Yoruba in Diaspora: An African Church in London (review)

Using the Cherubim and Seraphim Church (C&S), part of what is generally called the Aladuura churches, Hermione Harris analyzes a set of interrelated subjects on the importation of Yoruba religious ideas and practices to Britain, the use of religion to build a social and ethnic network in a foreign land, and the transformation of those ideas and practices by a new generation of migrants in search of spiritual power and personal success. What gives the study more appeal lies in the insertion, since 1969, of Harris into the C&S as a member and key observer, a position which enables her to write both as an insider and outsider at the same time.

While religion is the focus here, what makes the study possible is the African migration to London and other parts of the West, which has created what is referred to in the title of the book as the Yoruba diaspora. The Yoruba, as part of the British colony of Nigeria, began to travel to Britain in increasing number during the colonial era, many of them for educational reasons. By 1969 when this study began, a Yoruba community had emerged, one of the largest West African groups in London. The migrants carried with them many aspects of their cultures and religions. As part of a survival strategy, they fell on their own native ideas to make sense of living in a foreign land. The number of migrants continued to expand so that we now have a sizeable Yoruba ethnic minority in London. Harris, in the closing chapter of the book, is careful to see how the changing composition of this ethnic minority has affected the fortunes of the C&S. Each generation seems to be redefining the spaces and boundaries of religious creation and practices, and it should be possible to do a new book that will relate waves of migrations to a set of beliefs specified by a distinct era. Although not to be seen as a depressing conclusion to a brilliant history, we see how the daughter of the founder of the C&S, now based in London, attends an alternative "Born Again" church.

The takeoff point in the historical narrative is the emergence of Yoruba students and workers in Britain (chapter 2). As Harris shows, many of the students arrived in Britain in the early 1960s with the intention of completing their education and returning home. However, the opportunities to enable them to fulfill their aspirations were diminished. They became part of a growing black immigrant proletariat, doing menial jobs for survival. Members of the C&S turned to the church to "survive their problems and maintain a sense of their own professional identity and future" (p. 19). Chapter three examines the foundation of the C&S church in London, its beginning dated to a social and spiritual event on June 4, 1965; the C&S had previously been established and spread in West Africa. In chapter 4, the author elaborates on the concept of spiritual power, which she describes as the "unseen principle of efficacy that emanates from God and articulates his creation through a web of energy" (p. 56). This is a fascinating chapter describing what the C&S says about spiritual power, without which there would be no church and no faith. Here is a popular chorus in the C&S service cited by Harris:

There is Power, there is Power,There is Power in the Blood of Jesus.Send down the Power, send down the Power,Send down the Power, O Lord.

(p. 56)

Chapter five illustrates how this "power" works, forming the platform of ritual actions manifested in divination, spirit possession and prayer. The gift of possession by the Holy Spirit is fully discussed in chapter six, that of revelation in chapter 7, and that of prayer in chapter 8. In a concluding chapter, Harris shows how the idea of spiritual power has continued in a variety of new Pentecostal churches, even if they...