EARTHKEEPING NEWS A NEWSLETTER OF THE NORTH AMERICAN COALITION FOR CHRISTIANITY AND ECOLOGY Volume Four, Number Five May/June 1995 AFRICAN INDIGENOUS CHRISTIANS FORGE AN ECOLOGICAL ETHIC Excerpts from Healers and Ecologists: Pentecostalism in Africa, by Harvey Cox, Christian Century, Nov. 9, 1994, p. 1042 ff. Cox begins by describing a gathering of thousands in a rural area of Zimbabwe in preparation for the annual Holy Communion service of the African Apostolic Church, one of the thousands of indigenous Christian churches of Africa. They confess a wide range of sins of omission and commission. . . . "A particular trespass they are encouraged to mention that would not occur to most Western Christians is the sin of uroyi, usually translated as 'wizardry.' In years past this meant slipping back into the practice of placating the evil spirits and demons. . . . It now includes offenses against the 'Earthkeeping Spirit,' which is itself an African understanding of the Christian Holy Spirit. "Violations of the Earthkeeping Spirit encompass any activities that lead to soil erosion, fouling the water supply, or chopping down trees without replacing them. On a continent plagued by the loss of woodlands and arable land, a religiously based ecological ethic is appearing. This ethic is based on a spirituality that mixes ancient African religious sensibilities with modern environmental awareness and it is taking place with a movement that has arisen as Christian Pentecostal impulses have interacted with the throbbing universe of African primal religion. The prohibition against the wanton destruction of trees is not the result of importing an idea from Western forestry. It is the extension of an age-old sanction against cutting the trees in a sacred grove, one that was inhabited by spirits. Now, however, the whole earth and all the trees are understood to be sacred. "Healing is the area in which the African indigenous churches have the most to offer other Christians and the world at large. . . . Both the Christian prophet/healer and the traditional nganga, or medicine man, try to ascertain the cause of the patient's malady, and they often locate it in malevolent spirits. But . . . while the nganga attempts to find out what the malignant spirits want and then to satisfy them, the prophet banishes them in the name of the Spirit of God, and assures the sick person that he or she need no longer fear the spirits' powers since God's Spirit is mightier.... Most recent Western theologians have stayed away from the language of 'principalities and powers' . . . as embarrassing holdovers from prescientific times. . . . On balance, African Christians seem to have gotten it right. "While the Western churches still seemed mired in a theology that separates humankind from nature and grants it "dominion" over the beasts and the plants, Africans are developing a theology that locates human life within the web of nature and views violation of the natural order — the domain of the Earthkeeping Spirit — as a serious sin." Home     Table of Contents