The Conflicting Influence of the Christian Messages in Igboland By: Rev. Fr. Dr. Michael K. Onyekwere, SDV The Conflicting Influence of the Christian Messages in Igboland examines how the homogeneity of a people called the Igbos was destroyed. What they held as sacrosanct degenerated under conflicting and pluralistic Christian messages, thereby replicating the Babel experience in Genesis. With this book, Rev. Fr. Dr. Michael K. Onyekwere, SDV wishes to draw readers’ attention to identify the reasons why there is a breakdown of the values that gave identity to Igboland, threatening their identity as one people. He hopes to offer some solutions and leave some room for further work to be done in the area of conflict management and ecumenism.

The Conflicting Influence of the Christian Messages in Igboland By: Rev. Fr. Dr. Michael K. Onyekwere, SDV The Conflicting Influence of the Christian Messages in Igboland examines how the homogeneity of a people called the Igbos was destroyed. What they held as sacrosanct degenerated under conflicting and pluralistic Christian messages, thereby replicating the Babel experience in Genesis. With this book, Rev. Fr. Dr. Michael K. Onyekwere, SDV wishes to draw readers’ attention to identify the reasons why there is a breakdown of the values that gave identity to Igboland, threatening their identity as one people. He hopes to offer some solutions and leave some room for further work to be done in the area of conflict management and ecumenism.

For not integrating initially some of the good elements in Igbo culture, many Igbo Christians have double personality - Christian personality and traditional personality. They are Christians on Sundays but traditionalists on weekdays. To combat such an anomalous situation, in imitation of Christ's effort at completing what was lacking in the Jewish religion, author Edwin Udoye proposes radical inculturation. His book equally contains many serious theological reflections such that it recommends itself to both theologians and the scholars researching on the religions of the world. Udoye has therefore made a very significant contribution worthy of commendation to both theological and religious studies.

In our age and time, many Igbo Christians are faced with crises of faith and identity as to whether they are Christians, faithful to the teachings of their religion, or Igbos, loyal to their native customs and cultures. Addressing these crises, this book identifies and proposes ways of incorporating the Christian message, through a systematic process of inculturation, into the life of the Igbo people so that they can be at home with the message of the gospel, and at the same time, at home with the Igbo cultures. It assists the Igbo people to live out their Christian life as a truly Igbo people, and not in the foreign garments of missionary Christianity. Broadly, this book presents the intrinsic relationships and indissoluble marriage between religion and culture. It highlights the fact that, every religion has cultural influences, just as every culture has religious influences.

It is not always a comfortable position to question the position of a good majority. However, it is known that the majority can sometimes be wrong or see things differently. It takes courage and a particularly critical mind to question the depth of the Christian Faith in a land seen as the future of Christianity in Africa. As a Priest with some pastoral experience both in Africa and in Europe, the Author is at home with the subject matter in this book. He accepts the fact of the growing numbers in the churches but questions the depth of conviction in the face of the problems arising from the clash of values between Christian Faith and Igbo Traditional Religion. He maintains that, if God saw enough reasons to create men differently and revealed himself differently to them, he - God accepts that men have different understandings of his relationship with them and that they may relate with him using what is available to them - their Culture and Tradition.

Although Africa is today often seen, because of its large number of Christians, as the future hope of the Church, a closer examination of African Christianity, however, shows that the Christian faith has not taken deep root in Africa. Many Africans today declare themselves to be Christians but still remain followers of their traditional African religions, especially in matters concerning the inner dimensions of their lives. It is evident that, in strictly personal matters relating to such issues as passage rites and crises, most Africans turn to their African traditional religions. As an incarnational faith, part of the history of Christianity has been its encounter with other cultures and its becoming deeply rooted in some of these cultures. The central question remains: Why has the Christian faith not taken deep root in Africa? This volume is concerned with answering this question.