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INSIDE AFRICA

Christmas in Africa

Aired December 23, 2006 - 12:30:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

FEMI OKE, HOST: Hello, I'm Femi Oke. And you're watching INSIDE AFRICA, our weekly look at life and news on the continent. And today, it's all about Christmas. We're coming to you from the South Gate shopping mall in Johannesburg (inaudible) Christmas carols concert.
On stage right now, we have the African Youth Orchestra ensemble. Still to come, the recently Grammy nominated Soweto Gospel Choir. We'll see more of them later on in the program.

But first - Africans were amongst the world's first Christians. (inaudible) for centuries now. Let's take a close look.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JIM CLANCY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Christianity in Africa is nearly as old as Christianity itself. From the establishments of Christian settlements in North Africa in the 1st century A.D. it has spread across the continent, absorbing change in the process.

Some believe European missioners were the first to bring Christianity to Africa. Not true. It was Mark, author of the Book of Mark in the New Testament, who actually carried the message. 4th Century historian Eusibius: "This Mark, they said, was the first one sent to Egypt to preach the Gospel, which he had also written down, and he was the first who established churches in Alexandria itself."

Once Christianity rooted in Egypt, it spread west and east to Ethiopia.

EMMANUEL LARTEY, PROFESSOR OF THEOLOGY: It's important to recognize that, you know, Alexandria and these other places in north - North Africa were the places where some of the doctrines of Christian people were actually formulated. So, Africans were right there. Africans were there intellectually, Africans were there formulating, structuring, enabling the teaching and the understanding of Christian faith.

CLANCY: In the 15th century, the Portuguese carried the Gospel south of the Sahara. They were later joined by European and American missioners, intent on proselytizing in Africa's interior. Still, in 1900 there were fewer than 10 million Christians, while by the year 2000 Christianity claimed 350 million followers, one out of every two people in Africa.

Why the explosion in the faithful? Canon Burgess Carr credits black preachers. They were able to reach converts who otherwise were suspicious colonialism came right along with Christianity.

REV. CANON BURGESS CARR: The baggage that white people had to carry, that evangelists and pastors didn't have to carry those baggage. And - and because of that, Africans became free to - to give expression to their own forms and shapes of Christianity.

LARTEY: You think of African Christianity, their rituals or music and worship are very, very animated, they've very, very lively, because that's very much the kind of understanding and practice of people. Traditional practices have become infused with Christian meanings.

CLANCY: That influence has spread far beyond Africa itself.

LARTEY: Whether they're Episcopalians, or Methodists or Presbyterians - you know, Africans - African-American churches are like that, you know, as well. I mean, you - you - it's almost like you cannot have a worship service that is not expressive, physically expressive and spontaneous.

CLANCY: This and every year, the celebration of Christmas maybe that much richer for Africa's contribution. Jim Clancy, CNN.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

OKE: As Christianity has found and continues to find a home in Africa, (inaudible). Mainstream Christianity is (inaudible). But for those who preach or pray it, the message remains the same. Christian Purefoy has more from Kenya.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHRISTIAN PUREFOY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Marching with the flag of Christianity across Kenya, Sambokanesku Soi (ph) church in Kibera slum is just one of many churches across Africa to blend traditional African culture into their services. Not just drums, but miracles, prophecies and sacrifices.

BISHOP JOSEPH OTIONGORO (through translator): It doesn't mean that we're away from the Christianity. We do pray.

PUREFOY: In some of the worst slums in the world, churches offer hope of a better life, and makeshift churches are now everywhere. With the conversion of about 350 million sub-Saharan Africans since 1900, Christianity in Africa is going through a fresh interpretation.

One such interpretation uses African stories and ideas to interpret the scripture for Africans, as well as explaining Africa's take on the Bible to the rest of the world.

TOKUNBOH ADEYEMO, EDITOR, AFRICAN BIBLE COMMENTARY: The time has come for - for Africans - to - to go out there to the east and west, the west and east, bringing this message back to the people.

PUREFOY: But in crusades by some foreign preachers, they see this inclusion of African beliefs as a threat to the future of Christianity.

LOREN DAVIS, CHRISTIAN CRUSADER AND PREACHER: The Bible (inaudible) they don't agree with each other.

Christianity is imploding, as well as being caved in from the outside. So I must speak up about what real Christianity is, Bible Christianity, and we're not to follow our own thinking, our own revelation, but what Jesus taught.

PUREFOY: But filled with their own holy spirit, Africans believe it is time to stamp their authority on the future of Christianity.

From the dark and into the light, another new belief is taking hold, that the secular age is like a deaf child, whose time has passed.

