Download complete project material on The Impact of Christianity on Rural Areas from chapter one to five with references and abstract.
ABSTRACT
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The impact of Christianity on rural areas with direct reference to Ogoni traditional religion in every way would be better appreciated when one takes the mind back to the conflicting experienceencountered by the earlymissionaries and the colonial masters, who had a lot to do to convince their victims to drop their basic traditional worshipping for Christianity.
This paper shall dwell on the positive and negative impact of Christianity on the Ogoni traditional worship with respect to rural areas where all other forms of traditional worshipping thrives not just the Ogoni.
Religion, Christianity, traditional worship and Ogoni traditional worship are some of the major concepts covered in this paper.
Keywords: Religion, Christianity, Traditional worship, Ogoni traditional Kingdom etc
INTRODUCTION
Before the advent of colonialism and coming of Christianity and Islam to Nigeria in particular and to Africa in general, indigenous religions existed.
Traditional Religion in Nigeria is practicedby Nigerians in Nigeria. Nigerian Traditional Religion is still in existence.
Though the impact of the Nigerian traditional religion is not feltuntil issues like land disputes, environmental pollution, traditional festivities et cetera that directly affects these worshippers occurs.
Traditional religion can be said to be as old as the mother earth itself especially when major continents of the world like Africa and Asia are brought into consideration.
This according to sociologist may be attributed to manās feel of sub-ordination and need for stronger meta-physical powers to which it could ascribe its fortunes, success, frustrations and ambitions to.
The Ogoni Traditional Religion adumbrates the culture of the extended family system. The extended family system makes it possible for the adherents to see inter-relatedness of people whether from the fatherās side or the motherās side or both. This is because the nuclear family system is foreign to Nigeria. Much of the unfriendly attitudes Nigerians demonstrate to other. Nigerians are due to theemphasis of nuclear family system. It has led to unfriendly attitudefound among cultures cultural clashes in recent times. These clashes are struggle over portions ofland, resources and positions in government. Although communal clashes are part of human existence, they are prevalent in Nigeria in recent times. This is so because nuclear family system gives attention and preference to the father, mother and children only. Ogoni Traditional Religion, recognizes the extended family system, which is anchored on the principle of āLive and let liveā or āBe your brotherās keeperā. This is embedded in a community spirit, which emphasizes living and doing things in common.
This paper highlights the positive and negative impact of Christianity on Ogoni Traditional Religion with direct reference to the rural areas where Traditional religion is most practised.
CHRISTIANITY IN NIGERIA
ChristianityĀ is one of the two main religions inĀ Nigeria,Christians make up 48.2% of the population. Nigeria has one of the largest Christian population in Africa with over 70 million persons in Nigeria belonging to the church. The ecclesiastical provinces of the Church of Nigeria are: Lagos, Ibadan, Ondo, Benue, The Niger, Niger Delta, Owerri, Abuja, Kaduna and Jos. Its primate is most rev, Nicholas Okoh. The Church of Nigeria has about 15 million members.
TheĀ Nigerian Baptist ConventionĀ has about three million baptized members
The Archdioceses of theĀ Roman Catholic ChurchĀ are: Abuja, Benin City, Calabar, Ibadan, Jos, Kaduna, Lagos, Onitsha and Owerri. Ā It has about 39 million members in Nigeria.Ā CardinalĀ Francis ArinzeĀ is a Roman Catholic Cardinal from Nigeria.
There are about 380,000Ā New Apostolic ChristiansĀ in entire Nigeria.
The majority ofĀ ChristiansĀ are found in the south East and South-South and Middle-belt region. An increasing number of mission stations and mission bookstores, along with churches serving southern enclaves and northern Christians in the northern cities and larger towns, are found in the Muslim north.
