The Africanization of Christianity, An Anthropologist's View

Abstract

Our sincerest efforts to facilitate Africanization may prove counter-productive. And this may arise from the academic outlook of the facilitators, whether Western missiologists or African churchmen. Both are vulnerable to generalized or idealized views of African culture; and these trends may be accentuated either by guilt feelings, on the one hand, or cultural chauvinism, on the other, leading us to seek solutions in broad theoretical categories rather than in the specific diversity of the real Africa. Anthropologist Droogers believes that a better application of his discipline can help avoid the resultant risk of “artificial Africanization.” But even more importantly, he urges us to discern realistically, and view more optimistically, the degree of spontaneous folk-level Africanization that has already taken place — despite the obvious and regretted Western outer-garments that most African churches wear.

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