Whereas Christianity is in decline in Europe, in Africa it is still very strong.
Speaking as a rationalist and freethinker who believes he has objectively assessed the available data and has come to the conclusion that:
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Its hard to take faith-healing seriously anymore.
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Its hard to take stories of ‘demon-possession’ seriously anymore.
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Its hard to take pastors seriously anymore.
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Its hard to take bible-thumping politicians seriously anymore.
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Its hard to take the Gospels seriously anymore
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Its hard to take the fear of hell seriously anymore
… I wonder, does Christianity as a worldview still have anything to offer anybody besides the kind of subjective personal validation that one could also derive by subscribing to any number of passions, hobbies, or interests? Further, there exist today many avenues for seeking motivation for life and healthy living that do not require belief in Jesus or even a ‘God’ – and yet there are many for whom this belief is their reason for living on a day to day basis.
Atheists like myself view this dependency as a crutch.
But is there more to it?
And even if it is a crutch – what’s wrong with that, considering the dire situation the majority of Ugandans live in?
Matthew Parris an atheist, and journalist, wrote the following in his defense of Evangelical Christianity in Africa in the Times:
But travelling in Malawi refreshed another belief, too: one I’ve been trying to banish all my life, but an observation I’ve been unable to avoid since my African childhood. It confounds my ideological beliefs, stubbornly refuses to fit my world view, and has embarrassed my growing belief that there is no God.
Now a confirmed atheist, I’ve become convinced of the enormous contribution that Christian evangelism makes in Africa: sharply distinct from the work of secular NGOs, government projects and international aid efforts. These alone will not do. Education and training alone will not do. In Africa Christianity changes people’s hearts. It brings a spiritual transformation. The rebirth is real. The change is good.
I used to avoid this truth by applauding – as you can – the practical work of mission churches in Africa. It’s a pity, I would say, that salvation is part of the package, but Christians black and white, working in Africa, do heal the sick, do teach people to read and write; and only the severest kind of secularist could see a mission hospital or school and say the world would be better without it. I would allow that if faith was needed to motivate missionaries to help, then, fine: but what counted was the help, not the faith. But this doesn’t fit the facts. Faith does more than support the missionary; transferred to his flock. This is the effect that matters so immensely, and which I cannot help observing.
The hospitals, the schools, the charity work, the encouragement, the world view the belief system of Christianity contributes to Africa – all these are things Parris feels Africa cannot do without at this present time.
He adds:
Anxiety – fear of evil spirits, of ancestors, of nature and the wild, of a tribal hierarchy, of quite everyday things – strikes deep into the whole structure of rural African thought. Every man has his place and, call it fear or respect, a great weight grinds down the individual spirit, stunting curiosity. People won’t take the initiative, won’t take things into their own hands or on their own shoulders.
How can I, as someone with a foot in both camps, explain? When the philosophical tourist moves from one world view to another he finds – at the very moment of passing into the new – that he loses the language to describe the landscape to the old. But let me try an example: the answer given by Sir Edmund Hillary to the question: Why climb the mountain? “Because it’s there,” he said.
To the rural African mind, this is an explanation of why one would not climb the mountain. It’s… well, there. Just there. Why interfere? Nothing to be done about it, or with it. Hillary’s further explanation – that nobody else had climbed it – would stand as a second reason for passivity.
Those who want Africa to walk tall amid 21st-century global competition must not kid themselves that providing the material means or even the knowhow that accompanies what we call development will make the change. A whole belief system must first be supplanted.
And I’m afraid it has to be supplanted by another. Removing Christian evangelism from the African equation may leave the continent at the mercy of a malign fusion of Nike, the witch doctor, the mobile phone and the machete.”
Matthew Parris
It seems to me that Parris is saying Christianity is somehow necessary to fill the philosophical and metaphysical vacuum left by the erosion of traditional beliefs that have previously given Africans a cohesive albeit irrational worldview – because such a vacuum would leave Africans at the mercy of undesirable influences such as those things he mentions (though his selection criteria for those things is not clear).
It would not surprise me if some feel such sentiments to be patronizing in nature. I could see how one might accuse Parris of trying to imply that Africans are currently incapable of handling rationality and reason – and so at present need Christianity to save them from themselves. But even then, rather than infantilise Africans by replacing one crutch with another, why not give them the chance to learn how to walk on their own? The fact that there exists a growing number of atheists on the continent seems to challenge the implication that we are somehow unable to deal with reality without having Christianity as a crutch. Today, many Africans are increasingly looking at the world around them through a rational lens and are coming to the conclusion that one need not subscribe to religion to be moral, and charitable. Many of us have also realised that mysticism is not required as a foundation for a cohesive view of reality.
