Abstract
Apart from being asked about the food and weather in Africa, one of the most frequent questions I am asked as a seminary student from Ghana concerns the Christian experience in Africa, especially because many are aware of the vibrancy and growth of the church across the African continent. Indeed, because Christianity is on the rise in Africa whereas secularism is on the rise in the West, I am often asked whether there is hope for the faith in the West. Without a doubt, the answer is yes, but understanding how this is the case requires reflecting on history. After all, the most important difference between Africa and the West is the way it responded to the collapse of Christendom in the twentieth century. That is the story that must be explored if one hopes to learn from the dynamism of African Christianity.
On Good Friday, April 8, 1966, the cover page of Time magazine read, “Is God Dead?” According to Time, “the three words represent a summons to reflect on the meaning of existence.” 1 In the essay, editor John T. Elson heralded the rise of “the new atheism.” Elson drew on the religious and socio-political trends of the day, such as the jarring truth of the Holocaust, to argue for the decline in the consciousness of a personal God even among American Protestants. 2 Eighty-four years prior to this headline, Friedrich Nietzsche had opened a similar conversation in Europe with his infamous essay “Gott ist tot” (God is dead). The irony is that the West (Europe and North America), which accounted for roughly 80% of the world’s Christian population in 1900, was the face of Christianity. 3 However, after two bloody world wars largely fought by western powers it was time to clear the decks and rebuild everything. In the rebuilding, the consensus was that the Christian identity of the West was irrelevant.
Following this, Marxism and secularism replaced Christianity in Europe, while in North America the “Death of God” movement reflected the growing secularization of Christianity. The numbers that were attracted to these philosophies suggested that western Christianity now had formidable alternatives plunging it into a state of crisis. Commenting on the religious crisis of the 1960s in the West, Alister McGrath observes, “A new world had dawned, it was argued, and Christians would just have to bring their ideas into line with it. The message was clear: Christianity had to update itself or die. There was no shortage of those expecting the latter.” 4
From my perspective, the cultural and religious changes that took place in the West during the 1960s signaled the end of Christendom, though not necessarily Christianity. Jehu Hanciles defines Christendom as “the experience of Christianity as territorial faith and tribal religion.” 5 Under Christendom, Europe “adopted and experienced the Christian faith as custom or customary law,” and this “meant there could only be one church within the whole community.” 6 Furthermore, “the prominent role that rulers played in establishing the faith also created an intimate connection between cross and crown.” 7 The Christendom ideal “engendered strong intolerance of religious dissent and, by implication, explicit disavowal of religious plurality.” 8 Ultimately, the mass conversions and identification of Christianity with the European territory produced superficiality among adherents of the faith, leaving a weak church institution to deal with the forces of Marxism and secularism.
In their bestselling book, Resident Aliens, Stanley Hauerwas and William Willimon’s category of Constantinianism fits the Christendom paradigm. Under a Constantinian worldview, North America accepted “the notion that the church needs some sort of surrounding ‘Christian’ culture to prop it up.” 9 This notion inevitably led to a “Constantinian synthesis between the church and the world.” 10 According to Hauerwas and Willimon, Constantinianism extended from 313 to 1963 CE. Like Christendom in Europe, in Constantinianism, Christianity is experienced territorially and the church is functionally linked to the state. Hauerwas and Willimon summed up their experience of life under a Constantinian worldview: “church, home, and state formed a national consortium that worked together to instill ‘Christian values.’ People grew up Christian simply by being lucky enough to be born in places like Greenville, South Carolina, or Pleasant Grove, Texas.” 11
The effects of a post-Christendom West continue well into the twenty-first century. The Pew Research Center reports that in North America the adult Christian population shrank by 8% in seven years, from 78.4% in 2007 to 70.6% in 2014. Over the same period, there was almost an equal increase in percentage points of those who describe themselves as atheist, agnostic, or “nothing in particular.” 12 As for Europe, The Wall Street Journal on January 7, 2015 published an article, “Europe’s Empty Churches Go on Sale.” 13 According to the article, the Church of England accounts for the closure of about 20 churches a year. About two hundred Danish churches are also “deemed nonviable or underused,” and 515 Roman Catholic Churches in Germany have closed in the last decade. 14
Incidentally, the demise of Christendom in the West coincided with its demise in Africa between the late 1950s to the 1960s. Since Christendom “aims at the creation of Christian society, where it was deemed non-existent—that is, outside Europe,” the Christendom experience of Christianity found its way to Sub-Saharan Africa through western migration and missions between 1500 and the early 1950s.
