THE PROBLEM OF CONTEXTUALIZATION AND UNDERSTANDING OF THE THEOLOGY OF THE C&MA IN AFRICA,
DR CONGO CASE
Rev. Dr Joël Kuvuna Mbongi, PhD
1. Introduction
This research arises as a question of whether the theology of the Christian and Missionary Alliance has really been contextualized in Africa, within the setting of spiritual understanding in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
The objective of this research is to evaluate or examine, in a critical analysis perspective, the missionary action of the Christian and Missionary Alliance (C&MA) in DR Congo in order to postulate a permanent reform in the context of adaptation of the African theology.
The methodology used is the analysis of documents relating to the missionary work of the C&MA in DR Congo, as well as some interviews. An analysis of habits, customs, and traditions will also be used in this process.
The work will therefore start from the problematic, the mission of the C&MA in DR Congo, the briefing on contextualization, the theology of the Alliance by the Fourfold Gospel as well as the vision and missionary conception of the Alliance in DR Congo. A conclusion will complete our research.
2. Problematic
One hundred and thirty-five years after the arrival of C&MA missionaries in DR Congo, the work has increased significantly, despite some ups and downs. The Evangelical Community of the Alliance in the Congo (CEAC), with its thousands of members, is counted among the largest communities of 95 Communities members of the Church of Christ in the Congo. It has its headquarters in Boma, in Mayombe in the southwest of DR Congo where this work began. The community is essentially evangelical and preserves the achievements of its missionary founding fathers. The missionaries’ message could be summed up in what are called the four pillars of the Gospel, namely “Christ our Savior, Sanctifier, Healer and Coming King.”
This work turns out to be a re-visitation of understanding, if not, the contextualization of these pillars of the Gospel as well as the understanding of the missionary vision within CEAC. With a careful eye, the problem of contextualizing the theology of the C&MA continues to arise in certain points of view.
Congolese spirituality and, in particular, Yombe, who is the landing tribe of the C&MA missionaries, is itself, in a way, a landing strip for the missionary Gospel. This lead is the understanding of God. Before the missionaries arrived, our ancestors had their gods and their understanding of divinity. In his work “Kinkulu kia Dibundu”, Dr Kuvuna ku Khonde Muela[1] explains the ancestral understanding of God in the Yombe tribe. Apart from the gods and idols that our ancestors had, they recognized above them two higher realities. The first is “Nzambi a Mpungu” who was an assistant to “Bunzi Mbamba.” Nzambi a Mpungu was considered in the Yombe tribe as a god above all the gods; and Bunzi Mbamba was the creator of men and things[2]. This image of the ancestral divinity is not far from being a leveled track for missionary work. The expression Nzambi a Mpungu is used today to express the “Almighty God.” Mpungu means gorilla, a very powerful and strong animal. Nzambi a Mpungu’s expression (sometimes we add “tulendo”, which means strength) simply marks the Almighty of God, his invincibility, his strength … Christians today, using the same attribute or qualifier “Nzambi a Mpungu”, do not necessarily ally with the “Nzambi a Mpungu” of our ancestors. That of Christians is the one who is Trinitarian in Father, Jesus Christ, and Holy Spirit. Yet the supporters of “Nzambi a Mpungu” from our ancestors consider the Trinitarian God as a Western import and imposition that alienates our right, culture and religious authenticity.
Another landing strip for missionaries in Kongo culture is the existence of the Ngunzist and Spiritist movements. Ngunzism is prophecy. A Ngunza in Kikongo means a prophet. In their beginning, these movements evolved clandestinely, in hiding in the Mayombe. According to several sources[3], these Ngunzist movements saw their birth after the arrival of the missionaries and were widespread in Central Africa in many countries. This is how we got Kimpa Vita and Simao Toko in Angola and Simon Kimbangu in DR Congo. The common point of these African prophetic movements was the focus of their message on the liberation from oppression of the black man by the white man. This message of socio-political liberation for the well-being of the black man was welcome in the context of the African who had finally found in him a messianic spirituality responding to their situation of oppression. This is why many of these prophetic movements were fought by missionaries who believed that they were not only a danger to the Gospel of Christ, but also a racial threat. Yet the Gospel of Christ was more liberating than presumed by the African prophetic movements, provided it was well presented and understood. The meeting of the Gospel brings man true liberation. Jean Marc Ela insists that only liberation justifies the whole project of God for his people. The people of God are historically located and defined in relation to the founding event of the exodus. For him, God came to save the whole man. It is therefore necessary to put an end to the theology of the salvation of souls which “wants to lead souls to heaven as if the earth did not exist”. Africa will have to enter an urgent phase of reflection where the most important questions will be less the future of the soul than the commitment of a people in the struggle for their liberation from poverty, from the misery of injustices linked to calamitous management of neocolonial policies. In other words, you have to do a “ground-level” theology. It is from African problems that we must preach salvation in Jesus Christ[4].