Norm Allen, the former executive director of African Americans for Humanism, wrote in his response to Parris:
I readily admit that missionaries have done some great work in Africa—building roads, clinics, schools, etc. However, missionaries in recent years have also enriched themselves while exploiting the masses, discouraged millions of Africans from using condoms, thereby increasing unwanted pregnancies and the spread of Aids, promoted sexism, contributed greatly to the persecution and deaths of alleged witches, etc. Indeed, Africa provides the perfect example of what Robert Ingersoll said about the historic role of the Catholic Church: “In one hand she carried the alms dish, in the other, the dagger.” The same could be said of organized religion in general.
In Rwanda, Christians were complicit in the genocide that occurred there in the 1990s. Many people were brutally murdered in churches. In Nigeria, Christians and Muslims have been killing each other by the thousands. Throughout Uganda, Zimbabwe, Nigeria and many other African nations, Bible-based homophobia plays a major role in the persecution, and in some cases, murders, of LGBTs.
What Africa needs is what Ingersoll called “a caring rationalism.” The Bible simply contains too many ultra-reactionary and inhumane messages to be blindly embraced by believers. Christian ideas of tolerance are inconsistent with the biblical notion that acceptance of Christ is the only way to reach heaven. The Prince of Peace said he came to bring not peace, but a sword. It is no wonder that there are so many different conceptions of Christianity, not all of them benign.
A humanistic life-stance is the best way to approach the many divisive religious and ethnic conflicts that plague Africa. Human-centered thought and action offer much more for African uplift than piety and prayers ever could. Christian charity is, indeed, commendable. However our appreciation of the missionaries’ alms dish must never blind us to the dagger that so often accompanies it.
What do YOU think? Are you a believer? Then you probably disagree with atheists on this. Perhaps to you Christianity is real and is indeed the only path to one’s salvation – relevant today as it was 2,000 years ago.
This Freethinkers’ Night we are asking – Is Christianity Still Relevant in Africa?
We will be joined by several members of Mavuno Church, Kampala, who have expressed interest in participating in this discussion, with us.
The January 2013 Freethinkers’ Night will take place on Thursday, 31st January, at SPICE GARDEN (formerly 4 Points Bar & Restaurant), Centenary Park, Kampala, starting 6PM. Entrance is FREE.
If you are an open minded person whose opinions are formed on the basis of science, logic, and reason and are interested in meeting like-minded individuals – you are more than welcome to join us.
UPDATE: We attempted to record the discussion. The sound is inconsistent in the beginning but it gets better as it progresses. The recorder kept going off so there are breaks in just a few places, and it ends rather abruptly. That said, it is a fairly good recording – it sounds surprisingly much better than I thought it would, considering I recorded it using just my cellphone’s in-built recorder. Download.
11 comments
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January 30, 2013 at 12:37 pm
makagutu
If Parris is an atheist as he claims, did he need anything to replace the christianity he believed in before? Why would he think African would not be capable of adopting rationality and besides why must people need to rely on fantasy?
Nobody denies that some churches have done a lot of charity work. Some of them have done this at the expense of their congregations. People have to feed the church, bring food for the priests and so much more, we don’t need that. We want priests to look for honest labor and not tell us they mediate between us and ghosts.
I disagree with Parris to the extent that he thinks Africans need religion. We need to get rid of it sooner than later!
January 30, 2013 at 1:24 pm
themayan
Makagutu, they tried that whole “We need to get rid of it “religion” sooner than later” during the French revolution, Stalins Russia, Mao’s China, Pots Cambodia, 1945 Albania etc. and collectively it resulted in the deaths of tens of millions of innocent Christians and other religious people, (and in a short time period) and more so than all the religious wars and inquisitions of the last 2000 years. This paradigme was based on the notion that a Godless society was a superior society, and that religion was a crutch or opiate, but weak people do not deny their faith at the point of a gun. Atheist have no real history of martyrdom. In fact the vast majority of the 3000 that died during the 350 year Spanish Inquisition were in fact los conversos/ Spanish Jews who converted to Catholicism and yet were suspect of conspiring against the Spanish crown.
