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Much of Oluponas work is an attempt to provide a fuller understanding of the complexity and richness of African indigenous thought and practice by viewing it not as a foil or as a useful comparative to better understand Western religions, but as a system of thought and belief that should be valued and understood for its own ideas and contribution to global religions. During religious rites, believers sometimes enter a trancelike state in which the devotee may eat and drink, perform stylized dances, give supernaturally inspired advice to people, or perform medical cures or special physical feats; these acts exhibit the incarnate presence of the lwa within the entranced devotee. C'est l'poque de la colonisation belge que les premiers missionnaires catholiques et protestants sont arrivs dans cette rgion du Zare. Important lwa are celebrated on saints days (for example: Ogou on St. Jamess Day, July 25; Ezili Danto on the feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, July 16; Danbala on St. Patricks Day, March 17; and the spirits of the ancestors on All Saints Day and All Souls Day, November 1 and November 2). Islam has experienced a similar rapid growth. One important task, then, is to see the nature, the method and the implications of Gods revelation among African peoples, in the light of the biblical record of the same revelation. AR-Ndhdnn}H\{%jC!a,]c8F`1LE(3%"w+tj}](q w[,p8i$dd$GrMRD K4wLG4@h\WfPY Nevertheless, since 1900, Christians in Africa have grown from approximately 7 million to over 450 million today. Indigenous religion in Africa is the way Africans understand and worship their god. The fusion of cultures that was effected by the conquest of Alexander the Great (4th century bce), his successors, and the Roman Empire tended to bring together a variety of religious and philosophical views that resulted in a strong tendency toward religious syncretism. He must have been active among African peoples as he was among the Jewish people. Anthropologica is published for CASCA by University of Toronto Press. Our editors will review what youve submitted and determine whether to revise the article. National Center for Biotechnology Information - PubMed Central - Vodou's role in Haitian mental health, Learn Religions - An Introduction to the Basic Beliefs of the Vodou (Voodoo) Religion, Ancient Origins - The Origins of Voodoo, the Misunderstood Religion, LiveScience - Voodoo: Facts About Misunderstood Religion, Vodou - Children's Encyclopedia (Ages 8-11), Vodou - Student Encyclopedia (Ages 11 and up). Liberia is the only country where more than one-in-ten (12%) identify primarily with an African traditional religion. In 1988 the society changed its name to the Canadian Anthropology Society to clarify its identity and emphasize its role as an anthropology association. Below is the article summary. OLUPONA: My father, a faithful Anglican priest, was a good example. In Nigeria, the population in 1900 included 4.2 million Muslims and 180,000 Christians. GAZETTE: How do you balance your Christian and indigenous African identity? Authoring or editing more than half a dozen books on religion and African culture (including the recent African Religions: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford University Press), Olupona has researched topics ranging from the indigenous religions of Africa to the religious practices of Africans who have settled in America. Par contre, les croyances en la sorcellerie ont persist. One of Jacob Oluponas earliest memories in Massachusetts is of nearly freezing in his apartment as a graduate student at Boston University during the great snowstorm of 1978. Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. In contrast, witchcraft beliefs persist. 0000001198 00000 n As for the belief in God, it appears that the Bira have utilized Christianity to make their traditional God Mbali less remote and more caring, a change which has also made the Christian God more compassionate and forgiving . Diviners who go through a long educational and apprenticeship program hold the history, culture, and spiritual traditions of the African people. Ritual functionaries include priests, elders, rainmakers, diviners, and prophets. Indigenous African religion is primarily an oral tradition and has never been fully codified; thus, it allows itself to more easily be amended and influenced by other religious ideas, religious wisdom, and by modern development. Unlike in Europe and the United States, very few people in sub-Saharan Africa say they are unaffiliated with a particular faith. In the 17th century a movement led by the German Protestant theologian George Calixtus aimed at reconciling the differences between the Protestants in Germany, but his efforts were disparaged by orthodox Christian leaders as syncretistic. That book was followed by a flurry of literature on the so-called "death of God" theology (if "theology" it was, for I would call it "atheology"). Maybe this is why I am not an Anglican priest. Some Africans believe that the ancestors are equal in power to deities, while others believe they are not. The statistical expansion of the Christian faith in Africa in this century is one of the considerations that led me back to the issue of its relation with African religion. The statistical expansion of the Christian faith in Africa in this century is one of the considerations that led me back to the issue of its relation with African religion. Outline of the Curricular Framework: Anglicanization Atlantic slave trade "Atlantic World" Barbados (sugar) British-American system of slavery the Carolinas (rice) Caste system cereal crops Colonial resistance Dominion of New England Enlightenment Furs Great Awakening Indentured Servants Mercantilism Metis Models of colonization Molasses Act GAZETTE: But yet you said its a mixed bag? {PB,`s mixing of Christianity and traditional African religions What were maroon communities? Current articles and subscription information can be found at www.christiancentury.org. It will keep me chewing for a long time, and it will most certainly feed my theological development. So I read on and on, and conducted field research to learn more and more. 0000002026 00000 n Additionally, I will not discourage, disparage, or try and convert those who practice their form of African indigenous religions. startxref Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. Indigenous African spirituality today is increasingly falling out of favor. A calendar of ritual feasts, syncretized with the Roman Catholic calendar, provides the yearly rhythm of religious practice. The idea is that the traditional African practitioner who constructed that amulet believes in the efficacy of other faiths and religions; there is no conflict in his mind between his traditional African spirituality and another faith. 300 ce). African scholars The suppression of ancestor worship is the only area where mission Christianity has scored a triumph over the traditional religious life of the Bira. Corrections? One of the things these diaspora African religions testify to is the beauty of African religions to engage a devotee on many spiritual levels. A belief in ancestors also testifies to the inclusive nature of traditional African spirituality by positing that deceased progenitors still play a role in the lives of their living descendants. Pew Research Center does not take policy positions. Muslim populations are especially concentrated in a large geographic belt running west to east from Senegal to the Horn of Africa.1 Southern Africa is predominantly Christian. L'interdiction de pratiquer le culte des anctres est l'unique domaine dans lequel la mission chrtienne a triomph de la vie religieuse traditionnelle des Biras. (I myself have consulted with several diviners for my research on specific academic topics regarding African culture and history; consequently, if we were to lose Africas diviners, we would also lose one of Africas best keepers and sources of African history and culture. This item is part of a JSTOR Collection. It is the southern two-thirds of Africa (including Madagascar) which we can rightly call Christian Africa, as the northern one-third is Muslim Africa. endobj These impinge upon their daily life- and experience of the Christian faith. Their culture, history, world views and spiritual aspirations cannot be taken away from them. Revelation is given not in a vacuum but within particular historical experiences and reflections. Updates? But after braving that first blizzard in a land far from his native Nigeria, Olupona stuck it out and earned his Ph.D. The Pew Forums survey finds a similar number of people in Guinea Bissau identifying themselves as Muslim (38%) but a much higher percentage identifying themselves as Christian (62%) and very few describing themselves mainly as practitioners of traditional African faiths. The original constitution defined the organization's mandate as providing a forum for the exchange of ideas among ethnologists. (See the glossary for more information on the evil eye.). The WCCs very existence as a council of churches is a living hope. 0000002505 00000 n It is here that I have discovered the church in Burma, in the Pacific islands, the house church in China, the basic Christian communities in Latin America, the struggling church in South Africa, plus countless other endeavors of Christians all over the world. Numbers, Facts and Trends Shaping Your World, Chapter 3: Traditional African Religious Beliefs and Practices, Tolerance and Tension: Islam and Christianity in Sub-Saharan Africa, Next: Chapter 4: Interreligious Harmony and Tensions, Chapter 2: Commitment to Christianity and Islam, Chapter 4: Interreligious Harmony and Tensions, In the U.S. and Western Europe, people say they accept Muslims, but opinions are divided on Islam, In Western Europe, familiarity with Muslims is linked to positive views of Muslims and Islam, Q&A: Measuring attitudes toward Muslims and Jews in Western Europe, Europes Muslim population will continue to grow but how much depends on migration, The Growth of Germanys Muslim Population, Size & Demographic Characteristics of Religious Groups, Pew-Templeton Global Religious Futures Project, 60% of Americans Would Be Uncomfortable With Provider Relying on AI in Their Own Health Care, Gender pay gap in U.S. hasnt changed much in two decades. This article appeared in the Christian Century, August 27- September 3, 1980, pp. Spirit possession plays an important role in Afro-Haitian religion, as it does in many other world religions. I wish to apply "change of mind" here to mean theological growth, and not necessarily a rejection of or turnaround from ideas that I may have held ten years ago. So the church which exists on the African scene bears the marks of its peoples backgrounds. At many points I see intriguing parallels between the biblical record and African religiosity. 1996 Canadian Anthropology Society African spirituality simply acknowledges that beliefs and practices touch on and inform every facet of human life, and therefore African religion cannot be separated from the everyday or mundane..