However, these African spiritualities certainly did not have the same inspiration. They were spiritual movements, but not necessarily Christian. For example, if we believe that Simon Kimbangu, a Congolese ngunza, had really worked with the Holy Spirit through Jesus, it was not so for Kimpa Vita, a ngunza in Angola, who considered Christianity as a foreign religion , working in collusion with the settlers for the bondage of the black man. We can read her hostility against Christianity, when she says her prayer below:
(Kiadi, kiadi) woe, woe to you o Kongo!
Land of our ancestors
You abandoned Nzambi in Mpungu
You have worship for foreign idols,
Woe to you, you abandoned your creator
To alienate yourself from the Overseas Gods of three people…[5].
The Kongo people could therefore be compared to what the Bible tells us about, Athenians who were extremely religious. Paul, standing at the Areopagus says:
Because while traveling through your city and considering the objects of your devotion, I even discovered an altar with this inscription: To an unknown god. What you revere without knowing it is what I tell you (Acts 17:23).
The Pauline strategy was to sanctify what the gentiles offered to their deities, giving meaning to the living God. The missionaries therefore had the role of showing the true God who came through his Son Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of our sins.
Prominent African theologian Kä Mana was quick to call these movements “spiritualities of enthusiasm” when he wrote:
In reality, spirituality of enthusiasm is developing in our continent, a delusional spiritual fetishism and a Christianity of black magic, in flagrant contradiction with the need for battles for the reconstruction of the continent. Even where structured ecclesial groups and forces of change organize themselves to weigh heavily on the overall directions of society, the weight of spirituality of enthusiasm and Christianity of magic is such that African peoples do not yet come to understand clearly the link that should exist between the spiritual forces in a people’s life and the essential solutions that these people develop in the face of economic, political and social problems[6].
It is therefore in this socio-cultural context that we can speak of the mission established in DR Congo.
3. The C&MA Mission in DR Congo
The Democratic Republic of Congo is the biggest mission of the C&MA around the world. The first missionaries arrived in February 1885 (another version says 1884), five in number coming from New York. They landed at Mbuku Nzobe village in Mayombe. After several difficulties encountered in the adaptation and acceptance by the natives, one of them died and the others turned back in May 1885. Another team was dispatched in 1889 by A.B. Simpson under the direction of Mr. H. Reid to continue the work begun by the group in 1885[7]. One of the strategies for connecting with the reluctant gospel natives was to pretend to buy the aboriginal charms. When the villagers came to visit them, they also saw in the missionaries hanging charms; that is when they started to trust them. It is in this sense that the missionaries proved to the natives that the God they preached was more powerful by burning the charms they had bought. When the villagers saw the burned charms not producing effects for their destroyers, they could finally believe in the God that these white people preached[8]. At that time, the city of Boma was not yet reached[9].
Since then, 269 missionaries have succeeded, one after the other, for the extension of the Gospel in the Lower River. Up to 1984, the date of the 1st Centenary of CEAC, it had 149 pastors in 20 ecclesiastical Districts. Since 1984, the community has been growing significantly to this day. According to the data of the Community Presidency, the CEAC has 1,550,520 members, including 410,000 men and 795,000 women, 670 active pastors, 643 local churches, 60 ecclesiastical districts, one Bible school, one University, 22 hospitals and Health Centers as well as 303 elementary and secondary schools[10].
CEAC being evangelical, it must be the testimony of the Fourfold Gospel: Christ the Savior, Sanctifier, Healer, and the Coming King. As a Missionary, it must engage in missionary work, the Church’s last call. Finally, being an Alliance church, it provides opportunities and encourages fellowship among the members of the Alliance World Fellowship (AWF).
