CHRISTIANITY AND AFRICAN CULTURE:

A QUESTION OF EITHER…OR?

BY: ONWUEGBUCHULAM, SUNDAY PAUL CHINAZO

Name: Mr Onwuegbuchulam, Sunday Paul Chinazo

Email: sageugoh@gmail.com

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ABSTRACT

Modern African Christians are often faced with a dilemma as regards how to respond to the

issue of conflict between Christianity and Traditional African Cultures. This is as a result of

the fact that Christian Catechetical teachings which hails from the Christian missionaries has

presented the Christian Bible and faith as standing in contradiction to the cultural practices of

the African people. Hence for the African who embraces the Christian faith it becomes a

matter of “either…or” and as a result many of them who will like to abide by the demands of

their traditions and cultures and to participate in them whilst still claiming to be Christians,

has adopted a kind of schizophrenic identity as regards the matter of faith and belief. This

then raises the question: is the Christian Bible and faith incompatible with African cultures

and traditional practices? This paper tries to look at this issue critically and seek to answer the

question on whether being a Christian and upholding African cultural/traditional practices are

mutually exclusive.

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INTRODUCTION

Modern African Christians are in a dilemma on how to understand the relationship between the

Christian faith they have accepted and their traditional cultures. This is in the light of the fact that

the early missionaries who brought Christianity to the African continent presented the faith as

being contradictory to the many African cultural and traditional practices they encountered. Many

of these practices where termed as heathen and pagan practices and hence outlawed by these

missionaries. This creates a chasm in which it is apparently impossible for the Christian faith to

meet African Traditional religion and African cultural practises. In recent times these chasm is

ever widening as Christians faced with the dilemma of engaging in their cultural practises are

looked upon with disdain by their pastors and also by their fellow Christians as partaking in

heathen cultural practices. In the arguments that ensues many want to maintain the teaching of the

early missionaries which suggests abolishing the traditional practices, while some want to

maintain their cultural roots and uphold those traditional practices that identify them as members

of a particular African tribe and culture. Some are then in the middle and are termed as

schizophrenics of faith as they live a double identity of faith; practicing their Christian faith in the

morning and going to their traditional African practises, rituals and ceremonies at night in the

likeness of Nicodemus,1 when nobody will see them and lay accusation of them engaging in

pagan practises.

This paper will try to look at this issue critically and seek to answer the question on whether

being a Christian and upholding one’s African cultural practises are mutually exclusive. The

paper will re-evaluate the issue and try to present a way forward towards resolving this problem.

Since African culture is a wide area, this paper limits itself to the Igbo2 Culture. The paper is

divided into three major parts: the first part will explore the background to the root of the

problem. In the second part there is a critical appraisal of the question concerning the

compatibility of Christianity and Igbo culture. The final part will make a re-evaluation of the

issue and present a way forward.

BRIEF LITERATURE APPRAISAL

The issue of the apparent contradiction between the Christian faith and African traditional

religions and beliefs has dominated writings of liberation theologians, black theologians/ African

theologians, etc. The issue also is seen coming up in political discourses when discussing

colonialism and its effects on the religious beliefs of the native African people. Biko presents the

1 The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version. (Bangalore: Theological Publications in India, 1993), Jn 3:1-21.

2 Ndigbo is an African tribe that resides at the Eastern banks of the Niger River in the present day Nigeria in West

Africa.

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problematic of the black people and their plight in the hands of their colonial whites.3 In some

papers in that publication, Biko discusses the issue of the destabilization of the religious beliefs of

the native Africans by colonial power. Biko bemoans the fact that “in the effort to destroy

completely the structures that had been built up in the African Society and to impose their

imperialism…the colonialists…turned to the past of the oppressed people and distorted,

disfigured and destroyed it. No longer was reference made to African culture, it became

barbarism. …religious practices and customs were referred to as superstations.”4 For Biko this is

the real wrong colonialism did to African traditional religion and the sad reality is that the people

who helped to impart the Christian religion “steadfastly refuse to get rid of the rotten foundation

which many of the missionaries created when they came.”5 Hence for Biko it is sad that “to this

date black people find no message for them in the Bible.”6 But for him the only path open to the

black natives is “to redefine the message in the Bible and to make it relevant to the struggling