15
The Portuguese, encouraged by the Papal Bull of 1456 issued by Pope Calixtus III, were the first western empire to make contact with Africa. The Papal Bull placed the responsibility for the sponsorship of missionaries in the hands of the King of Portugal. The marriage between the church and the empire, ostensibly extending the frontiers of Christianity through missions, turned out to be an enterprise to extend the Portuguese empire to Africa. Harvey Sindima describes the fifteenth century arrival of Portuguese missionaries on the shores of Africa:
Portuguese missionaries entering Africa saw two enemies against their work: Muslims along the Mediterranean lands and East Africa, and the “pagan” culture which had to be replaced if success of Christianity was to be assured. Portuguese missionaries took an aggressive policy toward both enemies. They demanded that Africans not only accept the Gospel, but also the King of Portugal as the highest political and ecclesiastical authority.
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Because the Portuguese emphasized conversion and baptism as a means of acknowledging Christ and the King of Portugal, Christianity became an encroachment on the sovereignty of African states. The Portuguese were sometimes embroiled in battles with tribal armies, and this made the Christian faith unpopular on the continent. Ultimately, the Portuguese promotion of Christianity on the African continent became bogged down because of the waning of their political and military power both at home in Europe and Africa. This circumstance underlines the fact that under the Christendom model the fortunes of Christianity diminish when political power wanes. Additionally, the Portuguese sojourn in Africa foreshadowed the commingling of Christianity and colonialism in the western missionary expeditions of later centuries.
In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, after the botched endeavor of the Portuguese, western powers such as Britain, Belgium, France, and Holland embarked on a wider missionary campaign that covered the whole of Sub-Saharan Africa. Soon, in what is known as the “Scramble for Africa,” 90% of the African continent was divided among the western empires, and each empire became primarily responsible for missionary activities within its colony. As a result, it was difficult to distinguish between colonial administrators and missionaries because they drew support from each other. The missionary depended on the protection of the colonial administration, and the missionary’s service benefited the western empire’s desire to spread its principles of civilization for smooth governance. Thus, indigenous peoples widely perceived that the western missionary appealed to conversion towards the same end as the colonialists, namely the acquisition of Africa’s cornucopia of resources. Desmond Tutu famously quipped, “When the missionaries came to Africa they had the Bible and we had the land. They said ‘Let us pray.’ We closed our eyes. When we opened them we had the Bible and they had the land.” 17
Furthermore, because Christendom aims to extend a monolithic culture and Christian identity, conversion was to Africans a fundamental adoption of western lifestyle. This imposition of western culture on the claims of the gospel became a turn-off for Africans. Thus, after centuries of western colonialism and missions in Africa, the fortunes of Christianity did not improve.
The African Independent Churches (AICs) sparked the turnaround in the fortunes of African Christianity. Under the leadership of charismatic leaders such as William Wade Harris, Simon Kimbangu, and Garrick Braide, the AICs stood up against the Christendom ideal advanced by western colonialists. The AICs came into existence as a quasi-pro-independence nationalist force that sought among other things to strip away the imperialist garb of Christianity. Outside the control of the traditional denominations of the West, the AICs did not serve the interests of the colonialists. Arguably, their greatest contribution to the success of the faith on the continent was in their ingenuity to adapt the gospel to the spiritual, social, and political needs of the African. These aspects of the ministry of the AICs ensured that they were able to reach more Africans with the gospel than the traditional churches under western missionaries ever did.