4. Contextualization as a pillar for mission
Contextualization is one of the bases for a successful cross-cultural mission. It is understood as an attempt to do theology in the context of real life in the world[11]. This contextual theology has overcome the myth of theology becoming a matter for academic experts alone. One of the methods of this theology is to start with the context of ordinary life, to realize oneself in a community effort and to ask existential questions in a critical way, using resources like biblical interpretation. This theology ends up being practical by showing what we really have to do. This theology should therefore be the answer to questions of faith posed in a given context.
When theologians in Asia, Africa and Latin America became aware of the failure of imported theologies to properly deal with their history and culture, they began to develop their own “native” theologies. But they quickly understood that they had to take into account not only the specificity of each culture, but also its transformation under the impact of modern technology and basic struggles for justice and liberation[12].
By ignoring the contextualization, we risk slipping into two forms of theologies: State theology (which we will talk about later) and applied church theology without an in-depth analysis of the situation, and speaking for example of reconciliation, peace, justice and non-violence without in-depth analysis and criticism.
5. A look at the Alliance theology according to the Fourfold Gospel
This section consists of a rereading of the Fourfold Gospel according to A.B. Simpson, (Christ, our Savior, Sanctifier, Healer, and Coming King), according to its understanding in the Evangelical Community of the Alliance in the Congo.
5.1 Christ, our Savior
This section is about understanding the concept of salvation according to the vision of missionaries. A.B. Simpson uses the term “salvation” in three very different ways:
- Sometimes when he talks about salvation, he understands it as this initial reception of God’s grace after which we still need to receive more.
- Sometimes he uses it as God’s whole story of our redemption that will not be complete until Christ returns.
- Other times, for example in itself, the word “salvation” means the whole package, all the blessings[13].
According to some views, the salvation proclaimed by missionary theology seemed to be a one-dimensional salvation with an emphasis only on the soul that must prepare for heaven. Yet man is a multidimensional reality. Some social implications, in the formation of some schools, as well as in the social works, emphasized in the work of evangelization of missionaries in the Congo can contradict the theory of one-dimensional salvation. It is proven that at the beginning, these social works were intended to facilitate the work of the missionaries to reach their goal. For schools, for example, learning to read was about knowing the Bible. The natives learned to read the Bible. So, it had a spiritual rather than a social purpose. The medical and literary structures were, first of all, evangelical with the denomination “evangelical hospital…”, “evangelical literature…”. The goods distributed in the social framework were, first of all, a bait to attract the attention of the natives to the message of the missionaries. This can be justified when Joël Kuvuna writes:
Buna malembe, malembe, umosi umosi, bosi bole bole babwelama mu ndongokolo nateye beka dikabu dibantu bazaya tanga, sonika ye bundisa zintalu. Bampila yoyo bu balonguka fioti, bazaba tanga bibila ye sonika, buna bamindele babafidisa bonso minlongi mu longa bayau. Mu nzila yoyo biskulu biabadika[14].
In French:
Alors petit à petit, un à un, puis deux à deux, s’ajoutèrent dans l’apprentissage jusqu’à ce qu’il y eût un groupe de gens sachant lire, écrire et calculer. Ceux qui avaient un peu appris, pouvaient lire la bible et écrire ; ils étaient alors envoyés par les blancs comme enseignants de leurs paires. C’est ainsi que les écoles commencèrent.
In English:
Little by little, one by one, then two by two, they were added in the training, until there was a group of people who could read, write, and calculate. Those who had learned a little, could read the Bible and write; they were then sent by the whites as teachers of their peers. This is how the schools started.