masses…the bible must continually be shown to have something to say to the black man to keep

him going in his long journey towards realisation of the self.”7

Adamo also looks at the problematic of the encounter between colonialism and African cultures

which was characterised by hostility in which the African Indigenous Religion (AIR) was

condemned.8

The author presents a postcolonial approach to understanding what African

Indigenous religion is essentially about. For Adamo, his study is concerned “with the modern

encounter between Christianity and African Indigenous Religion (AIR) in Africa.”9 This is in the

light of the growth and resuscitation of African Indigenous religion. For the author the

postcolonial encounter between AIR “should be characterized by mutual respect, understanding,

tolerance, and some level of freedom, liberation and genuineness.”10

This according to him will

help and go a long way to reduce suspicion between Christians and practitioners of AIR as

“despite the adherents’ confession of Christianity, AIR is not about to be extinct.”11

He further

envisages that to realise this postcolonial new relationship between Christianity and AIR,

dialogue should be the watchword.

3 Biko, S. I Write What I Like. (Johannesburg: Picador, 2004).

4 Biko, I Write, 31.

5 Biko, I Write, 33.

6 Biko, I Write, 33

7 Biko, I Write, 33

8 Adamo, D.T., “Christianity and the African Traditional religion(s): The Postcolonial Round of Engagement”,

Verbum et Ecclesia 32, no. 1 (2011). 285. 9 Adamo, “Christianity and the African Traditional Religion”, 1.

10 Adamo, “Christianity and the African Traditional Religion”, 1.

11 Adamo, “Christianity and the African Traditional Religion”,1.

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Ezeogu interrogates the interphase between the Christian Bible and African culture as an in issue

in African theology.12

Ezeogu first affirms the fact that Christianity’s rise in Africa has been very

spectacular and Africa is on record the continent with the highest numerical Christian growth rate

in the world.13

However, for Ezeogu African Christians face some issues which has to do with

how to understand the Christian Bible and their cultures. He posits two models of relationship

between the Christian Bible and the African cultures which are Dialectic and dialogical.14

For

Ezeoguin the dialectic “the gospel and culture are opposed to each other, in perpetual conflict

with each other, and are ultimately irreconcilable.”15

While in the dialogical model culture and

gospel are viewed “as two compatible entities that could and that should be reconciled.

According to this view culture and Gospel could blend harmoniously. They could dialogue, and

such a dialogue would result in their mutual enrichment and efficiency.”16

For Ezeogu the reality

is that it is the dialectic tendency, which dichotomizes the Bible and African cultures, which has

been dominant.17

However for him, “the dialogical paradigm is more in consonance with the true

nature of both gospel and culture of openness to universality. Its promises are those of mutual

enrichment of both gospel and culture alike.”18

Dialogue is important to realize this and for

Ezeogu “to enter into this dialogue we need to have as aim to unify, as much as possible, the

African Christian world-view and experience.”19

BACKGROUND TO THE ISSUE

Advent of the Christian Missionaries in Sub-Saharan Africa

Christianity has been in Africa even right from the time of the inception of the Christian religion

itself. Baur reports that “modern Egyptian Christians...trace back the origin of their faith to the

very origins of Christianity itself.”20

Christianity boomed in the North and North East Africa as

early as the first and second centuries; the most progressive being the Ethiopian Christians who

were able to integrate the message of Christ to their milieu and language.21

Because of their deep

rooted form of Christianity embedded in their culture and worldview, they even survived the

onslaught of the Muslims which swept away the North African Greco-Roman Church.22

12

Ezeogu, E. M., “Bible and Culture in African Theology”, International Review of Mission 87, no. 344 (1998), 25–

38. 13

Ezeogu, “Bible and Culture”, 25. 14

Ezeogu, “Bible and Culture”, 27. 15

Ezeogu, “Bible and Culture”, 28. 16

Ezeogu, “Bible and Culture”, 28. 17

Ezeogu, “Bible and Culture”, 28. 18

Ezeogu, “Bible and Culture”, 36. 19

Ezeogu, “Bible and Culture”, 36. 20

Baur, J., 2000 Years of Christianity in Africa: An African History 62-1992. (Nairobi: Paulines Publications, 1994),

21. 21

Baur, 2000 Years of Christianity, 39. 22

See further Shenk, C., “The Demise of the Church in North Africa and Nubia and Its Survival in Egypt and

Ethiopia: A Question of Contextualization?” Missiology 21 no 2, (1993), 133-154.

