African Christianity: intersections between culture and identity among Amaxhosa

Résumé 0

There seems to be a paradox at the heart of African Christianity - that is, the synthesis between Christianity and African Traditional Religion (ATR). It is vibrant and growing but at the same time shallow and superficial. It is characterised by the struggle for authenticity, uniqueness and identity. On the one hand, it is a form of resistance against early missionary activities and their presentation of Christianity in a western apparel; and on the other, a search for self-actualisation in a convoluted interplay between the African religious heritage, traditional culture and identity. With this interplay in mind, it seemed necessary to investigate how African Christians identified themselves and expressed their religiosity in relation to their culture. This speaks directly to the understanding of self-concept or identity while questioning the place of culture in religious persuasions. Using a qualitative research approach in the form of one-on-one interviews, the study discovered that the practitioners of African Christianity do no sense any polarity or dichotomy that impacts them negatively in the knowledge of self or identity through the juxtapositioning of Christianity and African Traditional Religion.