The problem of the salvation of the Congolese man can come from Israel’s expectation of a socio-political Savior, the Messiah who should come. It is true that the missionaries insisted on the salvation of the soul, because they saw the imminent return of the King of glory; but the socio-political dimension was lacking. Yet this missionary period was simultaneous with Belgian colonization in the Congo: A period when the native was considered a machine to be produced by the colonists. Liberation by the Gospel should also include this socio-political dimension of liberation, which was nevertheless an urgent expectation and a reality for the Congolese people. Such a message would be problematic and risky because of the political context, from which the missionaries also received certain security favors from the state. It is in this context that the mission risked turning to state theology, a theology that would risk converting religion into an “opium of the people.” Note that state theology is a theological justification for the status quo, with its racism, capitalism, and totalitarianism. It blesses injustice, canonizes the will of the powerful and reduces the poor to passivity[15]. Its method is the quotation of biblical verses out of context, like “all authority comes from God”, “Que toute personne soit soumise aux autorités supérieures” (Romans 13.1) and other verses.
In his book on “contextual theology and revolutionary transformation in Latin America”, Richard Shaull, an American missionary, develops a contextual theology which has enabled the people of Latin America and the Caribbean to develop their theology of liberation from oppression . In the mission field, Shaull reflected on the Church and its mission in socio-political confusion[16]. It has been useful to develop liberation theology in the Congolese context. The contextualization of messianism opens the door to the reception and appropriation of Christ in the Congolese context, in its daily challenges.
5.2 Christ, our sanctifier
One of the values of C&MA theology is the place given to the concept of sanctification. It is one of the doctrinal foundations of Christian life. After 1874, after A.B. Simpsons’s special visitation by the Holy Spirit, sanctification had become one of the central themes of his preaching and his ministry. It was also central to its understanding of the missionary task of a church. For Simpson, the need for Sanctification stems from the nature of God and the condition of man. God’s people must reflect his nature which is holiness according to Leviticus 11:.44 and 1 Peter 1:16[17]. For Simpson, sanctification was not only moral, but also mystical. It is a separation from sinful habits, a consecration to God and to his will. A sanctified Christian is characterized by a life of obedience to God. The sacred then takes the place of choice in the man who sanctifies himself. Sanctification is that virtue without which no one will see God.
In addition, certain problems of conception and context have revealed themselves in the understanding or the application of the life of sanctification in the CEAC.
5.2.1 The African way of worship
The meaning of the Sacred can be understood differently from one environment to another, from one culture to another. The African form, for example, of worship and joy is understood differently. Two elements can be underlined in this contextual problem:
The first is the understanding of dance in sacred worship. Dance is an expression of joy for an African. However, in the primordial understanding desired by the missionary, worship should take on a silent and meditative character. It had even influenced the liturgy, where the rhythm had to be classical, meditative, and silent. The fiery worship did not seem to assume a holy character. Prayer had to be done one after another to respect the sanctity of the temple. It is true that meditation and silence are one of the dimensions of worship. Dancing in the “holy place” seemed to defile the holy place in the eyes of the missionaries. The cultural element to emphasize is the difference between Western and African conceptions. The West has further developed the meditative element in its encounter with God; while Africa is in a burning experience in its encounter with God.
The second is the use of traditional instruments for worship like the tam-tam, maracas… These aforementioned elements were considered to be defiled and pagan; while the modern and western piano, harmonica, flute, trumpet… had their place in the Holy Place.
5.2.2 The problem of alcoholic drinks
Alcohol abuse in society should be recognized. In Kongo culture, palm wine was widely used for ceremonial rites, and welcoming visitors as a sign of respect. Smith points out that bartering with alcoholic beverages was very common between the natives and the Portuguese[18]. Upon the arrival of the missionaries, drinking alcoholic beverages was prohibited on the basis of certain verses of the Bible, to such an extent that many who were no longer able to agree, found a way to drink it in secret. In order to force any member of the church to this discipline, the CEAC wrote a kind of contract, for any communicating member, worded as follows in Kikongo language: “Beto tuawawa mu lembua nwa bisansikisanga, ye lembua kitila bio”, which means “we have agreed not to take anything that is alcoholic [that makes you drunk] and not to market it”. This contract appears to be just a church convention, not a biblical doctrine.
More than a century later, certain problems arise, among other things, what would a faithful of the CEAC do if he finds himself in an environment where the Lord’s Supper is served with wine? Several parishes had this kind of problem when the Supper began to be served with wine. After many difficulties during this positioning, languages began to loosen amid the synods of the community, starting to revisit this convention on alcoholic beverages. Moreover, nowadays the code of good conduct for servants and faithful of the CEAC authorizes the use of wine or lemonade for the celebration of the Lord’s Supper. Also, several church leaders (laypeople) who financially support the church are good traders of alcoholic beverages. Sometimes the church finds itself unable to excommunicate these faithful because of this commercial activity.