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Christianity came to Sub-Saharan Africa with the advent of the early missionaries. Already

between the 15th

-16th

centuries, the Kongo kingdom has already a thriving Christian community

which was started by Portuguese missionaries who came with their colonial counterparts.23

Later

during the 18th

-19th

centuries, European missionaries have started preaching the message of

Christ to the many African tribes and lands in Sub-Saharan Africa. In most cases, as we see in the

Kongo example, the missionaries came with the colonial masters who sought trade and brought

with them an arrogant and narrow imperialist culture. They were convinced of the absolute

superiority of their culture and sought to annihilate the African cultures, condemning wholesale

the practices in these cultures, terming them as barbaric and heathen.

The Christian missionaries and colonial explorers started their activity in Igboland around 1885.24

It has to be acknowledged that truly the missionaries did bring the message of Christ, which talks

of the message of love of God manifest in Christ. They also brought schools (especially the

Catholic mission led by Bishop Shanahan), healthcare services and better and habitable houses. 25

Ndigbo realizing the good in this message accepted it and were able to abolish such evil practices

as witchcraft, killing of twins, slavery and human sacrifices. These good effects were

unfortunately effaced by the generally negative attitude towards local cultures which contained

human values acquired over times, and this is at the root of the contemporary conflict between

Christianity and the Igbo culture.

The Problem—Missionary evangelization: Westernization or Christianization?

A big question mark is placed on the content and method of catechesis used by the European

missionaries towards conversion of the locals. There is no doubt that the message of Christianity

brought by the Europeans was coated with Western culture and taught with a kind of imperialist

nuance. In most instances, the message Africans received from the missionaries was that their

culture and traditional practices were no good. According to Edusa-Eyison these European

missionaries did not respect the people’s culture as “everything Africa was primitive, pagan,

fetish, and heathen in the eyes of Europe.”26

Hence, Africans were told that in order to become

Christians they must renounce their cultural practices and accept that of the Europeans (this was a

sort of package deal). On Ndigbo axis, Nwosu affirms that “the missionaries adopted a negative

23

Baur, 2000 Years of Christianity, 55. 24

Baur, 2000 Years of Christianity, 149. 25

See Nwosu, C. U., The Catholic Missionary’s Method and Strategies among the Igbo’s of Nigeria (1885-1930): A

Socio-Theological Critical Survey. (STL Thesis, Katholieke Universiteit, Leuven, 1987), 139. Uzoh, L.N., The

Missionary Apostolate of Bishop Shanahan in Igboland of Nigeria. (PhD Dissertation, Pontificia Universitas

Urbaniana, Romae, 1988). 26

Edusa-Eyison, J.M.Y., “Kwesi A. Dickson: The Bible and African Life and Thought in Dialogue”, in African

Theology in the 21st Century: The Contribution of the Pioneers, Vol. 2, edited by B. Bujo, & J. I. Muya (Nairobi:

Paulines Publications Africa, 2006), 93-123.

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attitude that was tantamount to condemnation of disproval of traditional Igbo society.”27

The

adverse effect of this teaching is that it made people develop inferiority complexes concerning

their cultural identity. This is because they now believe that in order to be a Christian, one must

jettison his/her culture since they are thought to be “barbaric” and “heathen”.28

According to

Schreiter all these “have undermined African Christians in two ways: by demeaning their own

sense of worth and dignity as Africans.”29

The question to be asked then is whether the missionaries were really Christianizing or

Westernizing the African people. One will have to say that they were Westernizing more than

Christianizing and they might have done this consciously or unconsciously but the fact is that

they identified European culture with Christianity. It is obvious from the fruits of their works that

they imposed Western culture on the African people and their culture, resulting in their denial of

their cultural heritage. For some of these early missionaries a bit of “white man’s” civilization

will be good to the “heathen” Africans; so they went ahead to caricature the people’s cultures and

traditions, presenting theirs as superior. Onyeoma affirms that “some missionaries were not

actually presenting Christ but rather the superiority of their culture and personality.”30

