Resultados de Aprendizaje proyectados

An important aspect of early missionary thinking was the indigenous church concept and the ‘three self’ policy promoted initially by CMS Secretary Henry Venn (1841-1872).²⁴³ Venn anticipated the formation of governing, supporting, and self-propagating indigenous churches, and hoped to shift the focus from a civilising mission, promoting European ways, to the adoption of African ones, and the promotion of local agency.²⁴⁴ Venn’s accession to the office of CMS Secretary coincided with the Niger Expedition, and his thinking influenced early Protestant missionaries in Nigeria.²⁴⁵

During the high imperial period, there was a partial reversal of this approach, as European missionaries, influenced by Keswick spirituality, gradually replaced local leaders.²⁴⁶ The purge of the Niger Mission and the humiliation of Bishop Crowther precipitated the first wave of Nigerian independency, as ‘African’ or ‘Ethiopian’

churches were founded in Western Nigeria as a response to white discrimination of African agents. In the east, Anglican congregations of the Niger Delta became an

242 John and Jean Comaroff, Ethnography and the Historical Imagination. Studies in the Ethnographic Imagination, Boulder, Colorado/Oxford: Westview Press, 1992, 183.

243 See Hastings, Church in Africa, 293-98; Yates, Christian Mission, 35; Murray, Church Mission Society, 42, 49-50.

244 Hastings, Church in Africa, 290.

245 Walls, ‘Protestant Missionary Motivation’, 60, notes that due to a lack of missionaries and the dangers attached to living in the interior, there were pragmatic as well as theological reasons for Venn’s indigenous church policy.

246 Stanley, Bible and the Flag, 115; Hastings, Church in Africa, 389; Walls, ‘Protestant Missionary Motivation’, 62; Isichei, Igbo People, 160-61.

independent self-supporting Pastorate within the Anglican Church, and by 1921, there were 29,225 Christians attached to the African churches of Lagos, and an almost equal number attached to churches of local origins, though most were located outside Igboland.²⁴⁷

Africanisation was even slower within the Roman Catholic Mission. During the late 19^th century, RCM missionaries showed little confidence in indigenous lay agency, preferring to rely upon European and ‘native’ clergy.²⁴⁸ Commitment to a sacramental approach to evangelisation (a ministerial function) and focus on the school approach, made them reluctant to use African catechists.²⁴⁹ Despite a shift from ‘paternalism’ and the notion of white superiority during the early 20^th century,²⁵⁰ this attitude persisted.

Yet Igbo agents were largely responsible for evangelisation and pastoral care during the mass movement to Catholicism that occurred after 1906.²⁵¹

During the inter-war years, the Protestant missionary enterprise was influenced by J. H.

Oldham, Secretary of the Edinburgh Conference and later the IMC.²⁵² Oldham was a firm advocate of the civilising potential of Christianity and the ‘benefits’ of imperialism. The new generation of missionaries believed in the enduring quality of the colonial order, insisted on the retention of control, and felt that the achievement of an

247 James B. Webster, The African Churches among the Yoruba 1888-1922, Oxford, 1964, 95-6. See also Isichei, Christianity in Africa, 179-80; Kalu, Embattled Gods, 170. Isichei, Igbo People, 181, states that by 1925 there were 20 United Native African churches in Aba, with 4,000 adherents.

248 Omenka, School, 271. Though the first Igbo priest, John Anyogu, was not ordained until 1930.

249 Clarke, ‘Holy Ghost Fathers’, 41, 49, 50; Hastings, Church in Africa, 453.

250 Clarke, ‘Holy Ghost Fathers’, 57.

251 Hastings, Church in Africa, 450-51, makes the point that between 1906 and 1918 the number of Catholic missionaries in Igboland remained at around 30, while the number of Igbo catechists increased from 33 in 1906 to 552 in 1918.

252 The International Missionary Council, founded in 1921.

indigenous church could safely be left on hold. Little attention was given to the formation of African clergy, and by 1950, no African Anglican diocesan bishop had been appointed since the death of Crowther. However, at local church level, pastoral care and evangelism remained largely in the hands of local catechists and the small number of ordained Africans.²⁵³ The situation was similar within the Roman Catholic Mission.²⁵⁴

During the 1950s, with independence looming, and missionary recruitment levels low following World War II, there was growing awareness of the need to increase the number of ordained Africans and improve their level of training. Yet despite the granting of a level of autonomy to Anglican and Catholic communities, there was only a limited transfer of ecclesiastical authority.²⁵⁵ While there was a steady increase in the number of ordained African clergy, especially within Catholic ranks, the training of catechists for lower, localised ministries was neglected. Prodigious church growth meant that the burden of congregational responsibility rested largely with catechists, often ageing and untrained, and increasingly with lay members.²⁵⁶ But clericalism and hierarchical structures remained dominant features of mainline churches in the 1960s.