After the independence of African states between the 1950s and 1960s, colonial administrators and foreign missionaries who were the physical structures of Christendom left the shores of Africa. However, the churches established by the western missionaries continued to propagate the gospel with its western accretions. The cerebral and antisupernaturalist tendencies of western Christianity contrasted with the teachings of the AICs, who emphasized “spirituality and faith-healing practices.” 18 Therefore, the AICs drew a larger following among Africans, and soon their success influenced the traditional churches established by foreign missionaries to give an African face to the teaching and praxis of the gospel.
Despite the proliferation of despots, most of whom are not friendly to Christianity, and widespread economic hardship in post-colonial Africa, Christianity accounted for over 40% of the African population (360 million) by the year 2000. 19 According to the Pew Research Center, by 2050 “four out of every ten Christians in the world will live in Sub-Saharan Africa.” 20 Indeed, Africa stands today as the new face of Christianity, and that is quite remarkable considering the fact that the entire continent accounted for just 9.9 million Christians (9.4%) in 1900. 21
Furthermore, the growth of Christianity on the continent is staggering considering the fact that Africa experienced an end of the Christendom model of Christianity just about the same time as the West. The difference, however, lies in the fact that whereas in Europe and North America, Marxism and secularism filled the vacuum left by the Christendom experience of Christianity, a dynamic and New Testament brand of Christianity marked by the power of the Holy Spirit, afflictions, persecution, and an explosive church growth filled the vacuum in Africa. Commenting on the changing landscape of Christian leadership from the West to the Third World, Andrew Wells asserts, “there can be no automatic assumption of Western leadership; indeed, if suffering and endurance are the badges of authenticity, we can expect the most powerful Christian leadership to come from elsewhere.” 22
The remarkable growth and development of African Christianity has spilled over to the West today through African Christian migrants. In a phenomenon known as reverse missions, African Christian migrants now act as missionaries to the West. Importantly, the presence and ministry of African Immigrant Churches in Europe and North America have become living proof that a return to New Testament Christianity is possible in the western context. For instance, Sunday Adelaja, an African international student from Nigeria, planted the largest church in Ukraine and the largest evangelical-charismatic church in Europe. The church, Embassy of God, which began in 1993 with just 7–15 members, has grown to 25,000. 23 Remarkably, it is an intercultural and racially diverse church open to both African Immigrants and native Ukrainians. The church feeds the hungry and rescues alcoholics and drug addicts through its rehabilitation center. By Adelaja’s account, this was achieved despite “racial abuse and insults” directed at him and his family as well as intimidation by the government and traditional churches in Ukraine. 24
The success story of Adelaja’s ministry correlates with that of African Immigrant Churches in North America and all over Europe. As an international student from Ghana, I have firsthand experience of the faith renewal that African Christians can bring to western Christianity. The testimony of my faith journey from Ghana to Campbell University Divinity School in North Carolina has revived the faith of some within my sphere of influence. Furthermore, as Afe Adogame observes, my presence and those of other African Christians has “brought an … appreciation of the multicultural nature of Christianity in the twenty-first century” to the West. 25 Actually, the lack of appreciation for the multicultural nature of Christianity is one of the major deficiencies of the Christendom model. Such an appreciation is needed for western churches, Christians, and theological seminaries if they are to open their doors efficaciously to receive the ministry of the teeming number of migrants who come to the West.
Fifty years after the 1966 publication of “Is God dead?” is there hope for Christianity in Europe and North America? In my opinion, the demise of the experience of Christianity through the Christendom paradigm is a cause for great optimism. The fact that Christianity is becoming increasingly difficult if not impossible to experience as a territorial faith opens the opportunity for an authentic expression of the faith. After all, the history of the Early Church suggests that the church thrives when all outward privileges of Christianity are stripped away. As a conscious minority in a secularized society, Christians in the West have an opportunity to walk the path of the New Testament church in all its glory and splendor. In fact, the western church has the rise of African Christianity at home and abroad to look up to for hope and inspiration.