The problem now emanates from the fact that those who accepted the message preached by these

missionaries and passed it on, thought that accepting their cultural identity/traditional cultural

practices and the message of Christianity preached by the missionaries is a question of either one

or the other. For them, as they were taught, you either be a Christian or a traditionalist. Hence

those who saw the good in the message of Christ and embraced it but still want to maintain their

cultural heritage had to resort to a kind of schizophrenic life. They practise Christianity during the

day and go during the night to participate in their cultural rituals and ceremonies. This has caused

lots of misunderstanding in local Christian communities and families as members are

embarrassed and are called “pagans” and “heathens” by their fellow brothers/sisters, just because

they participated in a traditional ceremony.

This phenomenon raises a big theological question for African Christians on how to understand

the relationship between the message of Christ and cultures of those that receive it. There is need

for answers and to give an informed one, there is need to critically explore what culture is and

how we can understand the message of Christ that comes in contact with different cultures.

27

Nwosu, The Catholic Missionary’s Method, 139. 28

Nwosu, The Catholic Missionary’s Method, 139. 29

Schreiter, R. J., “Jesus Christ in Africa Today”, in Faces of Jesus in Africa, edited by R.J, Schreiter (Maryknoll:

Orbis Books, 1994), viii. 30

Onyeoma, R., “Inculturation: Dancing Step of a Wounded Emperor”, Pallottine, (December, 2009), p16ff.

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A CRITICAL APPRAISAL OF CHRISTIANITY AND CULTURES

Culture as a way of life intended by God

Culture is generally defined as the way of life of a particular people.31

It is what defines a

particular people and what is at the core of their worldview and attitude towards life. People are

born into cultures to which they identify themselves with. Culture forms many aspects of our

lives and is evident in the way we eat, our clothes, our beliefs, our language, our values and vices,

etiquettes, etc. It is also the case that we always refer to our cultural codes in making certain

decisions in life; it is the reference book containing unwritten codes that we always have recourse

to. One cannot but agree that God ordained culture for the good of people after all the Scripture

says “behold they were all good”.32

Azorji hence affirms that “there must be much to affirm in a

local situation... as any cultural milieu with the creative act of God has more positive quality than

negative ones.”33

In the Scriptures, God calls people and relates with them according to their

culture and tradition. The Israelite nation understands that God accepts them in their culture, so

they worshiped and made rituals to God basing from their cultural understanding of the worship

of the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. In the covenant with Noah,34

theologians see all

humanity being called to God and of course they can only come to God from the different

cultural backgrounds in which the scattered children of Noah found themselves.35

Hence, one

does not see God making a preference to one culture as more acceptable, since it is God’s will

that people are born into and live in different cultural situations.

Perhaps, the Incarnation is the most substantial prove that God accepts us in our human culture.

In the Incarnation, the Son of God Jesus Christ took flesh and was born into the Jewish people

and culture.36

God willed his Son to be born into a human culture (Jewish), which tells us that

God does not reject human cultures. Christ grew up in this Jewish culture and appropriated the

religious and cultural values of His Jewish origins. Christianity was borne out of the Jewish

culture and religion (Judaism). The early Christians were Jews, who still believed in their culture

and took part in their religio-cultural practices like going to the synagogues to pray and worship;

celebrating the ritual of the Passover; and partaking in other Jewish home rituals as stipulated in

the law and the prophets and as believed to have been ordained by God himself. One does not

31

See further Barker, C., Making Sense of Cultural Studies: Central Problems and Critical Debates. (New York:

Sage Publications, 2002). 32

Gen. 1:31 33

Azorji, E. E., Some Recurrent Problems of Christian Inculturation in Nigeria with Special Reference to the Igbo

People. (PhD Dissertation, Pontificia Universitatis Urbaniana, Romae, 1988), 60-61. 34

Gen. 9:1-29 35

See Busenitz, I. A., “Introduction to the Biblical Covenants: The Noahic Covenant and the Priestly Covenant”, The

Master’s Seminary Journal 10, no 2, (1999), 173-189. Gentry, P.J., Kingdom Through Covenant: Humanity as the

Divine Image. Online article, 2010, available at [http://www.sbts.edu/resources/files/2010/02/sbjt_121_gentry.pdf].