Today there still exist atheist orientated countries that still persecute Christians, yet an atheist can live freely in an predominated Christian populated country, including those with an official state religion. They say God is bigger in Africa because he is needed the most there. In the US and other countries that live in the land of milk and honey, some have lost site of the more spiritual things. Its easy to be an atheist with a full belly, and even easier to believe that you are responsible for this good fortune.
January 30, 2013 at 4:00 pm
makagutu
themayan, you are being dishonest here. Stalin’s Russia protected the Orthodox church and I don’t think there is occasion to suppose they hindered religious belief. China, Cambodia and Albania I will have to read about them. Whether they killed 1 person or 3000, those are 1 person too many!
I know only of China, where religion is state sanctioned so you’ll need to provide a list of atheistic countries where christians are persecuted. Well we don’t need god in Africa.
What is your point? Does god feed the hungry thousands in Somalia, North Eastern Kenya? Are you saying one can only be an atheist when they are well fed? Isn’t this then an indictment of whatever god that exists if it is keeping people hungry just so they worship him?
January 30, 2013 at 4:31 pm
themayan
Wikipedia and sourced.
The state was committed to the destruction of religion,[2][3] and destroyed churches, mosques and temples, ridiculed, harassed and executed religious leaders, flooded the schools and media with atheistic propaganda, and generally promoted ‘scientific atheism’ as the truth that society should accept
The Soviet regime was ostensibly committed to the complete annihilation of religious institutions and ideas
Convinced atheists were considered to be more virtuous individuals than those of religious belief
The holding of a religion was never officially outlawed and the Soviet Constitutions always guaranteed the right to believe. However, since Marxist ideology as interpreted by Lenin[18] and his successors dictated that religion was an obstacle to the construction of the communist society, putting an end to all religion (and replacing it with atheism[19]) was a fundamentally important ideological goal of the state. The persecution of religion was carried out officially through many legal measures that were designed to hamper religious activities, a massive volume of anti-religious propaganda as well as education, and through various other means. The official persecution was also, however, accompanied by much secret instructions that remained unofficial. In practice the state also sought to control religious bodies and to interfere with them, with the ultimate goal of making them disappear.[19] To this effect, the state sought to control the activities of the leaders of the different religious communities.[7]
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/publiccatholic/2012/12/christian-persecution-number-of-chinese-christians-detained-soars-131-8-from-2010/
http://www.christianpersecution.info/china.php
Vietnam Affirms Consistent Policy on Religion: White Paper
US State Department Country Report 2006 on Vietnam
http://www.persecution.org/2012/08/28/crackdowns-on-christians-increase-across-laos/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_atheism
January 30, 2013 at 5:07 pm
themayan
Being a Christian does not mean you will not have trial and tribulation.
February 4, 2013 at 11:50 pm
makagutu
I haven’t said anything to the contrary, I just said we don’t need religion. Christianity is a disease, the priest tells you you are born in sin and they have a solution to the problem. They make the cradle evil and death much more evil!
July 3, 2013 at 7:48 pm
Mazzaroth Darkman
Before any Christian debates atheism with me, i would ask him/her why he/she is not a muslim or buddhist, or Osirian, or Serapian etc etc….also i would like to know why, if Protestant, is he/she not Catholic, or Adventist, or Quaker, or Methodist etc. I would require a thoughtful response to this claim: Remove ALL ancient Sun mythology phrase/practices and Christianity would be an empty shell…this includes phrase like “our (obviously male) Father” “in Heaven”, open upward palm prayer mode, the “Lord’s” day being “SUN”day, Easter, Christmas, the suffix “el” in any god-bearing name (Raphael, Gabriel, Ezekiel, Israel), any reference to the Saviour as the “light of this world”…”seen by all eyes”, whose rising is in the East etc etc and etc…
June 7, 2019 at 10:34 pm
Usar
I like the little piece of letter that you wrote some years back, if you are still around let me hear from you.
May 23, 2014 at 9:00 am
peteraknz
Just countering the false claim that “religion should not be criticized because, what are you going to replace it with ?”
Removing religion is like removing a stone from your shoe or alcohol from your bloodstream. You will be better off without it. It may not feel like that immediately, but when you realize you don’t have a heavenly voyeur it’s more liberating than anything.
March 23, 2015 at 12:28 pm
Pierre Marsal
Is your association still active ?
The blog looks deserted, is freethinkers night still on ?
November 15, 2018 at 9:23 am
Is Jesus African? / The-Ave.US
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