Matthew Parris returned to Africa on an aid project. After returning he had this observation:
It inspired me, renewing my flagging faith in development charities. But traveling in Malawi refreshed another belief, too: one I’ve been trying to banish all my life, but an observation I’ve been unable to avoid since my African childhood. It confounds my ideological beliefs, stubbornly refuses to fit my world view, and has embarrassed my growing belief that there is no God.
Though he says he is a confirmed atheist, he also says this:
I’ve become convinced of the enormous contribution that Christian evangelism makes in Africa: sharply distinct from the work of secular NGOs, government projects and international aid efforts. These alone will not do. Education and training alone will not do. In Africa Christianity changes people’s hearts. It brings a spiritual transformation. The rebirth is real. The change is good.
Can you believe an atheist in this day is saying this??? I find it hard to believe. Maybe there are still some atheists out there with the civility of H. G. Wells. I thought they were all gone, given that all we ever hear from are Christopher Hitchens and Richard Dawkins.
We, as Christians, now have a model to uphold. Of course, with Christ’s grace we can do it. These lines are evidence of Christ’s grace at work in Africa.
We had friends who were missionaries, and as a child I stayed often with them; I also stayed, alone with my little brother, in a traditional rural African village. In the city we had working for us Africans who had converted and were strong believers. The Christians were always different. Far from having cowed or confined its converts, their faith appeared to have liberated and relaxed them. There was a liveliness, a curiosity, an engagement with the world – a directness in their dealings with others – that seemed to be missing in traditional African life. They stood tall.
Mr. Parris admists square on that the reason change has taken place is because Christ’s message has been delivered to some parts of Africa and accepted by them.
It would suit me to believe that their honesty, diligence and optimism in their work was unconnected with personal faith. Their work was secular, but surely affected by what they were. What they were was, in turn, influenced by a conception of man’s place in the Universe that Christianity had taught.
This is the conclusion Mr. Parris reaches as he sums up his experience on a trip to a land he knew as a child and apparently loved so much.
Christianity, post-Reformation and post-Luther, with its teaching of a direct, personal, two-way link between the individual and God, unmediated by the collective, and unsubordinate to any other human being, smashes straight through the philosphical/spiritual framework I’ve just described (pervasive passivity) . It offers something to hold on to to those anxious to cast off a crushing tribal groupthink. That is why and how it liberates.
You can read for a time his article here: Click!!
I would love to hear your observations!! As with any topic here we are open to your comments below or would you pass it on through a reading service?
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