Accessed: 23 August, 2013. Naugle, D., “The Covenants with Noah and Abraham”, Christian Worldview Journal,

Kingdom Living, 11, (2010). 36

John 1.

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read in the Scriptures that God disapproved of these religio-cultural practices if performed with

the proper attitude, as they were the means through which the Jews maintained a strong

relationship with God.

The Message of Christ and Cultures

If culture is a way of life of people ordained by God, one can then ask: why must a person do

away with his/her cultural identity in order to accept the message of Christ? Is it because the

message of Christ cannot fit into these receptor cultures without annihilating them? Some people

obviously thought so among whom are the early missionaries to Africa; however let us also note

that the same problem reared its ugly head during the early days of Christianity.

The Apostles of Christ and early Christians came in contact with people of other cultures right

from the beginnings. Hence, there were cultural problems in the early Church of the Acts of the

Apostles, between the gentiles who accepted the message of Christ and the Jewish followers of

Christ.37

One of the issues raised concerns circumcision, a Jewish cultural practice that marked

one as a member of the Jewish community. The problem was that some Jewish Christian elders

wanted the gentile converts to become circumcised and also to jettison some of their cultural

practises and accept the Jewish ones. Their reason was that it should be so since Christianity was

born into the Jewish tradition and assumes its religious worldview. However, the Apostles and

elders meeting at the first council at Jerusalem were enlightened to realize the problem in asking

people to leave their cultural identity and accept that of the Jews because they wanted to accept

the message of Christ. So they ruled that circumcision was not necessary for Christians, but that

they should abstain from cultural practices that involved idolatry and immorality. In effect they

were able to discern that the message of Christ is not culturally bound as Peter had earlier

asserted that in any culture anyone who receives Christ pleases God and is saved.38

It is therefore not true that the message of Christ cannot fit into other cultures without uprooting

them. According to Ilogu “Christianity is intended to be the religion not of one particular race of

people, but of the whole world; but in different countries it will wear different clothes.”39

Such

different “cloths” take the shape of the cultures of the people to whom the Christian Gospel and

faith is brought to. Pope Paul VI observes that “there are many links between the message of

salvation and cultures [as] God spoke according to the culture proper to each age.”40

St Paul at

Athens was able to make people understand the way to the true God, through their own

37

Acts 15:1-35. 38

Acts 10:34 39

Ilogu, E., Christianity and Ibo Culture. (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1974), 198. 40

Paul VI, Evangelii Nuntiandi. (London: Catholic Truth Society, 1975), 20.

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traditional religion.41

He (Paul) was the epitome of a good missionary who understands that the

message of Christ can find means of expression in different cultures without uprooting or

annihilating the said culture. Hence, Christianity can find a way of growth in any culture but this

can only be possible, if the evangelizers of the Christian message adopt the approach of the

Apostles of Christ. It is hampered when, these evangelizers like some missionaries to Africa

cannot not distinguish between their own cultural bias and the Christian message they bear. It is

this failure that has resulted in the conflict between Christianity and the African culture.

Christianity and the Igbo/African Culture: a question of either or?

Considering what we have explored so far, one wonders why the early missionaries to Africa

were so convinced of the superiority of Western culture as to disregard local cultures. The

enlightenment movement, the encyclopaedists, and similar ones had created the conviction that

only the West was ‘civilized’, and all other populations were primitive or barbaric, waiting to be

shown the way to true progress in the western fashion. We have seen that the early Christians,

who spread the Gospel of Christ, did not employ the method of destroying cultures, but one of

sowing the seed of Christianity within the culture to let it grow to maturity. Although they might

have felt strongly about their culture (as surely anyone does), they understood the cultural

problem. They preached the essential kerygma and let the Spirit make it grow in a way that

reflected it in the shape of the local culture. Hence they taught only what Christ taught and

allowed the message to sanitize whatever element in the culture of the people was contrary to the

message brought by Christ; as evidently not all tenets of African culture agree with the message

of Christ, since culture is a human construct and revealed religion is a divine construct.

One must then assert that the relationship between Christianity and the Igbo/African cultures

should not be seen as one of “either - or” but one of “both - and”, at least to a greater degree than

it is now. This is so if we agree that God works His ways through every culture and if we also

acknowledge that the message of Christ can find root and grow in any culture. Christianity and

the Igbo/African culture are compatible to a high degree, and there is need to bring the two into a

mutual relationship for the sake of the many African Christians who are in a dilemma today.

