Transnational Nigerian-Initiated Pentecostal Churches, Networks and Believers in Three Northern Countries

Professor André Droogers
Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Department of Social and Cultural Anthropology

Postdoctoral researcher: Dr. Kim E. Knibbe
Investigator A: Prof. Dr. Michael Bergunder, University of Heidelberg
PhD candidate: Anna Quaas
Investigator B: Prof. Dr. Allan Anderson, University of Birmingham
Postdoctoral researcher: Dr. Richard Burgess

Contact: af.droogers@fsw.vu.nl

Central research question:

How do transnational Pentecostal churches, networks and believers from Nigeria operate in public space in Germany, Britain and The Netherlands, and to what extent are they representatives of religion as a re-emerging social force?

Forms of global Christianity that originate in the Southern Hemisphere are increasingly negotiating public space in the Western European religious landscape. In the Southern Hemisphere continents, Pentecostalism is the fastest growing religion, its membership having multiplied in thirty years by a factor 7, now possibly numbering an estimated half a billion people (Anderson 2004:1).

Nigeria has an established Pentecostal landscape, arguably the most dynamic in the whole of Africa often with a significant missionary impulse and theological influence on other African Christians. These churches also circulate large amounts of printed and audio-visual material, providing ample sources for researching religious identity production (Hackett 1998, Ukah 2005).

More and more must these churches be reckoned with as an emerging social force, operating effectively with a transnational strategy. At first sight, for Pentecostal migrants their churches often serve as organizations that facilitate adaptation to and integration into the new environment. Apart from this facilitating integrative function, believers and churches, though identifying with their countries of origin, usually have a broader perspective. Pentecostalism is by origin a global movement with a worldwide mission. Pentecostals often view themselves as world citizens - as is expressed in church names such as Jesus House For All Nations. Although many migrants come to Europe for economic or educational purposes, they sometimes reformulate their life-story in religious terms, interpreting their migration as directed by God.

Migrant Pentecostals tend to adopt the idea of a reversed mission, meant to reclaim secularized Europe for Christianity. Whereas the established European churches seem to have accommodated to the secularized situation, these new churches feel challenged by it. Their methods are evangelism through mass media, planting churches, social action and prayer. Their doctrines usually include a strong emphasis on holiness, encouraging honesty, integrity, marital fidelity, rejecting worldliness and encouraging caring relationships. Some churches emphasize a critique of the moral relativism they feel is prevalent in Europe. They also embrace success and prosperity as signs of divine favour.

They are usually self-financed by their members or partly supported by other parishes of the same denomination. In some cases, the mother churches manage this reversed mission process, putting their European branches to work in a coordinated manner as part of a global network.

This research project therefore includes research in Nigeria and a comparison between three different countries in Europe. It will make in-depth case studies of Nigerian-initiated Pentecostal churches in Germany, Britain and the Netherlands. In the centre of the project stands one particular Nigerian (Yoruba) church, the Redeemed Christian Church of God, active in all three countries. It is one of the major Pentecostal churches in Nigeria with thousands of congregations globally and was not founded by Western Pentecostal missionaries but developed out of an African Independent Church. Moreover, the Redeemed Christian Church of God is already known as a church with a decisively global outlook and mission agenda (Adogame 2004, Hunt 2002, Ukah 2005).