Christian Purefoy, CNN, Kenya.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

OKE: We'll have more on the African Bible Commentary later on in the program. And when we come back, a new spin on a (inaudible). We take a look at how one Nairobi church is reviving the ancient path from adolescence to adulthood. Plus, getting into the Christmas spirit. We check out the Soweto Gospel Choir. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

OKE: The world's first ever African Bible Commentary came about after major church leaders in Africa realized that people didn't know enough about the Bible and misunderstood its teachings. The works of around 70 African scholars and theologians aims to explain and apply the Bible's teachings to modern-day Africa. It looks at issues like HIV/AIDS, war, demons, ancestral worship and initiation rites.

The Africa Bible Commentary was published earlier on this year. The book uses African proverbs, metaphors and stories to try and get the message of the Bible to Africans in a way that we can relate to. We spoke to the general editor of the commentary, Tokunboh Adeyemo, in Kenya.

(BEGIN VIDEOCLIP)

TOKUNBOH ADEYEMO, EDITOR, AFRICAN BIBLE COMMENTARY: God is closer to the people when he speaks their language. Why don't we do that then, look at the word of God, and begin to tell the stories using African languages and whatever - and proverbs, and a lot of that is done in this book, is to have the Africans understand the word of God, and to have them apply it to their contemporary situations.

In addition to the - to the commentary, it's -- we have 70 articles in this book, dealing with the struggles, the issues that the Africans are grappling with. I.e., or e.g., the issue of poverty. Many have said that we're poor because we're - we're cursed. And what this book has done is to debunk that. It is not as a result of a curse. It's as a result of bad management, your idea of work, your attitude to work. The Bible says that if a man doesn't work, he shouldn't eat.

You have to change your idea of time. You know, there is always African time, not knowing that time is money, or time is life. You cannot replace it. If you lose it, it's gone.

And so, this corrects some of the misconceptions that we have carried - the baggage that we have carried along for a long time. We dealt with subjects of witchcraft, HIV/AIDS, debt relief, or alleviation, or whatever you want to call it, and governance, democracy. Is African - was there anything like the concept of democracy in Africa before the colonialization? All of these - violence, war - are issues that we have dealt with there in this book.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

OKE: And that was Tokunboh Adeyemo, general editor of the African Bible Commentary.

Rites of passage, especially from adolescence to adulthood, have long been at the center of African tradition. But in many of Africa's major cities, these customs have almost died out. But in Nairobi, a group of churches is bringing them back, but with a Christian twist. Marie Lora has that story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MARIE LORA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: For this group of Kenyan adolescents, the 40-kilometer trek in the bush is the path to adulthood. They're tired and they're hungry, but they're willing to do whatever it takes. They're participating in an initiation program organized by an association of Nairobi churches, Kotenarika (ph). The churches are reviving one of the cornerstones of African culture: The rite of passage, a tradition long lost to the cities.

The churches are modernizing it and giving it a Christian spin, everything tailored for young people like 14-year old Gakenia.

GAKENIA GATHURA, GIRL INITIATE: You will feel the toughness, but you wouldn't be - it wouldn't hurt you in any way, it will not harm you in any way. You will have learned a lot. It does help, because it's better this way than the traditional way.

LORA: For Gakenia, the traditional way might have been female circumcision, an ancient practice that has fallen into disfavor in many African nations. Through the several days' journey, Gakenia and her fellow hikers enjoy a series of tests, like finding their way on a map or crossing a river on a shaking, makeshift bridge -- all designed to shape them into responsible men and women, able to face life's challenges.

GATHURA: Across the river and - I felt very week, because every time you step, it goes down, and it's like -- and there are so many splinters of wood that look as if they're just (inaudible), so many are broken. It was quite scary.

MWANGI CHEQUE, CAMP DIRECTOR: For us, our mark is - is a challenge, a straight experience, that's what we call it. It is either a rock climb, a bridge repair, a long hike, but mostly to get someone to their - to - to be stretched. Not to their panic zone, not to their comfort zone, but the stretch zone.

LORA: The program also includes a seclusion period of 24 hours, during which boys and girls are required to fast, pray and reflect on their lives.

CHARITY WANJIRU, COUNSELOR/COORDINATOR: It's all physical, social, emotional, psychological, mental, and spiritual, because they're Christians.

LORA: During the course of her initiation, Gakenia has been taught about abstaining from sex, drugs and alcohol.

On their last day, boys and girls are greeted by their parents, who come to celebrate their first steps into the adult world.

Back at home, hospital circumcision awaits many of the young men, but not the girls. The association condemns female genital mutilation. Instead, heart to heart discussions between mothers and daughters, an occasion to talk about the lessons learned.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I asked her the new - whether I can have more responsibility, because I know I'll be ready for them from now on, and I'll learn to be able to understand the other things that she'll be able to tell me.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (inaudible) on my part, I'm just going to find out what exactly she has gained from the whole experience, and also to tell her what I expect of her from now on.

LORA: For Gakenia, the road to adulthood has just been made easier.