5.2.3 Question of the pastoral ministry of women
This issue has long been very hot in the community. Since the arrival of the missionaries, women have never been consecrated as pastors. Yet they are accepted in theological institutions. They serve in other ministries of the church, but not in pastoral care. This gender issue has its roots in the cultural weight of Kongo society, as in most African cultures, because it cannot find solid biblical arguments. The matter having been debated in one of the recent synods, after a vote, a simple majority was in favor of the consecration of women. However, the Management Committee has seen fit to continue to develop the discussion so as not to create frustration.
5.3 Christ, our Healer
The redemption work of the Lord Jesus Christ also involves healing the mortal body. Praying for the sick and anointing with oil, as taught in the scriptures, are privileges for the Church in our time.
The question may arise as to why insisting on Jesus as a healer, when there are a multitude of roles that Christ plays through the Bible. Physical healing is one of the points that Jesus emphasized in his earthly ministry in Luke 7:18-22.
Remember that A.B. Simpson, the founder of the Alliance, was not in good health. During his lifetime, he experienced the power of God healing his sick body. This personal experience, added to other movements of his time, has sparked a lot of debate around the reality or not of physical healing, to the point that this doctrine has assumed enormous importance in the denomination.
Having a healing ministry in the church allows the Holy Spirit to give people healing gifts. According to 1 Corinthians 12, just as the Holy Spirit offers gifts to people for other needs of the Church’s body, he also offers gifts for healing.[19].
The Bible clearly tells us about the spiritual gifts that must be exercised within the Church for its edification. However, putting Scripture into practice in this context is problematic especially in the area of healing that God grants us. Several times, the manifestations of spiritual gifts have been the subject of controversy, to such an extent that those who indulge in it have been qualified to embrace the “nsambudulu zanzenza”, which means foreign practices or prayers.
Where the gap in understanding of doctrine or understanding of this pillar comes from is yet to be seen, according to A.B. Simpson. From those who brought the Gospel or of the natives themselves? It is also true that even in the days of A.B. Simpson the attestation of physical healing was part of many contradictions and debates. While there is a biblical foundation for this notion of healing, its particular emphasis in the C&MA was drawn more from the personal experience of its founder. One can ask the question of what would have happened if the founder had had an experience other than that of Simpson? Is experience a doctrine?
5.4 Christ, our Coming King
Christ’s affirmation, “Behold, I am coming soon,” is a strong pillar for evangelism and an argument for hope for the immediate arrival of the Son of Man. A.B. Simpson made this confirmation of the coming of Christ one of the pillars of his theology and his mission.
However, for centuries, it has been useful to ask: Since He is coming soon, should we abandon everything to wait for this coming? What should the attitude of Christians be while waiting for this great day? Some think that we will simply have to wait without getting involved in everything that is earthly, to devote ourselves entirely to this waiting. Others, however, would like to wait for this big day by getting involved in a responsible manner, while having the expectation of life to come.
The tacit implication of the socio-political conception of salvation is in fact a blind acceptance of the socio-economic situation by brandishing the argument of a better life that awaits us. While awaiting the arrival of this “day”, the hope of the arrival of the King can numb us and make us indifferent to earthly misery. This is the theology of “lumbu kina”, which simply means “that day”. It is this understanding of the Christ-Who-Comes and of eschatology that numbs us and makes us insensitive to earthly realities. According to Makanzu Mavumilusa, it is this theology that sends people like rockets to heaven, forgetting that they are still on earth[20].
This theology has been improperly developed in several servants of God to the point of not taking care of everything that is earthly and material ease, claiming that everything that is earthly is completely useless. Christ will fill us the day we see each other with him. It is therefore from this theory that we can understand the perspective on poverty as a sign of humility and true consecration to God. A dedicated and powerful servant should therefore appear miserable. Sometimes certain biblical portions are misused such as: Blessed are the poor in spirit, for the kingdom of heaven is theirs (Matthew 5.3). The expression “poor in spirit” was not understood according to the author’s thought.
