“You can’t understand Africa without understanding religion,” said Emmanuel Katongole, a Catholic priest from Uganda. As he led a tour of Kampala, Uganda’s capital, it was soon clear what he meant. Slogans such as “Jesus cares” and “Try Jesus” adorn taxicabs. Ads for a Catholic bank named Centenary print the letter T as a cross. Businesses have such names as “Holy Light Clinic,” “Born Again Bankers” and “Holy Hair Care.” “There is no Western-style division between secular and sacred or public and private here,” Katongole said.
But the infusion of religion into everyday life has not made Uganda a peaceful land. “We have a culture in Uganda of taking power by the point of a gun,” said Archbishop John Baptist Odama. The archbishop’s see, based in the town of Gulu in the north of the country, has been the scene of a vicious civil war for the past 22 years. The Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), led by Joseph Kony, has waged an antigovernment insurgency, savagely attacking rural villages and abducting children, who are turned into soldiers or sex slaves. An estimated 25,000 to 30,000 children have been kidnapped over the years.
Before anything else is said about this, let us be clear that the LRA has been proven to be Muslim, not Christian, and those who know the territory well understand the LRA to be funded mostly by Khartoum. These facts are on record.
Lumen, I would slightly disagree. The LRA is its own brand of crazy which is some amalgamation of the Ten Commandments (plus Kony’s 11th commandment-thou shalt not ride a bicycle), some few verses of scripture that are violent and are taken completely out of context by an illiterate group of people (this is not a slant on them, they just are literally illiterate), certain practices of the muslim religion (like praying towards Mecca), and witchcraft. The LRA is neither Muslim nor Christian nor any other known religion. I think it is basically a cult of Kony held together by fear of being killed by the other members of the cult.
By the way, here in Uganda witchcraft is still a major problem. One of the papers reported in December that something like 20 young kids were beheaded due to witch-doctor rituals–usually in order to obtain more money for the person performing the murder.
Oh, and it is definitely true that the church here picks up the slack the government leaves. I think our churches in the West have a lot to learn from the African churches. The church runs the schools, the hospitals, the radio stations, AIDS outreach programs, etc. and all on a dime and a prayer. In my diocese top clergy often do not get paid for months so that the diocese can continue to support its programs. Note that my experience is with the Church of Uganda and not the Roman Catholic Church who seem to be the focus of the article, but I’m sure the same goes for them as well.
This article is well worth reading in its entirety.
Of course, what John (#3) describes as the church’s role in Ugandan social provision today would not have been unfamiliar to many 19th century Americans (Protestant and Catholic). Nor, for that matter, would the “prosperity gospel” have been unknown.
That the LRA is syncretistic is certainly true. My point is that the base or reference point is more Muslim rather than Christian, and that it has been used to benefit the interests of the Muslim gov’t in Sudan.
The media likes to portray Christianity as somehow causing or contributing to unrest in Africa. I am trying to suggest that this is a distortion. I have seen articles in US magazines that identify the LRA as “fundamentalist Christians,” and people just take it for granted here that, “Oh, of course — [i]them[/i]– they are always the cause of violence.”
The attacks in Sudan have been encouraged and aided by Muslims. That is my point.
Thanks, John, for the input on the syncretism and witchcraft. I have no doubt that these are also significant factors here.
The Christians (of all sorts) in Uganda and Sudan (as well as others) are in our prayers.