The dynamics and contradictions of evangelisation in Africa
Subtitle: an essay on the Kom experience
By: Peter Acho Awoh
Publisher: Langaa Research & Pub.
Published: 2011
Place of publication: Mankon, Bamenda, Cameroon
Language: eng
Number of pages: 184
ISBN-13: 9789956578214
Subjects: Kom (African people); Religion; Evangelistic work; History; Church history
Other titles: Dynamics and contradictions of evangelization in Africa
Description: This book critically discusses missionary Christianity and colonization in Africa as twin enterprises with a common ambition. While the colonialist set out to invest capital and reap profit, the missionary desire was to tend and turn African souls from damnation. It was this desire that drove the missionaries into the interior, propelled by the belief that no land was too remote to escape their attention and vigilance. It equally kept missionary zeal buoyant. The clarification of the concept of salvation within the Roman Catholic Church during the Vatican II Council set in motion the current lethargy that has in some places crippled the mission itself. In retrospect, one can begin to wonder why Africans became Christians. What reasons motivated the early adherents to cling to this foreign religion? Were there some internal deficiencies in African traditional religions, which the Africans hoped to remedy by joining the new religion? Or was it just part of the wholesale flirting with whatever was foreign and perceived to be modern? What baits were used by the missionaries to entice Africans? Christianity posed a danger to many of the time-honoured answers to African problems. These were the 'values' Africans converting to Christianity were expected to abandon. Why have Christians continually returned to their abandoned roots in time of crisis? This moving, well argued, richly documented and empirically substantiated study concludes by cautioning against the stubborn drive at radical conversion to Christianity with scant regard to the imperatives of enculturation.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. 181-184).
Table of contents: title: Introduction; title: Missionary theology; title: Motives and methods; title: Present day challenges.