There is the impatience and ire that Christianity has been the tool
used to enslave the peoples of mostly sub-Saharan Africa physically, and
that it has successfully remained the tool being used to enslave the
minds of the same peoples today. This is not quite the case.
What happened was that the missionaries did quite a great work in bringing light to Africa, their only ignorant mistake was that they helped to dilute and destroy the good aspects of our cultures while removing the barbaric aspects of them. An example of a good missionary would be Mary Slessor. She promoted women's rights, protected native children and stopped twin infanticide amongst the Ibibios. The good missionaries should therefore be separated from that blame of being agents of religion (especially Christianity) who had contributed in helping to put the chains in the minds of African people (s) today.
The slave traders were not particularly moral people. They regarded religion as a perfunctory exercise. Those who used religion to their hearts' content would be the cotton plantation and slave owners (not the terribly cruel slave traders shuttling through the Atlantic, though some caught on).
America under Abraham Lincoln had to fight a civil war between those states which wanted to continue slavery and those which did not. At the end, light won. Lincoln himself abhored slavery but held onto the bible. In contrast, George Washington far before him had embraced slavery and held onto the bible too.
So what happened to us? Two factors: Africans are very enamored of mysteries. We are naturally more religious than any other race such that we by ourselves enslave ourselves into religion and culture. This was happening before the first slave ship landed. We even did human sacrifices and still do under heavy political cover. This obsession with religion continued after the last slave ship departed. Then enter the politically minded colonialists. They saw this obsession in us and exploited it. The missionaries were sincerely spreading Christianity. The British District Officers were busy using Christianity as a political tool. After the time the colonialists left, we continued the obsession with religion.
The second factor that happened to us is the disinterest in science and technology. I read an article written in 1908 by an educated African and I realized we had opportunities to get into science as early as that time, but we would not be bothered. So today, we blame religion for our woes.
IT IS NOT RELIGION, BUT US, HOW WE LET OURSELVES GET OBSESSED WITH RELIGION.
America is a Christian nation till date, at least their motto is still "In God We Trust". The religion in that nation did not stop America from putting the first man on the moon. And America is still the greatest nation in the world in terms of leadership and industrialization, despite recent reaches by China. While atheist nations are peaceful and progressing, there is a certain disillusionment in the minds of many people in such nations. There is a certain yearning that religion can fill. This is why a Nigerian pastor has thousands of people, almost all with former atheist background, worshiping in his church in Ukraine, an atheist nation!
What's my point? We should not stop religion altogether and become totally atheist. What we should do is to reduce our obsession with religion. Too much of anything is bad. We should increase our inclinations towards science and technology. India is a religious country (Hinduism etc), yet they are not as obsessed as Africans with religion. This is the remote singular reason they can put a satellite in the moon's orbit.
(C) Jeff Unaegbu, August 29, 2019.
What happened was that the missionaries did quite a great work in bringing light to Africa, their only ignorant mistake was that they helped to dilute and destroy the good aspects of our cultures while removing the barbaric aspects of them. An example of a good missionary would be Mary Slessor. She promoted women's rights, protected native children and stopped twin infanticide amongst the Ibibios. The good missionaries should therefore be separated from that blame of being agents of religion (especially Christianity) who had contributed in helping to put the chains in the minds of African people (s) today.
The slave traders were not particularly moral people. They regarded religion as a perfunctory exercise. Those who used religion to their hearts' content would be the cotton plantation and slave owners (not the terribly cruel slave traders shuttling through the Atlantic, though some caught on).
America under Abraham Lincoln had to fight a civil war between those states which wanted to continue slavery and those which did not. At the end, light won. Lincoln himself abhored slavery but held onto the bible. In contrast, George Washington far before him had embraced slavery and held onto the bible too.
So what happened to us? Two factors: Africans are very enamored of mysteries. We are naturally more religious than any other race such that we by ourselves enslave ourselves into religion and culture. This was happening before the first slave ship landed. We even did human sacrifices and still do under heavy political cover. This obsession with religion continued after the last slave ship departed. Then enter the politically minded colonialists. They saw this obsession in us and exploited it. The missionaries were sincerely spreading Christianity. The British District Officers were busy using Christianity as a political tool. After the time the colonialists left, we continued the obsession with religion.
The second factor that happened to us is the disinterest in science and technology. I read an article written in 1908 by an educated African and I realized we had opportunities to get into science as early as that time, but we would not be bothered. So today, we blame religion for our woes.
IT IS NOT RELIGION, BUT US, HOW WE LET OURSELVES GET OBSESSED WITH RELIGION.
America is a Christian nation till date, at least their motto is still "In God We Trust". The religion in that nation did not stop America from putting the first man on the moon. And America is still the greatest nation in the world in terms of leadership and industrialization, despite recent reaches by China. While atheist nations are peaceful and progressing, there is a certain disillusionment in the minds of many people in such nations. There is a certain yearning that religion can fill. This is why a Nigerian pastor has thousands of people, almost all with former atheist background, worshiping in his church in Ukraine, an atheist nation!
What's my point? We should not stop religion altogether and become totally atheist. What we should do is to reduce our obsession with religion. Too much of anything is bad. We should increase our inclinations towards science and technology. India is a religious country (Hinduism etc), yet they are not as obsessed as Africans with religion. This is the remote singular reason they can put a satellite in the moon's orbit.
(C) Jeff Unaegbu, August 29, 2019.
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