6. The vision and the conception of a missionary church in the Alliance in DR Congo
It should be noted that many thinkers believe that Africa is not making an effort for the mission, and the few churches that send missionaries suffer from the lack of organization.
The Evangelical Community of the Alliance in the Congo is supposed to be a missionary community like its initiators. One hundred and thirty-five years later, it has done a great deal of work in extending it in a large number of territories. However, after the overseas missionaries left, the concept of mission had some difficulty in some ways. Mission field sites have struggled to survive; the new fields were difficult to open; and those who were already open had problems surviving for lack of financial means to supervise the servants. The question is, how is it that a community of nearly a million members is unable to take care of its missionaries well? There are many reasons. A few can be discussed below:
The first reason comes from the disastrous socioeconomic situation: The socioeconomic situation of the DR Congo which affects all sectors of the country, does not spare the Church. The faithful being in misery imposed by egocentric leaders, often find themselves unable to take on the work of the Lord as desired. Socio-political instability can also affect the missionary will of community members. The experience of the beginning of the mission can remind us that in 1884 the first expedition to Zaire[21] was not successful because of two things: The lack of spiritual maturity and experience, as well as the lack of understanding financial charge. History tells us that young missionaries sent on missions to the Congo should rely on God’s providence, working to survive without the support of their American brothers. This caused a delay in the development of the community in Zaire[22]. An unaccompanied mission faces several material challenges that may prevent the advancement of the work. Socio-economic difficulties create the syndrome of dependence on wealthier countries, even in the area of mission.
The second reason consists in a problem of strategies, planning and solid structures: It is noted that in the CEAC, with its hundreds of parishes, only three or four each have, independently, a missionary vision. These parishes are almost all French speaking. They have managed to open extensions that they frame. Curiously, missionary projects initiated by the community are struggling to evolve. So, it is a problem of basic missionary vision. Several communities currently manage to expand thanks to their strategies and their missionary vision at the base, that is to say, each implanted parish must seek to implant new ones. When it is the base that designs the vision and strategy, the motivation is also great. Bold work at the grassroots level should be done to enable the community office to coordinate and follow up on missionary actions carried out by many local churches.
The third reason comes from the understanding of the concept “mission”: This problem has arisen since the departure of Western missionaries. It is true that the Western strategy has worked well in relation to the financial support of the mission fields. This is also due to the strength or financial stability of the West. The mother church was the provider. But a void can be created in the conception of the natives who cannot assume the understanding of the mission as a passage from another race going towards other races, for the advancement of the gospel. Reynolds’ speech informs us when he says:
Let me reflect for a few moments on the experience of my growth with the conventions of the missionaries of the Alliance. I have attended almost 40 missionary conventions in my life (one per year). The image of missions I have seen in most of these conventions is that missions are something that the people who come to visit us do for a given people somewhere. At first I didn’t really ask myself any questions, but when I entered high school and university and started to understand the problems of colonialism, racism and various other things, I wondered if it was something we should do: send all these white people somewhere else to tell people what to do[23].
This conception of missions continues to slue the true meaning of the mission. A missionary seems to be understood as someone who would leave from one country or far away to another. The CEAC, for example, is suffering in the execution of this missionary vision. As a result, several mission fields have remained on the back burner since the departure of Western missionaries.
The fourth reason is that missionaries taught indigenous people more about evangelism than mission. The two expressions appear to be very close to each other, but very different in essence.
According to the interview with Reverend Pastor Kombetassie, head of the Mission Department of the CEAC, he confirms the following:
When the missionaries left, it was believed that the mission was a white job. After the missionaries left, there was a period when the Church did not know what to do for the mission. Missionaries from the West did not go to the CEAC, but to C&MA. So, after opening Mayombe, Matadi and Kinshasa, they stayed there only to watch over the doctrine. For some time, local leaders have instilled this missionary vision in the faithful. There is now a mission committee which regularly subsidizes the mission[24].
We can therefore understand that the mission is still a step to take, a school to enroll in and a lesson to learn.