There is need to re-evaluate this issue in order to find a way forward to rectify the mistake of the

missionaries and hence solve the conflict between Christianity and African cultures, so that

African Christians could be proud to call themselves true Africans and true Christians.

41

Acts 17:22-28

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RE-EVALUATION AND THE WAY FORWARD

The Need for Re-Catechizing

The first step towards solving the contemporary conflict between Christianity and the Igbo

culture in particular and African cultures in general, is to make efforts towards re-catechizing

people by returning to the essential Christian proclamation of the sovereignty of the one God in

three persons, and the incarnation, passion, death and resurrection of Our Lord Jesus Christ who

has redeemed us and made us members of God’s family. Many traditional notions people had

about God can then be rejuvenated by integrating them with, and applying them to the supreme

God worshipped by both traditionalists and Christians, and thus emancipate them from the

shackles of early missionary methodology coated with western culture under the agenda of the

colonial masters. Re-presenting the Gospel by divesting it of non-essential elements and

concentrating on the person of Jesus Christ can foster a reflection on what is acceptable in the

moral code of the local people that does not contrast with Gospel values. The consequence should

also be a re-thinking of the ways to worship and to administer the Sacraments in rituals that carry

the proper symbolism for the people and reflect the inner theology of the sacred actions.

Furthermore, most of the problems we find as hindrance to people in proclaiming that they can

maintain their culture and still be good Christians are fomented by our nicely ‘colonized’ brothers

and sisters who are in charge of catechesis at the different Christian communities. They adhere to

the early teachings of the missionaries and have refused to accept the fact that people can retain

their cultural identity and still belong to Christ. Hence, they help in widening the chasm between

Christianity and African cultures and this is evident in some of the demands they make of people,

for example, to baptize a child or a convert in most parishes in Igboland, some catechists or

parish priests require a foreign saint’s name; and one does not really understand for what

theological reasons is this request made, when many local names show a connection to God. In

fact, the natives have good names, most of which are traditional religious names that tell of the

great works of God in their lives; so why should they not be allowed to use such names? People

should be allowed to use names that have meaning for them and show a focus in their lives.

There is a great need for re-catechizing the people in order to make them realize the positive

aspects of their culture, which God has ordained, and that they can come to Christianity in the

way they are. Those who are in charge of catechesis at parish levels should be first re-catechized

so as to empower them to reach out and sensitize people to no longer be ashamed of their cultural

identity. They need to be told that God accepts us the way we are whilst calling us to repentance,

change of evil ways and faith in Christ. They should be taught that the message of Christ can

always find root and bear fruit in our African cultures, just as Christ the Son of God took flesh

and became human first among Jews and now asks that He becomes flesh in our cultures in order

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to transform them, not to annihilate them. However, DomNwachukwu notes that the re-

evangelization and re-catechizing will demand dialogical interactions; and this will lead us to see

that dialogue and inculturation are important in resolving this issue.42

Need for Inculturation and Dialogue

The second effective way in which this problem can be resolved is through dialogue and

inculturation. Schreiter, affirms that “inculturation...remains a prime...item on Africa’s agenda”

because “for long...embracing Christ and his message meant rejection of African cultural

values.”43

Since the realization of the mistake of the teaching of the missionaries to Africa

concerning African culture and Christianity, African theologians had always called for dialogue

between Traditional African Religion and Christianity. The aim is to find ways of inculturation

through which the two can meet in a mutual relationship. In order to understand how this call can

be realized in the Igbo situation, there is need to look at the Igbo traditional religious worldview

which was overlooked by some missionaries and some of the elements that are causing great

problems today in the Church in Igboland.

