Part XXXIII Matthew - Watching the Traditions of "Dedication/Hanukkah" Develop

Column by Bishop John Shelby Spong on 30 October 2014 1 Comments
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Question

Do you have views or commentary on indigenous Christianity that has become so widespread in Africa and elsewhere? I am trying to find some commentaries on this subject.

 

 

Answer

Dear Colin,

I am not sure that the word you mean to use is “indigenous.” Indigenous means a value that rises out of the people and is native to their own evolving understanding of life. The native religion of Africa today is neither Christianity nor Islam, since both were imported from other parts of the world. Native African spirituality is probably closer to what the earliest human forms of religion were. It was a religion that postulated a “spirit filled world” and it is known by the name “Animism.” Animism has nothing to do with animals, as some seem to think, but it comes rather from the word “animate.” It was an attempt on the part of our human forebears to explain the vital forces of nature. It was the spirit of the river or creek, the animist suggested, that caused it to flow. It was the spirit of the sun that caused the sun to give off heat; the spirit of the moon that caused it to shine, and the spirit of the fruit tree that caused it to bear fruit. The list would be infinite. The spirits were thought to be personal and Animism, as a religion, helped to guide worshippers to relate to the spirits so that the spirits would act favorably toward human beings. A river that overran its banks was judged to have been caused by the river’s angry spirit. A sun that caused a heat wave, a sky that withheld its rain, creating drought, land that did not produce crops were all interpreted to be manifestations of angry spirits that had been offended by human behavior. That very briefly, and thus inadequately, is what indigenous religion was and is. Africa’s indigenous religion contained similar themes, but with particularly African modifications. Both Christianity and Islam have been imposed onto that continent with missionary zeal and in their fundamentalist forms both are wrestling today for control of the soul of Africa.

I suspect, therefore that when you ask about “indigenous Christianity” you are referring to the brand of Christian fundamentalism that is today the dominant form of Christianity on that continent. It is marked by biblical literalism and by the claim to possess not only eternal truth, but also the only saving truth. Advocates of this version of Christianity believe themselves to be duty-bound to try to convert the “heathen,” by which they mean anyone who thinks differently from the way the one speaking thinks and which includes the few remaining animistic worshippers, that the fundamentalists would call “pagan.” They also treat women as inferior creatures, much as primitive Christianity did in this country and they still make headlines with policies toward homosexual people that are not only harsh and vengeful, but that are also based on profoundly dated and inaccurate knowledge, much the same as we practiced in the West fifty years or so ago. No one today who is learned believes that any one chooses his or her sexual orientation and therefore no learned person believes that homosexuality is per se immoral. When Pope Benedict XVI kept referring to homosexual persons as “deviant” the embarrassment was not that he was prejudiced so much as it was that he was so profoundly uninformed as to be ignorant! If one is going to speak publicly on any issue one has a responsibility to be informed.

I have been to Africa on several occasions with stops in Kenya, Uganda, South Africa, the Malagasy Republic and Mozambique. I have also consulted with Anglican bishops in all parts of Africa. Biblical fundamentalism thrives where educational opportunities have been limited. There are some great African leaders who have benefited from education at the best universities of the world. One thinks of Desmond Tutu, for example, but if most Africans have received education, it tended to occur in church-sponsored schools where the agenda was frequently more oriented to conversion than to education and where the Bible was the one inerrant textbook. Many African church leaders today have been able to do further study in England or the United Sates, but most of the local clergy are trained in “Bible Colleges” that would never engage the thought of Galileo, Darwin or Freud just to name a few.

I see no evidence that Africans have less native intelligence that any other human beings. I see great evidence that Africans have not had the educational opportunities that we have had in the West. People living in nations that are treated as colonies of another nation seldom do.

Parts of the United States are still replete with pockets of fundamentalists who still think evolution is godless atheism and who still believe that God is a supernatural miracle-worker who lives above the sky. They court this God’s favor with acts of “prayer and praise.” These Christians also still believe that that every word of the Bible was dictated by God, they still believe that women were created to service men and that homosexual persons choose their sexual orientation because they are either mentally sick or morally depraved. That kind of religion, however, will not endure. It offers short term security and long term disillusionment.

Africa could be the continent of the future. Its rich resources have up until now, been used primarily to enrich the West. Someday it will begin to enrich the native Africans and when it does, it will lift Africa quickly into the modern world. When that happens, primitive forms of Christianity will be among the casualties. So will primitive, fundamentalist Islam. Christianity in Africa will then have to engage the knowledge available in this modern world in the same way that we in the west had to engage that that same knowledge over the last 600 years. I hope the Africans do a better job of that than the West has done, for traditional forms of Christianity are also dying in the West. Fundamentalism is thriving by refusing to engage contemporary knowledge – that is a sure path to death. We can do better. Perhaps Africa will show us the way.

John Shelby Spong

 

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