Nairobi — The arrival of Christianity in Africa heralded a new beginning of faith and life in the continent. European missionaries brought the Christian faith, which taught the African to discard his culture, hitherto considered primitive. But the resultant effect has been that of many an African living two lives, posing as Christians during the "day" and living the life of the African traditionalist at "night". In this article, AANA Correspondent, Joseph K'Amolo seeks some answers.

When Christianity arrived in Africa, it condemned traditional practices and beliefs. With it came the Western education system, which further poured cold water on the African way of life, including traditional religion.

Systematically, with the help of colonial powers, the two elements (Christianity and Western education) started spreading across the continent. More churches were built as more Africans became converted.

African converts were made to condemn their traditional norms. Those who held on to such were viewed as being "lost" and "primitive".

Today, the Christian faith is more than 100 years old in the continent.

It is here that Christianity has been touted to be growing at a rate faster than anywhere else in the world.

But events on the ground cast doubt as to whether the faith has really stamped its authority on the lives of the people.

Many professing Christians can be said to be living in two worlds. They are divided between traditional lifestyle and Christian approach to life. What with them still consulting witch-doctors, diviners, and oracles. This is in sharp contradiction to what the Bible teaches.

States Deuteronomy 18:10-13: "There shall not be found among you anyone who ...practices witchcraft, or a soothsayer, or one who interprets omens, or a sorcerer, or one who conjures spells, or a medium, or a spiritist, or one who calls up the dead. For all who do these things are an abomination to the Lord, and because of these abominations, the Lord, your God, drives them out from before you."

According to Rev Dr Kasonga wa Kasonga, head of Christian and Family Life Education at the Nairobi-based All Africa Conference of Churches (AACC), many people find themselves divided between these two worlds because they harbour the wrong notion that problems end with one becoming a Christian.

He acknowledges that man faces myriad problems, some of which the Church cannot supply immediate solution to. In such an event, many people feel defeated and start looking for alternatives. A number run from one church to other in search of prophets.

Says Rev Kasonga: "Some even get burnt out and go to consult witchdoctors to be affirmed in their lives. This is because they feel the support of their lives have collapsed."

In a veiled admission that the Church has not done enough, he says the Church needs to review itself and question its way of dealing with such situations.

"Perhaps we have been talking to ourselves and not to the person, the message we deliver does not address the real person. Therefore, the Church should adjust its ministry to address the person," he says.

But he also notes that if people do not open their hearts, they will always be vulnerable to temptations. He advises that people should be receptive to the gospel to have a total change in their lives.

The key elements of the gospel, says Rev Kasonga, are hope and faith. He stresses that hope is something that needs to be practised in our lives.

It calls for patience and goes together with faith.

But to those who might think hope means sitting and waiting; far from it. Hope calls for being active as one looks forward to what he has asked for.

Those who wonder about looking for immediate results are people who have lost the virtue of hope. Rev Kasonga reminds people that God's timing is different from man's.

He also discourages the gospel of prosperity, which tends to let people think they can be blessed without working for it.

He is, however, upbeat that the Church continues to be pre-occupied with strengthening its ministry along the line of preaching, educating, counselling and healing. "It is an ever-growing effort," he says.

In the views of Prof Gilbert Ogutu of the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Nairobi, human beings are disturbed by the riddle in life. "Some problems have no solutions and we cannot understand why they happen, so we seek help elsewhere," he states.

He argues that it is human tendency to turn to supernatural powers in such situations. And this power, according to him, can be God, some spirits, or some intermediary between God and man and it is here where Jesus, and ancestors in the African religion, play similar roles. In either case, the ultimate goal is to ask God for His divine intervention to the problems man has no solution to, contends the university lecturer.

"While Christians approach God through prayers and fasting, traditionalists offer sacrifices. There are also those who approach God by hurting their bodies.

"Some deny themselves earthly pleasure, while some go for retreat," says the professor. "The approaches may differ, but the reason remains the same," he continues.

Prof Ogutu observes that prayer is a mysterious activity that is done with the hope that God is listening. But he accepts that man is always in a hurry to get results, which may not be the case always. This has driven some people to try one means after another.

Even where a diviner is consulted, the truth is that it is not him who provides the miracles, alleges Professor Ogut, but God.

Just like Jesus spat on soil when healing a blind man, so do traditional priests use physical materials to invoke certain cosmic forces, and in the process, effect healing.

"Cosmic powers are the forces that make the universe move, and there are people who understand them through powers given to them by God," asserts the university don.

The belief in other forms of supernatural powers is not uniquely African. Even in the United States of America, it is alleged that witchcraft and the "dark" arts are on the rise, and Christianity is sharply declining there.

According to a 2001 study conducted by American Institute of Religious Studies (AIRS), Christianity in America is down 10 percent from 1990.

Projections anticipate a further 30 percent drop within Christian congregations over the next 40 years.