7. Conclusion
This study was a rereading of missionary work in its contextualization in DR Congo. The missionary work wanted to realize the four pillars of the Gospel according to A.B. Simpson. After analysis, it turned out that an effort of contextualization should still be made for a much more African theology, taking into account local realities by capitalizing on the freedom of Spirit that the Gospel offers us to fully experience a Christ the Savior of a people suffering from social injustice, a Christ who sanctifies and not banishes the indigenous culture, a Christ who heals both physical and moral infirmities, and a Christ who soon comes as King, but allows us to commit ourselves fully to temporal affairs by waiting for his return.
In any case, the CEAC must also contextualize its vision of the mission, by turning to current inter and transcultural realities.
Bibliography
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Draper, K. L. The Fourfold Gospel as Simpson’s Pastoral Theology, 1997.
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Leonard, G. S. D. (ed.). Kairos, the moment of truth, Pietermariztburg: Ujamaa Centre, 2011.
Makanzu, Mavumilusa. Quand Dieu te gêne (When God hinders you). Wuppertal: Editions VEM, 1986.
Reimer, A. A Pastoral Approach to Healing in the Alliance. Canadian Bible College, Regina, SK, 1998.
Reynolds, L. Missions and Indigenous Churches. Christian and Missionary Alliance in Canada, 1992.
Shaull R. M. Contextual Theology and Revolutionary Transformation in Latin America: The Missiology of M. Richard Shaull, 2010.
Smith, V. L. Bâtie sur le roc (Diatungwa va tadi), Congo: Viola Allan, 1966.
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Yanagihara, Jura. Histoire de l’Alliance Chrétienne et Missionnaire. Conférence de la CMA. Mali.
[1] Former President and Legal Representative of the Evangelical Community of the Alliance in the Congo from 1975-1991
[2] Kuvuna K. M., Kinkulu kia Dibundu, (Boma: CEAZ, 1984), 2.
[3] Interview with Professor Dianzungu Diabiniakunu from November 14, 2019
[4] Jean Marc Ela, Rethinking African Theology (Paris: Karthala, 2003)
[5]Kongo University, Diplomacy in the former Kingdom of Kongo. Historical and prospective study (Kinshasa: Presses de l’Université Kongo, 2008), 88-89
[6] Kä Mana, G., The new evangelization in Africa (Paris and Yaoundé: Karthala and Clé, 2000)
[7] Kuvuna K. M., Op.Cit, 14-15
[8] Ibid, 18
[9] Smith, V. L., built on the rock (Diatungwa va tadi) (Congo: Viola Allan, 1966), 35 informs us that apart from this entry into Mayombe, in January 1878, Grenfell and Comber of the SMF had already left Cameroon, entering by the river to downstream of Matadi. In February of the same year, the English Craven and Strom of Livingstone Inland Mission landed in Boma and built the first mission station in Palabala.
[10] CEAC Presidency statistical data for 2019
[11] Kaufmann, L., The contribution of contextual theology to moral theology: An analysis of the institute for contextual theology in South Africa (South Africa, 2001), 51
[12] Bevans, S. B., Models of Contextual Theology (New York: Orbis Books, 1992), 634
[13] Draper, K. L., The Fourfold Gospel as Simpson’s Pastoral Theology (1997)
[14] Kuvuna K. M., Op Cit, 126
[15] Leonard, G. S. D. (ed.), 2011. Kairos, the moment of truth (Pietermaritzburg: Ujamaa Centre, 2011)
[16] Richard Shaull M. T., 2010. Contextual Theology and Revolutionary Transformation in Latin America: The Missiology of M. Richard Shaull (2010), 234
[17] Warnken, R., A.B. Simpson’s doctrine of the baptism of the Holy Spirit (1997), 15-16
[18] Smith, Op.Cit, 41
[19] Reimer, A. 1998. A Pastoral Approach to Healing in the Alliance (Regina, SK: Canadian Bible College)
[20] Makanzu M., Quand Dieu te gêne (When God hinders you) (Wuppertal: Editions VEM, 1986)
[21] It is the old name for the Democratic Republic of Congo.
[22] Yanagihara, Jura, History of the Christian and Missionary Alliance, (C&MA Conference in Mali), 1
[23] Reynolds, L., Missions and Indigenous Churches. Christian and Missionary Alliance in Canada, 1992
[24] Reverend Kombetassie, in charge of the Mission of CEAC. Interview of November 11, 2019