What is the African religion?

The majority of Africans are adherents of Christianity or Islam. African people often combine the practice of their traditional belief with the practice of Abrahamic religions.

What is the purpose of African religion?

The whole purpose of life in African Traditional Religion is to preserve and enhance this life force that everyone has received (Magesa 1997:51). Moral behaviour maintains and enhances life force, but disobedience and disloyal behaviour toward the tradition passed on by the ancestors will weaken life force.

Why is it important to study African traditional religions?

Accordingly, when African Traditional Religion is discussed or studied, it is chiefly for the purpose of understanding the Africa’s past in order to build the current African present, so as to look forward to a glorious future. It is for the purposes of knowing our religious history and appropriately making use of it.

How did African traditional religion begin?

HISTORY. African indigenous religions are timeless, beginning with the origin of human civilization on the continent, perhaps as early as 200,000 b.c.e., when the species Homo sapiens is believed to have emerged. Myth and oral history are integral elements of their culture.

What are the African beliefs?

The three main religious traditions—African traditional religion, Christianity, and Islam—constitute the triple religious heritage of the African continent.

What is the African concept of God?

In African terms, God is the animating force that makes life possible, the one who answers the question of life purpose. According to Akan anthropology, the ancestor symbolizes actualized human potential, a realized life purpose. One can only ascend to the ancestral realm upon fulfillment of his/her human destiny.

How did religion impact Africa?

Religion still has the potential to influence socio-political and economic processes in Africa. Such positive influence could ameliorate poverty and corruption, thereby assisting with the socio-political and economic transformation of the continent.

What are some contemporary challenges and issues related to religion?

However, like anyone, people with religious beliefs may experience mental health challenges, which may or may not be related to their religion….Religion and mental health

• Anxiety.
• Depression.
• Guilt and shame.
• Substance abuse.
• Trauma.
• Low self-esteem.
• Self-harm and suicidal thoughts.

What are the differences between African traditional religion and Christianity?

African Traditional Religion suppresses the truth of the knowledge of God and the deeds of God. Christianity expresses God’s truth and deeds. African Traditional Religion is an expression of humanity’s inherited unrighteousness from the sin of Adam.

Does African believe in God?

Generally speaking, African religions hold that there is one creator God, the maker of a dynamic universe. Myths of various African peoples relate that, after setting the world in motion, the Supreme Being withdrew, and he remains remote from the concerns of human life.

How did Christianity affect Africa?

Christianity was an agent of great change in Africa. It destabilised the status quo, bringing new opportunities to some, and undermining the power of others. With the Christian missions came education, literacy and hope for the disadvantaged.

Why is Christianity popular in Africa?

Much of the recent Christian growth in Africa is now due to African evangelism and high birth rates, rather than European missionaries.

How should we study African traditional religion?

Religion enters into every aspect of the life of the Africans and it cannot be studied in isolation. Its study has to go hand-in-hand with the study of the people who practise the religion. When we speak of African Traditional Religion, we mean the indigenous religious beliefs and practices of the Africans.

What is religion in Africa?

RELIGION is a fundamental, perhaps the most important, influence in the life of most Africans; yet its essential principles are too often unknown to foreigners who thus make themselves constantly liable to misunderstand the African worldview and beliefs.

What is the influence of traditional African religion in African culture?

The continued influence of traditional African religion is also evident in some aspects of daily life. For example, in 14 of the 19 countries surveyed, more than three-in-ten people say they sometimes consult traditional healers when someone in their household is sick.

What happens after death in African traditional religion?

According to African Traditional Religion, there is no break between life and death. After death a proper funeral must be organized with necessary ceremonial rituals. This is done to prevent the dead person from wandering around. It is believed that if the dead person fail to get a place he wanders and becomes a ghost. Place of the departed.