Igbo Traditional Religio-Cultural Practises in Conflict Seeking Understanding

Ndigbo have strong traditional religious background and also valuable cultural practices. The

concept of a supreme God is not alien to the Igbo religious psyche; they refer to the supreme God

as Chukwu (Big God). They believe that God works through and blesses them through their

ancestors and the lesser gods and goddesses of the land identified with the nature around them;

hence they have gods/goddesses dedicated to hills, rivers, lands, trees, animals, seas, etc. The

rituals and festivals of Ndigbo are thus geared towards the worship of God and reverence of the

gods and ancestors of the land. On the side of cultural ceremonies in Igboland, such prestige

taking ceremonies like the Ozo, Nze, Ichie, chieftaincies, are done in order to recognize deserving

members and elders of the community as vanguards of the moral fibre of the communities. These

ceremonies are ritualized and sacrifices are made to invite Chukwu, the gods of the land and the

ancestors to come and sanctify and sanction the installations. Other rituals include those done by

the masquerade cults and the elders during initiation of young men into adulthood; sacrifices

made as part of sending a dead into the world of ancestors, etc. All these have caused lots of

misunderstanding resulting to those who participate in them oftentimes excommunicated from

parishes and regarded as heathens.

42

DomNwachukwu, P. N., Authentic African Christianity: An Inculturation Model of the Igbo. (New York: Peter

Lang, 2005), 205. 43

Schreiter, “Jesus Christ in Africa Today”, viii.

13

If one looks at these ceremonies one notices that there is no element in them that contradicts the

law of love in Christ. It is true however that in the past, some of the sacrifices involve humans,

but these days people know this evil and have abolished such sacrifices and used other means to

sanctify these ceremonies, yet, it still causes lots of problems. The issue of traditional rituals and

sacrifices are a no-go-area for some of our priests and African theologians. They condemn them

as part of idolatry; but then it is no problem to talk about the sacrifice of Christ on the cross. One

cannot but ask why the fuss about sacrifices? Christians got their idea of sacrifice from that of the

Hebrew religion and this involves blood, so why should that of Africans be such a big issue? We

must understand that sacrifices are means by which people are reconnected with the sacred and

divine as evident in the Sacrifice of Christ which reconnected sinful humans to God.

The Igbo culture and traditional religion asks to be understood. The misunderstandings between

the Church and Igbo culture stems from the fact that the Church leaders in Igboland has not

understood that to be a Christian, Ndigbo need not abandon their cultural heritage and those

practices which identify them as such. According to Ilogu “the Ibo Christian...can be taught to

feel at home from the totality of his (sic) being, as obtained in his past and his present

experiences, both as a Christian as well as a member of his society.”44

Hence there is need for

dialogue between the theologians in Igboland and the experts of Igbo Traditional Religion and

culture towards finding ways in which Inculturation can be realized between the two cultures.

3.2.2 Dialogue and Inculturation as Effective Ways Forward

Dialogue as envisaged by African theologians is geared towards the realization of an effective

and genuine inculturation. In dialogue two parties with varying views meet to talk with each other

in order to understand the points of agreement and dissensions and this is done in a spirit of

respect for each of the parties and their views and it leads to a realization of a point in which the

two parties can agree to foster mutual relationship. DomNwachuku emphasizes this point when

he says that “in going about these dialogical roots, the Church in Igboland should be aware of the

principles of effective dialogue, which among other things regards the listener as an equal and

respects his/her views.”45

In dialogue as proposed by African theologians, Church theologians sit

with the experts in the African religion and cultures and try to understand the practises and

tradition of the people in order to see how to allow the people’s culture to “come to Church”. It is

not an act of Christian charity and respect for the dignity of human person and his/her cultural

background, when we stand and condemn people’s cultures without trying to understand them

and we have seen that the early missionaries to Africa were largely guilty of this crime; hence the

call for dialogue as a step in trying to rectify such a heinous mistake. Dialogue will make it

44

Ilogu, Christianity and Ibo Culture, 198. 45

DomNwachukwu, Authentic African Christianity, 205.

14

possible that people’s culture be understood properly and thus see that people can be Christians

and undertake their cultural practices since such practices are not contrary to the law of love as

preached by Christ.