253 Hastings, Church in Africa, 550-55.

254 Hastings, History of African Christianity, 60-1.

255 By 1960, there were Nigerian Anglican diocesan bishops in Lagos, Ibadan, Ondo-Benin, and the Niger Delta, but Igboland remained under the authority of the British Archbishop C. J. Patterson, based in Onitsha. Hastings, History of African Christianity, 112-13; Kalu, Divided People of God, 68-9.

Despite the rise in number of African Catholic priests, there was a corresponding reluctance by the Roman Catholic Mission to appoint African priests to the episcopate, though by 1960 there were Igbo bishops over the dioceses of Umuahia, Port Harcourt, and Enugu. Omenka, School, 277. In Onitsha Archdiocese, there were 15 Igbo priests in 1960 (compared to 112 expatriate clergy), with responsibility for approximately 380,890 Catholics. The first Igbo Archbishop was Frances Arinze, appointed in 1967 over the Onitsha Archdiocese. Hastings, Church in Africa, 170; V. A. Nwosu, ‘The Era of Archbishop Charles Heerey 1931-1967’, in V. A. Nwosu (ed.), The Catholic Church in Onitsha. People, Places and Events (1885-1985), Onitsha: Etukokwu Press, 1985, 62; Nwosu, ‘Catholic Church in Onitsha’, 45.

Kalu has argued that the missionary response to decolonisation was to maintain control by adopting a policy of ‘passive revolution.’²⁵⁷ Yet this was hindered on two fronts:

from the centre by the moratorium debate, and from the fringes by various forms of independency, especially during the 1970s.²⁵⁸ I examine the latter in chapter three.

Moratorium became an issue during the 1958 IMC meeting in Ghana, following an appeal by Walter Freytag for fewer missionaries.²⁵⁹ This call was to become more strident in the 1970s, and reflected African dissatisfaction with the missionary version of indigenisation.²⁶⁰ Meanwhile, during the 1960s, while older missions were trying to diminish their presence, new missionaries were arriving from other more ‘theologically conservative’ groups, such as SIM.²⁶¹

SU was more successful at devolving power and developing an indigenisation strategy in Nigeria. It did this by a process of ‘Nigerianisation’ that involved leadership training courses, one-to-one discipleship, and the placement of Nigerians in key leadership positions.²⁶² In chapter three, I examine the significance of this for the Civil War Revival. In 1966, Mike Oye’s appointment as the first Nigerian travelling secretary was

256 Hastings, History of African Christianity, 167.

257 According to Haynes, Gramsci used this term to refer to the way a dominant socio-political group may have to change its way of wielding power if it wants to maintain its hegemony. Jeff Haynes, Religion and Politics in Africa, London: Zed Books, 1996, 105. The reluctance to relinquish control on the part of mission authorities is noted by Beetham and Taylor, both of whom served the home base of missionary organisations. See T. S. Beetham, Christianity and the New Africa, London: Praeger, 1967, 24, 29, 151;

J. V. Taylor, ‘Selfhood: Presence or Personae?’, in Peter Beyerhaus and Carl F. Hallencreutz (eds.), The Church Crossing Frontiers: Essays on the Nature of Mission: In Honour of Bengt Sundkler, Studia Missionalia Upsaliensia, 11, Gleerup, Uppsala: Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, 1969, 171-76.

258 Ogbu U. Kalu, ‘Passive Revolution and its Saboteurs: African Christian Initiative in the Era of Decolonization’, paper presented to the ‘Missions, Nationalism, & the End of the Empire’ conference, Currents of World Christianity Project, University of Cambridge, 6-9 September 2000, 1, 8-16.

Missionary reluctance to devolve power meant that this decolonisation process within the mission churches extended across the broad period 1955 to 1975.

259 Hastings, History of African Christianity, 120.

260 For more on the moratorium debate, see Hastings, Essay in Interpretation, 22-36.

261 By 1966, SIM had 648 missionaries in Nigeria. See Hastings, History of African Christianity, 165.

262 Ojo, ‘Campus Christianity’, 85-7. See also Sylvester, Scripture Union, 211.

an important landmark. Oye became a symbol of SU ‘Nigerianisation’ and later a key figure during the Civil War Revival.²⁶³ The establishment of Pilgrims groups in 1967 to cater for school leavers also encouraged the development of Igbo Christian leadership.²⁶⁴ SU adopted a policy of national autonomy in Africa aimed at fostering financial and governmental independence, and in 1966, SU Nigeria became an autonomous body.²⁶⁵