every happening finds a spiritual explanation. It is puzzling that although Christianity is widely followed, yet it often comes a poor second to the African Traditional Religion—at least with regard to being a source for providing such explanations even spiritual anchor or solid reference point. The adherence to the African traditional beliefs and practices are still very strong among African Christians. When encountering anAfrican, who is already ‘religious,’in own way, Christianity often finds a superficial acceptance and comfortably (to great amazement) stands alongside other religious views and cherished beliefs. It is only when conflicts or competition of sorts arise, that we can tell with certainty where true loyalty of the African adherent lies. In Africa, Christianity is for most part a religion of convenience, social identity, a way to be, and not necessarily a spiritual home and certainly not the only spiritual home for most professing Christians. It is true that most African Christians would, as Benezet Bujo observes, “Return to the traditional practices for comfort in times of crisis,”1 and we may add, that they do so to find spiritual security and meaning in traditional religious beliefs and practices. It is little wonder then why Christianity often takes a back seat during such times as funerals and the elaborate African rites and rituals that accompany it. The resilience of such traditional practices as upholding ethnic loyalty and identity, fear of magic, practice of witchcraft, resilient polygamy, concubinage, wife inheritance, widow _______________________________________ 1 African Theology in its Social Context, 1992:31. 6 African Christianity: The Stranger Within cleansing, sexual taboos, female initiation and burial rites2 is evidence that the African Christian still largely operates in the African traditional religious mind-set. As Allan Anderson perceptively describes, “These burial and mourning customs [and such other African religious beliefs and practices] suggest that many practices still prevailing in African Christianity … are vestiges of [African traditional religion and that] … the church does not always determine the form of the funeral.”3 We have welcomed and accepted Christianity even though it largely remains a stranger of sorts in the midst of the African traditional and religious world. My conceptual framework is thatAfrican Christianity, planted in Africa in the context of colonialism and oppression, has only managed to effect a social adjustment of sorts. At a deeper level, Christianity has failed to inspire, reshape or transformAfrican social history and basic identity. A glance through history may unravel why Christianity even though widely accepted and followed inAfrica yet has remained a stranger within the phenomenal world ofAfrican religiosity. Historical Origins: An Overview Africa...