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Tools for Learning Animistic Worldviews
Perceiving Cultural Diversity A missionary may live in the midst of an animistic culture without knowing that it is animistic. He conceives "reality" through the grid of his own background and experience. He assumes that people think as he thinks, feel as he feels, and communicate as he communicates. Because he uses Western language and cultural frameworks, indigenous cultural conceptions escape recognition. For example, short-term apprentices from the United States to East Africa almost invariably express the sentiment that "people all over the world are basically alike." They superficially see the wide use of Western dress and Western technology and assume that similar externals manifest similar internals. Or a campaign leader tells prospective Americans going to a Third World country, "People are people are people! You will not have to learn a new language or a new way of thinking to teach people in this country." One two-year missionary to Africa wrote: "People are people the world over. Not only are people basically alike in makeup, but they are minutely identical in needs. All need the gospel, and all can be approached in principally the same manner." Nothing could be farther from the truth! In this case, nationals were identifying with the missionary by speaking his language and communicating in his cultural framework. Communication was being westernized in transmission. However, the missionary wrongly assumed that the commonality was based upon the universal similarity of humans rather than upon years of Western education and cross-cultural communication on the part of nationals. The nationals were identifying with the missionary rather than the missionary identifying with the nationals. The average person in an animistic society may wear Western clothes, desire education, listen to the radio, and travel long distances in automobiles, buses, taxis, and trams. He might live in a plush suite in a multistoried apartment building. These material benefits make him appear Western. However, when he is sick or his wife is barren, he consults the medium or diviner. He believes in God yet fears his ancestors. He appreciates Christianity but is frightened of witchcraft. He worships Allah yet places portions of the Qur'an around his house to magically ward off the spirits. While affirming the power of God, he believes that hatred in and of itself has power to kill or inflict disease. A man who kills another's pregnant cow would expect his next baby to be dead at birth if restitution is not made. No rash generalizations that "people all over the world are basically alike" can be made. Only when the cross-cultural evangelist realizes the diversity of culture and how to perceive distinctive thought patterns can he begin to understand animistic beliefs and behaviors. The following pages provide some basic tools for learning worldviews, tools which will enable the missionary to understand an animistic worldview and to proclaim the message of the Gospel in terms that the animist can understand.
Copyright ©2000
by Gailyn Van Rheenen -- excerpt from Communicating Christ in Animistic
Contexts (Pasadena: William Carey Library, 1996)
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