We note that it is the lack of dialogue and the outright imposition of a Western kind of

Christianity to Africa that has led to the development of African Independent Churches, whose

members profess that they want to adapt Christianity to their own culture and not the colonial

culture. One sees a lot of sense in that, because ultimately Christianity has to make sense to the

African in his/her cultural context. Those who remain orthodox to the teaching of the colonial

missionaries still find themselves trying to find their way back to their cultural roots and

traditional religion in the face of sickness and other phenomena which they cannot find practical

answers to from their parish priests. According to Ela “because the Christianity of missionaries

supplies no answer to the difficulties of daily life, Christians continue to follow the traditions of

their village or district.”46

They seek the help of the dibias (diviners) and many have come to give

testimony that they got what they want from these dibias; how was that possible? We cannot

know the answer if we do not sit down with these experts and to understand how this traditional

form of healing works. God has blessed people in their cultural settings and traditional religion

and will continue to heal them through these. This has to be understood and the Church should

engage the experts in these cultures and dialogue with them in order to these cultural practises

and find ways towards an effective inculturation. Azorji accentuates that, “since we believe that

the Creator is always with all of us in all cultures of the world; the task of relating the Gospel

message to the cultures of the people cannot be over-emphasized.”47

Inculturation is the process by which the understandings reached in dialogue between culture and

faith is implemented. In this, both are brought into a mutual relationship whereby one helps in

purifying the other. We have seen the forms in which the Christian message has transformed

some of the wicked practices found in the Igbo culture, in inculturation also the Christian faith

allows itself to be interpreted in the language and according to the worldview of its recipient

culture. This is what Shorter means when he says, “it is also the case that Christianity is

transformed by culture, not in a way that falsifies the message, but in the way in which the

message is formulated and interpreted anew.”48

In inculturation, efforts are made to interpret the

Gospel of Christ through the Igbo cultural experience in order to make the Gospel message

relevant to Ndigbo.49

Ilogu regrets that “the Christian Church at its beginning in Igboland did not

do what St Augustine did among the Angles, namely, baptising the people’s culture into the

46

Ela, J-M. My Faith as an African. (New York: Orbis Books, 1988), 30. 47

Azorji, Some Recurrent Problems, 26. 48

Shorter, A., Toward a Theology of Inculturation. (London: Geoffrey Chapman, 1988), 14. 49

Shorter, Toward a Theology, 14.

15

Christian Church.”50

The result of this was the kind of conflict we are discussing about, as the

Church in Igboland grew and cut off from the cultural roots of Ndigbo. But the truth remains

“that for the Igbo to understand Christianity and its demands, the Christian message must be

delivered to the Igbo in their socio-cultural context”;51

hence, the call for inculturation becomes

important.

However, there have been fears expressed concerning the inculturation project; some ask about

its feasibility and some theologians have warned against syncretism. On the cultural side, people

like Onyeoma are a bit sceptical that inculturation can work, since according to him the Christian

faith brought by the Europeans assumed the European culture and so cannot find means of

expression in the Igbo culture.52

But one can still say that that there is a possibility of divesting

the missionary Christian message of its Western coatings in order to find the essence of the

message of Christ, which then should find expression in Igbo culture. The fear of syncretism is

also well founded, what with the stories of priests becoming dibias and resorting to divinations.

This is not the mission of the theology of inculturation; rather it seeks to find practical ways in

which Christianity can become deeply rooted in the African cultures and its values.53

It is geared

towards seeing ways in which the Igbo can interpret his/her cultural values in the light of the

Gospel and having understood ways of integrating the two, can be free to practise the demands of

his/her culture and thus be proud to proclaim him/herself as being proudly Christian and proudly

traditional Igbo.

CONCLUSION

According to Ela “what is certain is that in many African countries, Christians are defined above

all as people who had to abandon their traditional customs.”54

However, the Church now teaches

that culture is ordained by God as evident in the theme of the theology of Incarnation. Hence

Pope Paul VI calls on those going to mission land to respect people’s culture and find ways in

which the message of Christ can bear fruit in these cultures.55

We can then commend all efforts

towards re-catechizing/re-evangelization of African people and all effort towards dialogue and

inculturation. These commendable gestures will go a long way in rectifying the misconception

that Christianity and African cultures are incompatible. These have been what this essay has tried

to present as a contribution to the current discussion in African Theology concerning the conflict

between African cultures and Christian faith.

50

Ilogu, Christianity and Ibo Culture, 230. 51

DomNwachukwu, Authentic African Christianity, 1. 52

Onyeoma, “Inculturation: Dancing Step”, 17. 53

Azorji, Some Recurrent Problems, 34. 54

Ela, My Faith as an African, 33. 55

Paul VI, Evangelii Nuntiandi, 20.