As Catholic church falters in the West, African growth spreads new hope

September 3, 1999

BY STEVE CHAMBERS
NEWHOUSE NEWS SERVICE

BENIN CITY, Nigeria -- As rows of wooden ceiling fans whir uselessly against the 90-degree heat, Catholics dance in the church aisles, swaying slowly but methodically toward collection boxes for the third offering.

Women in bright red, green and blue African robes release crumpled nairas into the already overflowing wooden boxes, singing and clapping to the beat of drums, gourds and electric guitars at the Holy Cross Cathedral.

At a time when Roman Catholicism is struggling to keep members and increase the ranks of its clergy in the West, some say one of its strongest assets is the African church.

With traditional forms of devotion often considered passe in the United States and Western Europe and the number of candidates for religious life in continued decline, church observers say something mysterious and wonderful is going on in a continent that long had been considered mission territory.

Whether it is because of civil strife and grinding poverty, a yearning to join hands with the Western world or simply the power of faith, an unprecedented spiritual revolution has captured the soul of Africa.

Growth, challenges

"The fastest growth ever in the history of Christianity is happening in Africa," said the Rev. Peter Schineller, a Jesuit lecturer and missionary who has spent 14 years in Nigeria. "It's unheard of in church history."

In the past 30 years, the Roman Catholic Church has seen its ranks triple to more than 110 million in Africa, and the continent now accounts for 10 percent of the worldwide church population. These and other impressive statistics -- including the world's largest classes of prospective priests and nuns -- are proof of the church's vitality.

But the African church also faces serious challenges as it enters the next century.

Islam is the other powerhouse religion in Africa with 300 million members. The violent relationship between the faiths in some parts of Africa is a key concern of Pope John Paul II and other members of the Catholic hierarchy.

Then there is the explosion of Pentecostalism -- a trend that threatens Catholic dominance in Latin America, as well. Pentecostalism has helped make Christianity the majority faith in Africa, giving the continent an estimated 350 million Christians in all.

Revitalizing tradition

Regardless of these challenges, the growth of Catholicism, with its starkly different feel in Africa, comes at a significant time in church history. Its explosive numbers are beginning to influence the broader church, as priests and nuns from Africa now work as missionaries in the United States and Western Europe to shore up what they view as an erosion of the faith.

Africa's seminaries and convents are producing the largest class of young priests and nuns in the world, and their staunchly traditional beliefs are being heard worldwide.

"The faith was brought to us by the early missionaries, and we want that faith to grow," said Raphael Imoni, a Nigerian seminarian scheduled to be ordained to the priesthood later this year. "If that means going abroad to revitalize the faith in Europe and the United States, we will do that. We hear about signs of a dying church in America ...the loss of mystery, a loss of God."

These attitudes buoy church traditionalists in the West, who since the reform-minded Second Vatican Council ended in 1965 have bemoaned a series of changes that have left some traditions behind.

In Nigeria, home to at least 13 million Catholics, worship looks much the way it did in the United States four decades ago.

Women cover their heads at mass, and worshipers kneel at the altar rail for communion. Priests sit for hours hearing confessions from congregants who patiently say the rosary while waiting their turn. Dissent against Vatican edicts is nonexistent.

"We don't tolerate this optional lifestyle of gays and lesbians and same-sex marriages. Here they are considered downright abominations," said Archbishop Gabrielle Ganaka of the northern Nigerian Diocese of Jos, expressing a point of disagreement with many Christians in the West. "We note with shock and dismay what is happening in America."

Criticism and response

Many Westerners shake their heads at such criticism, assuring themselves that the spark of progressive reform eventually will hit the younger African church. These liberals argue that the Africans are products of conservative missionaries as well as a Vatican hierarchy that wants to turn back the clock on reform.

"It's always a mistake for any local church to point a finger of blame or criticism at another church," said the Rev. Richard McBrien, a liberal theologian at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana. "Circumstances differ. I'm not impressed by the criticisms that emanate from segments of the African church about the erosion of the faith in America. They are parroting the line some in the Vatican have been using regularly in the last 20 years."

He and other liberals say there is plenty of life in the U.S. church, pointing to an active laity and packed churches. (About 25 percent of America's 60 million Catholics attend weekly mass, and most experts agree that the U.S. church is more vital than Western Europe's.)

Others in the West are hopeful that the unprecedented growth in Africa will spur deeper devotion in places where daily mass and weekly confession have become a thing of the past.

"Certainly the Africans have something to contribute to the spirituality of the universal church," said Bishop William McCormack, national director of the Society for the Propagation of the Faith, which provides financial support to seminaries in the developing world. "Their joy and expressiveness, their sense of family and community in the church will benefit us all."

Embracing the liturgy

Despite their conservative bent, African Catholics have firmly embraced changes in the liturgy ushered in by the Second Vatican Council. Services are alive with African dance and song, featuring hymns sung in hundreds of languages across the continent.

This process of claiming the liturgy as their own, known in church terms as inculturation, is one reason experts say Christianity has caught fire in Africa.

"The church has told us to embrace inculturation, worship God in our own language and take pride in who we are," said the Rev. John Ofei, who heads the Justice, Development and Peace Commission for the Nigerian Catholic Secretariat.

Many Nigerians view the sudden explosion of Christianity in Africa after centuries of virtual dormancy as the mysterious workings of God. But others agree there are deep, accompanying sociological forces at work.

When Africans began breaking their colonial bonds in 1960, the Catholic hierarchy was made up largely of white missionary priests. Today, most parish priests, nuns and bishops are Africans schooled in local seminaries or convents.

"Catholicism can no longer be called a white man's religion," said the Rev. Matthew Hassan-Kukah, general secretary of the Catholic Church in Nigeria. "Indigenous priests know the area. They know the language, and they understand the kind of things people were afraid of when they were dealing with white missionaries."