Anglican Church in Nigeria Growing Despite Tensions with Muslims
Episcopal News Service. December 11, 1991 [91250]
Michael Barwell, Director of Communication for the Diocese of Southern Ohio
"I personally feel we have come to the end of the religious riots," Nigerian Anglican Archbishop Joseph Abiodun Adetiloye said in late November. "If there is going to be any riot after this, it will be really bloody. It will be very, very bloody."
Adetiloye's comments on the religious riots in October 1991 can be seen both as a hope and a warning that one of the fastest-growing churches in the Anglican Communion is facing extraordinary challenges and dangers during the Decade of Evangelism.
At the same time, the archbishop said, "literally thousands of Muslims are being converted." Some of the conversions are due to Adetiloye's bold initiative to consecrate nine new missionary bishops in the Muslim strongholds last year -- an idea that Archbishop of Canterbury George Carey recently said he might adapt for use in England.
In October, Muslims and Christians rioted in Kano, a predominantly Muslim northern city. It was the second set of serious riots during the past four years in the northern states. In 1987, Muslim riots in Kaduna ended after the Anglican seminary was set afire.
This time, however, the Christians fought back.
"What sparked the Kano riots was a public evangelism rally," Adetiloye said. "A German evangelist was invited by the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) to evangelize in the north." The evangelist "was sosuccessful...that the Kano people feared that many would be converted and tried to prevent the rally." However, Adetiloye explained, Kano's Muslim governor had already issued the necessary permits for the public Christian rally. "It was too late to stop," the archbishop said. "That is why the Muslims ran amok."
"I tried to warn the government," Adetiloye said in an interview, referring to the predominantly Islamic government of the military ruler, President Ibrahim Babangida. "Over years it appeared as if the government was trying to pacify these Muslims. I said the government had to be careful -- that if the day ever dawned when individuals in this country could no longer trust the government to protect them, then they would protect themselves.
"When the riot first started, it was the Muslims against the Christians," Adetiloye said. "Because the Christians have always been very peaceful, the Muslims have always taken advantage of that to start new riots." The Christians understandably fled, but "after about 30 minutes, they came to themselves," Adetiloye reported, adding that the Christian leaders asked themselves, "'For how many years are we going to run away? If they want a fight, we'll give them a fight.' So they turned, and by the next day it was the Muslims begging for mercy and saying 'enough is enough."'
One Christian leader is quoted as saying, "Jesus said to turn the other cheek -- but he didn't say what to do after that."
The Nigerian archbishop and other clergy in Nigeria explained that tensions with Muslims -- especially in the north -- have increased in recent years.
Islam predates Christianity in Nigeria by many centuries. The majority of Nigerian Muslims are Sunnites, a relatively peaceful sect that has long coexisted with Christianity and indigenous religions. In recent years, however, more fundamentalist Shiite Muslims have arrived as missionaries, funded with oil money from other Middle East countries.
Christianity, on the other had, is relatively new in Nigeria, brought first to the Benin City area by Roman Catholic priests before the Reformation. Subsequent missions -- and a strong foothold in the more populous south -- came with the arrival of freed slaves in the middle of the 19th century, followed by the Church Missionary Society of England, which established churches, schools, and clinics. The Anglican Church -- the state church of the former British colony -- is celebrating its 150th anniversary in 1992.
Some of the tensions are related to Britain's colonial rule of the West African province. In 1900, the first British governor of Northern Nigeria ceded the area to Queen Victoria, specifically declining to interfere with Islam.
Ninety years later, Archbishop Adetiloye stood on the same spot and proclaimed northern Nigeria for Christ, officially opening the Decade of Evangelism. In April 1990, Adetiloye consecrated nine new missionary bishops for the northern states, and three other missionary bishops and dioceses were named in May 1991. Adetiloye said that he estimates that the Anglican Church of Nigeria will expand to include as many as 52 dioceses by the middle of the decade.
Christian-Muslim tensions are significantly less pronounced in the populous southern and western areas of Nigeria. In many communities, Christians and Muslims intermarry and routinely attend celebrations of holy days and community religious events, such as harvest festivals, which can have animist and traditional religion roots.
In one community on a remote island, in the lagoons near the largest city, Lagos, Christian lay leaders continued 19th-century-style services for decades without the benefit of regular clergy visitations. The small Christian communities -- literally isolated outposts of faith representing perhaps 10 percent of the island's population -- continue to coexist peacefully with Muslim neighbors who routinely attend Christian services.
Estimates indicate that approximately 42 percent of the 120 million people are Christian, 40 percent are Muslim, and the remainder belong to traditional religions. Anglicans, estimated at 4 million in 1988, and Roman Catholics represent the majority of Christians, although evangelical and pentecostal churches -- mostly imported from the United States -- are gaining.
It is difficult to make accurate estimates about church growth because, until November 1991, Nigeria had almost no accurate count of its total population. During the last three days of November, a national census was taken under enforcement of martial law. All residents and visitors were confined to their homes or offices for 12 hours to ensure an accurate count. But the census deliberately did not include any questions about religion, religious affiliation, or preferences. As one Nigerian journalist cynically quipped, "Sometimes it is better not to know -- one way or the other."
Nevertheless, there is extensive evidence that the Anglican Church of the Province of Nigeria is one of the fastest growing in the Anglican Communion. Reports from priests, bishops, and laypeople across Nigeria indicate that many of the 1,563 Anglican parishes have regular Sunday attendance averaging more than 1,500 adults -- with another 1,000 or more children in Sunday school.
There is a rapid rate of conversions to Christianity -- many of whom are former Muslims.
"There are thousands of Muslims who are getting converted but who cannot declare openly," Adetiloye said.
"In April, I met [with some] of the Muslim converts and their leaders. And they told me of their own conversions and how they are now working among Muslims and converting them," Adetiloye added.
"There is a whole belt of Muslim-Christian conversions from the Congo right across to the Cameroon and to Mombasa [in Kenya]. There is a whole movement," Adetiloye exclaimed, resulting in the formation of a large "underground" church. "Because it is death to declare openly that you convert from Islam to Christianity, people are afraid," he said. "They are now forming a massive link, waiting for the appropriate time when they all will declare. We get regular reports and requests for prayers. Apart from the underground church, which is really massive, there are individuals and tens and twenties coming to conversion."
Not all of the Anglican Church's experiences are fraught with tensions. In some cases, Islamic leaders actually have welcomed the Anglicans.
When Adetiloye initiated his plan for nine missionary bishops in 1990, he first went to some of the Muslim rulers. One ruler -- an old friend from university -- reportedly told Adetiloye that he would prefer to have the Anglicans come because they are more reasonable and easier to deal with than the emerging fundamentalist and evangelical Christian sects, which by doctrine are deliberately antagonistic to Islam. According to reports, the 1987 riots were spurred by an evangelical preacher who made fun of the Koran -- Islam's holy book.
One of the new missionary bishops also reported that a local Islamic leader welcomed him with open arms, acknowledging the new bishop's expertise in hospitals, clinics, schools, and administration. "Come, do that here for us," the ruler reportedly said.