Marie Lora, for CNN, Vadana (ph), Kenya.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

OKE: Still to come, it's one of the world's and Africa's oldest churches. After the break, we'll tell you how it is (inaudible) marking the holy season. And we'll be singing (inaudible) praises, the Soweto Gospel Choir. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

OKE: They were among the world's first Christians, and to this day the traditions of Egypt's Orthodox Coptic Church remain pretty much the same. Shahira Amin has more in Cairo.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SHAHIRA AMIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It's two weeks until the Coptic Christmas, celebrated by Egypt's Orthodox Christians on the 7th of January. And for Loula Zaklama, a devout Copt and a successful entrepreneur, it's a busy time of year. Zaklama is CEO of a marketing and public relations company, which she founded in the `60s. There was hardly any private enterprise in Egypt at the time, but her business has thrived, a miraculous feat, considering that Zaklama works and lives in a male-dominated, majority Muslim society, where Copts often feel discrimination.

LOULA ZAKLAMA, PRES., INTL. PR ASSOCIATION: It is hard work, it is faith, it is perseverance, it is the fight for survival.

AMIN. Tonight, at home with members of her family, Zaklama can relax, away from the pressures of work. The conversation at the dinner table is light-hearted, and the meal, too, is light: A thick lentil soup, salad and broccoli. That's because the family is observing the 43-day Coptic fast, which ends on the Coptic Christmas Eve, on January 6th.

ZAKLAMA: We don't eat meat, fish, eggs, dairy. We eat - we eat vegetables and fruits.

AMIN: Egypt's Coptic Orthodox Church is one of the oldest in Christianity. Historian Jill Kamil tells us how it came to stand alone.

JILL KAMIL, HISTORIAN: For the first three centuries of the Christian era, there was no difference between the churches of Alexandria and Antioch, of Constantine and Jerusalem and Constantinople. It was when Egypt refused to endorse the decrees that were tabled at the Council of Chalcedon in the middle of the 5th century that Egypt broke away from mainstream Christianity.

AMIN: In essence, Egypt's Christians refused to endorse Orthodox Christian doctrine, and were categorized as non-Chalcedonian. Followers of the Coptic Church founded their own pope and patriarch at Alexandria, and translated the New Testament from Greek into Coptic, primarily following the teachings of St. Mark, the author of the oldest gospel.

Today, it's estimated 6 to 10 million people of Egypt's 78 million are Copts. They continue to practice their age-old traditions. In the weeks leading up to the Coptic Christmas, Cairo's churches are packed with worshippers, keen to assert their religious identity, in a country which many believe denies them equal citizenship rights.

YOUSSEF SIDHOM, NEWSPAPER EDITOR: This can be summarized in their inequality between Copts and Egyptian Muslims, versus their right to build and maintain places of worship. They're denied full rights to occupy chief executive posts and high rank jobs in state bodies.

AMIN: The rise of an assertive Islamist current in recent decades and some growing anti-Coptic sentiment has translated into sporadic incidents of sectarian unrest.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Everybody is concerned. The growth of fundamentalism is a threat to everybody, Christians and Muslims, because this is a new phenomenon.

AMIN: So, even with Cairo's vibrant Coptic community adding colorful decorations to the city's streets and spreading the Christmas cheer, there is an underlying concern among many Copts that the rise in Islamic fundamentalism may lead to more troubles in the future.

But Zaklama won't allow her worries to dampen her Christmas. The spirit of the holy season will prevail, she says, and the age-old rituals and celebrations are continuing.

For INSIDE AFRICA, Shahira Amin, CNN, Cairo.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

OKE: Oh, yes, and the crowd goes wild at Soweto Gospel Choir (inaudible) 2002. You can hear some of the best voices of Soweto township when you watch them perform and listen to them sing and (inaudible). Check them out.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

(MUSIC)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think South African gospel, it's a gospel that has a lot of tradition in it. We sing traditional African and modern African. So it's a fuse of different cultures.

OKE: Give me an example of the languages that you sing in.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: English, Sutu (ph), and Afrikaans, (inaudible).

(CROSSTALK)

(MUSIC)

OKE: That's the click song, yes?

(MUSIC)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have to be flexible body-wise, and you must help (inaudible) your voice.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was said that (inaudible) has been nominated for the Grammy Awards. You know, everywhere, people were screaming, jumping around, you know.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: When we heard all the other awards people, but we never even thought of Grammys.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It means we've done a lot, because for us, it's come (inaudible). So we should (inaudible) this award (inaudible) South Africa.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

OKE: That's it for this week's edition of INSIDE AFRICA. Thank you so much for watching. I hope you'll let INSIDE AFRICA be your window to the continent.

I'm Femi Oke, wishing you a very happy Christmas if you're celebrating. If you're not, enjoy the rest of the weekend. Until the next time, take care.

END

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