Christianity in Yoruba area traditionally has been Protestant andĀ Anglican, whereas Igboland has always been the area of greatest activity by the Roman Catholic Church. Other denominations abounded as well. PresbyteriansĀ arrived in the late seventeenth century in theĀ Ibibio,AnnangĀ andĀ EfikĀ land and theĀ Niger Delta area and had missions in the middle belt as well.
The works of the Presbyterian Church in CalabarĀ from Scotland by missionaries like Rev Hope M. Waddell, who arrived in Calabar 10 April 1846, in the nineteenth century and that of Mary Slessor of Calabar being examples. Small missionary movements were allowed to start up, generally in the 1920s, after the middle belt was considered pacified. Each denomination set up rural networks by providing schooling and health facilities.
Most such facilities remained in 1990, although in many cases schools had been taken over by the local state government in order to standardize curricula and indigenize the teaching staff. Pentecostals arrived mostly as indigenous workers in the postĀ independence period and in 1990 Pentecostalism was spreading rapidly throughout the middle belt, having some success in Roman Catholic and Protestant towns of the south as well.
There were also breakaway, orĀ Africanized churchesĀ that blended traditional Christian symbols with indigenous symbols. Among these was theĀ AladuraĀ movement that was spreading rapidly throughout Yorubaland and into the non-Muslim middle belt areas.
MISSIONARY WORK AND CHRISTIANITY
Apart fromĀ BeninĀ andĀ Warri, which had come in contact with Christianity through theĀ PortugueseĀ as early as the fifteenth century, most missionaries arrived by sea in the nineteenth century. As with other areas in Africa, Roman Catholics and Anglicans each tended to establish areas of hegemony in southern Nigeria.
AfterWorld War I, smaller denominations such as theĀ Church of the BrethrenĀ (asĀ Ekklesiyar Yan’uwa a Nigeria),Ā Seventh-day AdventistsĀ and others worked in interstitial areas, trying not to compete. Although less well-known,Ā African-AmericanĀ churches entered the missionary field in the nineteenth century and created contacts with Nigeria that lasted well into the colonial period.
THE OGONI PEOPLE
The Ogoni are of the Ijaw extraction that occupy a large land mass in present day Rivers State. They have a common culture and religion with very minor variations. They are grouped according to culture groups, such as Khana, Tai, Eleme and Gokana all of which amalgamated into a federation called the Ogoni Diversion during the colonial period.
The Kingdoms in Ogoniland are five, Babbe, Gokana, Ken-Khana, Nyo Kana and Tai, while their languages are Kana (Khana) Gokana, Eleme and Ogoi, (Ejere and Williamson, 1989). Today (2013) these group can be found in three local government areas ā Khana, Gokana and Tai.
The Ogoni rose to international attention after the massive public protest against shall oil led by the movement for the survival of Ogoni people (MOSOP) led by the playwright and environmentalist Ken Saro-Wiwa Oral Tradition holds that they migrated from Ancient Ghana down to the Atlantic Coast and eventually found their way into the Eastern Niger Delta (Alagoa,1972).
Efere and Williamson (1989) dates the linguistic relations of the Ogoni to the period before 15 BC, making it the oldest settlers in the Eastern Niger Delta region. This has been confirmed by oral traditions and Radiocarbon dating from sites around Ogoni land.
They are mainly an agricultural nation, keeping livestocks and herds and fishing to supplement that food diet. Salt making, palm oil cultivation arts and craft, trade are some of the economic activities the people engage in.
Oil exploration had been going on in Ogoniland since oil was discovered in commercial quantity in 1958. In a study that covered 1976 ā 1991 it was discovered that 2,976 oil spills of about 2.1 million barrels of oil in Ogoniland accounting for 40% of the total spills of Royal Dutch/Shell Company worldwide.
In an assessment of over 200 location in Ogoniland conducted by the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) it was established that 50YP oil exploration in the area has caused environmental degradation.
Oil spills, oil flaring and waste discharge, the alluvial soil of the areas is no longer viable for agriculture. This however, is not the focus of this paper. It is religious life of this great people that we will explore briefly.
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