A century ago, the Catholic intellectual Hilaire Belloc wrote, “Europe is faith.”
Today, conservative Christians, both Catholic and Protestant, increasingly say, “Africa is a faith.” Because that's where the demographic future and the strongest commitment to traditional teachings lies.
At a time when the American right strongly opposes immigration and globalization, and the left casually portrays conservatives as racist, many Christians who make up the Republican base, and many of the center-right elite, are also underdeveloped. I have high hopes for the country. Hope.
While Africa's population is rapidly increasing, fertility rates in the United States, Europe, and East Asia are below replacement levels.
The United Nations estimates that by 2050, Africa's population will reach 2.5 billion people and continue to grow.
Nigeria, a country with a deep division and bitter conflict between Muslims and Christians, already has a population of about 240 million people and a birthrate of 4.5 children per woman, compared to 1.8 children per woman in the United States. It's a person.
Ethiopia is a Christian-majority country with a population of approximately 120 million and a birth rate of 3.8 children.
The United States is also a Christian-majority country, but that majority is shrinking, with just 64% of Americans now identifying as Christian, according to data from the Pew Research Center.
Numbers don't tell the whole story. There are also qualitative differences between African beliefs and American and European personalities.
African Christianity is generally conservative.
Traditionalist Catholics in America were disappointed by a recent statement from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith allowing the blessing of same-sex couples under limited circumstances.
No, the Catholic Church does not sanction gay marriage. But conservatives are concerned about the guidelines set out in the law. Fiducia Supplican This is a leap in that direction.
But if Rome under Pope Francis is a source of anxiety, Africa may offer conservatives a sense of security.
The African bishops issued their own statement, saying: Fiducia Supplican It cannot be implemented in Africa,” they announced on January 11.
“We, African bishops, do not believe it is appropriate for Africa to bless same-sex unions or same-sex couples, because in our context this would cause confusion and disrupt the culture of African communities. This is because it directly contradicts the spirit of the
The “cultural ethos'' of American and European communities troubles conservatives. Same-sex marriage is widely accepted here among mainline Protestants and many Catholics, leading some conservative Christians to feel like outsiders in their own churches.
But in their hearts they feel close to the African church.
Christianity has always been a world religion and has aspirations even if it doesn't reach them. Jesus' disciples not only evangelized the Roman Empire and the Germanic tribes north of it, but also sent missionaries east to India and beyond.
Ethiopia became Christian by the 4th century, and Roman-controlled North Africa produced early Christian leaders like Athanasius and Augustine.
But this history contains warnings that today's conservative Christians with any hopes for the Global South must heed.
Belloc was able to write that “Europe is a faith'' because outside Europe, Christianity encountered bitter, often bloody, decisive setbacks.
Although Islam conquered North Africa, Christianity had little permanent presence south of the Sahara before the era of European colonialism.
The growth of Christianity around the world, including in China and sub-Saharan Africa, was strongest during the centuries when Europe and America were dominant.
Although the early churches established in Persia, India, and further east were tenacious, most failed and were wiped out by persecution and the perception that they were an exotic faith.
Although there are millions of Christians in the Middle East and Turkey (lands that were under Roman authority during Jesus' life and for centuries after), Islam is dominant.
And even in Africa, Islam is now growing faster than Christianity.
In some places, this expansion is accompanied by violence.
Between December 23 and Christmas Day, Fulani Muslims carried out attacks in Nigeria's Plateau state that killed and injured hundreds of Christians.
Early Christians believed that the Roman Empire, for all its sins, played a providential role in creating the secular conditions for the spread of Christianity even among those who eventually conquered the Roman West. I believed I had accomplished it.
Europe and America have similarly fostered an environment in which Christianity can flourish on a global scale.
Will post-Christian Europe and America be able to maintain that environment, or will Christianity around the world be in mortal danger if Christianity succumbs to the culture wars here?
Conservatives are understandably concerned about the growth of this religion in Africa.
However, if the civilization that Christianity built in Europe and America cannot survive here, the prospects for Christian civilization everywhere are bleak.
The West is not a faith, but a moral battleground on which the future of faith on several continents is at stake.
Daniel McCarthy is the editor of Modern Age: A Conservative Review.
Twitter: @ToryAnarchist
