Abuja Journal of Philosophy and Theology (APT) 9.Foreign Aid and Africa's Development (original) (raw)
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The book gives a comprehensive and systematic presentation of Catholic social ethics on human rights, ecology, globalisation, international co-operation and aid, human and cultural development, business ethics, social justice, and the challenges of poverty eradication, and the need for solidarity to the poor, minorities, and those on the margins of life. The book shows how the social questions of the day impact the African continent. It further engages the principles and practice of Christian charity, aid and development and their implications for the challenging African social context. This work is a refreshing attempt at a transformative Christian theological praxis, and takes Catholic social ethics from the confines of rectories, chanceries, lecture halls and conferences to the living life situation of millions of Africans in their challenging social context. It proposes an integral theology of development, and creatively lays the groundwork for Christian humanitarian and social ministry in Africa. This work is a ground breaking attempt at vulnerable missional praxis through a social analysis informed by the Gospel, and a Gospel analysis which is capable of radically altering the ways and means Catholic and Christian charities carry out their humanitarian work, aid and development initiatives in developing countries of Africa, and among the poor in our world. This is a Christian manifesto for a better world.
This special issue aims to bring together theologians, academics of religions and development and missionaries to explore how missions affiliated with the Eastern Orthodox and other pre-Chalcedonian or Miaphysite Churches (so-called ‘Oriental Orthodox’) engage with and affect communities in Africa and Asia. The special issue is particularly interested in bridging mission studies with international development, which has been increasingly focusing on faith-based actors and the role of religious beliefs in development. Both these literatures have been informed primarily by Roman Catholic and Protestant missionary experience in the African and Asian regions, and have drawn very little attention to their non-western Christian counterparts. As a result, the distinct theological and dogmatic underpinnings that govern these non-western missions have not been captured in the literature, nor have the implications for missionary activity abroad been explored systematically. Due to their theologies, such missions have engaged with local belief and knowledge systems, cultures and languages in notably different ways, with important implications for human and societal development. The special issue aims to increase knowledge around these missions and their historical and contemporary engagements to suggest a more nuanced template for thinking about faith actors and development in Africa and Asia.
The church and sustainable development in sub-Saharan Africa
Studia Historiae Ecclesiasticae (SHE), 2015
The snail-pace of social and economic development within sub-Saharan Africa is of major concern not only to the development community, but to all who have the continent's well-being at heart. Various attempts (many rather elusive) at diagnosis and prescription of the right antidotes to the problem have been made for decades. This paper, however, shares Jeffrey Sachs's optimism in End of Poverty with the point of departure being that organised religion holds the key to a reversal of the trend. The paper explores the impact of religious beliefs on the development of some communities in the past and the present before concluding that Christianity could unlock the prospects to sub-Saharan Africa's economic fortunes. In the view of this researcher, African theological reflections, in response to the challenges of endemic corruption, nepotism, superstition, and bad work ethics on the continent, must be grounded in the language, traditional beliefs, values and practices (i.e. culture) of the people as grounds for integration with the modern scientific and technological advancement that confronts the continent. This underscores the need for Christianity itself to become that culture which is willing to accommodate a consciously reconstructed past as the pathway to a developed future.
Sacralization of the Humanitarian Space: Faith Based Organizations, Mission-Aid and Development in Africa: Eds. Chitando, E., Gunda, M. R., Togarasei, L. In: Religion and Development in Africa. BiAS 25, ERA 4. Bamberg: University of Bamberg Press, pp. 123-136. , 2020
The Service of Faith: Christian Entanglements with International Development
The past decade has witnessed a surge of scholarly interest into the relationships between religion and development with significant attention being given to Christian actors. Recent studies have examined the vast array of ‘development‐type’ activities carried out by Christian organisations in health, education, poverty alleviation, refugee services, disaster relief etc. Transnational Christian service is a powerful dynamic shaping social imaginaries and development outcomes. Anthropology has been at the forefront of this emerging scholarship, helpfully illuminating the deep histories of Christian involvement in development and furnishing textured analyses of diverse Christian missionary and non‐governmental actors. Also of direct relevance is the widely‐heralded ‘return of theology’ in which theological concerns are again being located at the centre of academic enquiry. Various approaches to analysing the theological, including particularly ‘political’ and ‘practical’ concerns, are making incisive interventions into development debates. This symposium builds upon emerging anthropological and theological research on the entanglements between Christianity and development. It seeks to further expand the horizons of scholarly debate by attending to both theologies and practices. We aim to open new lines of enquiry by asking: How have interactions between Christianity and development reshaped each other? What are the genealogical and historical connections between various Christian traditions and the values, formations and practices of mainstream international development? What tensions have arisen between Christian and development (and within Christian development) actors and what do these reveal about the nature of development today? What directions should anthropological and theological analysis take in future research on development? Short provocations by leading scholars from anthropology and theology will help facilitate a broad‐ranging interdisciplinary conversation which will open new spaces for rethinking analytical frameworks and move the debate about Christianity and development into new questions and arenas.
Effective Partnership Between the West and the African Church
This article challenges intercultural partnerships, especially those instituted by Christians and churches across the cultural divide between Africa and the West, that can become a means of exploitation, of limiting people’s freedom, and of introducing and encouraging corruption. The author observes a massive influence on African communities by the West. Material and financial dependency discourages speaking out against a system that orients communities towards the pleasing of foreigners even when what the latter bring is neither understood or in some ways desired. Definitions of ‘success’ have in parts of Africa become integrally linked to the pleasing of donors. Three case-studies illustrate outcomes of foreign donor-based partnerships. This article advocates for the institution of some partnerships, focusing especially on Western and African churches, that are rooted other than in the superior languages and resources of the West.
Faith in Christ the Way Forward in African Development
Association of Christian Economists (UK),, 2017
Christian incarnation of the sacred into human society enabled distinguishing of divine and secular realms in a way often invisible to non-Westerners. Westerners often ignore this history of their contemporary dualism. In overseas interventions, the West prioritizing the secular in the divine / secular duality means that contemporary research on African development ignores religion in general and Christianity in particular. Christianity plays key roles in many African communities. Because key human values originate in faith in god(s), the spiritual underlies and precedes the material. This article proposes the necessity of a Christian/spiritual dimension to development advocacy in Africa and beyond.
Editorial Critical Perspectives on Governance, Religion and Humanitarian Aid in Africa
Alternation eBooks, 2021
Religion is a major force in the governance of countries in contemporary Africa. At the same time, religion is a major motivating factor for the growth of humanitarianism, be it directed at Africa by other people of goodwill and organizations from other continents, or by Africans at one another and outsiders. Given that religion plays an important part in the lives, including the physical as well as mental wellbeing of the people of the continent, any serious study concerned with the continent cannot avoid its impact on many aspects of African life, including development, humanitarianism, and governance. As a result, the 'Critical Investigations into Humanitarianism in Africa' (CIHA) Blog (www.cihablog.com) held a conference in fall 2016 at Seth Mokitimi Methodist Seminary (SMMS), Pietermaritzburg, South Africa, to explore these issues. Jointly organized by CIHA, the SMMS, and the University of Kwa