African Ecologies: Literary, Cultural, and Religious Perspectives

2020

The relationship between religion and the environment has generated considerable scholarly attention. Researchers from diverse disciplines have sought to understand and to explain the interface between the two fields. In terms of the emergence of the discipline, the contribution by Lynn White, one of the pioneering figures in the field, in his article, "The Ecological Roots of Our Crisis", 2 remains foundational. In summary, White maintained that the contemporary ecological crisis emerged from Christianity's dominating approach towards the created order. Christian attitudes to the environment were basically exploitative, he argued. Since then, different contributors to the debate have either sought to confirm, debunk, recast or expand White's underlying thesis. The realisation that we are living in a world characterised by a radical plurality of religions has led to the broadening of the focus, beyond Christianity and the Bible. That there is a global environmental crisis is widely accepted, except by a few powerful individuals and institutions who do not recognise the implications of this reality. Such individuals and institutions are mainly located in the global North and are aware that the global environmental crisis demands that they change their lifestyles, as well as making financial contributions to address this pressing challenge. Some activists have been frustrated by the intransigence of the powerful denialists, concluding that they are impervious to scientific facts. I am persuaded that those who deny the reality of an environmental crisis are adopting a strategy that enables them to hide in plain sight. Although the reality of climate change has become clear to citizens of the global South, some powerful individuals in the global North are able to avoid their responsibility, because the impact is not yet as obvious in their context. Climate policy analysts Anja Kollmuss and Julian Agyeman have summarised some of the key factors that influence the failure to act in the wake of environmental challenges. 3 These include, first, the non-immediacy of many ecological problems, second, the slow and gradual ecological destruction and, third, the realities of complex systems, since environmental problems are highly complex and not easy to simplify. Such factors lead to lack of urgency in addressing environmental issues.

Cross-Currents: An International Peer-Reviewed Journal on Humanities & Social Sciences

With the growing awareness of environmental issues in the twenty-first century, this study explores the extent to which African philosophy contributes extensively to the discourse of climate change and the natural world. However, some critics are of the view that African philosophy is inherently anthropocentric and has nothing significant to offer in addressing climate change. Against this backdrop, this undertaking illustrates that the natural environment for Africans is not labeled “other” as often observed among industrialists rather it is a vital part of the African traditional world equilibrium. Hence, anything that imperils the African peoples‟ ecosystem endangers their very existence-socially, economically, morally, politically, spiritually and ecologically. The study demonstrates that there is a huge correlation between socio-political, economic and suppressive structures in Africa‟s postcolonial condition which have brought about climate change, environmental despoliation a...

and the Environment The world is currently experiencing the severe consequences of the mismanagement of the environmental. This environmental crisis is posing a serious threat to the existence of the human person alongside other living organisms within the ecosystem as the exploitation of nature is finding expression in deforestation, desertification, extinction of species, forced migration, bush fire, air pollution, soil erosion, oil depletion, ozone depletion, greenhouse gas increase, extreme energy, water pollution, natural disasters, metals and solid minerals depletion, etc., (Gwamna 2016). Chiras (1989) sums up the fears in these words: "Together, the problems of overpopulation, depletion, and pollution have created an ecological crisis-a threat to the integrity of natural systems of which humans are part, and therefore a threat to the survival of human life." (p. 5) Regarding deforestation, which involves the removal of forest products, thereby converting the land to a non-forest use, is resulting in the damage of the habitat, biodiversity loss, aridity, etc. As a result of the disappearance of tropical rainforests, ecosystems preserved in these thick forests are facing extinction. Human activities such as digging of the soil and cutting down of plants have led to erosion (Ehrenfed 1978). Thus, nutrients needed by plants are washed away by erosion; there is also the reduction of the quality and quantity of land, the pilling of sediments inside streams, lakes, brooks and other bodies of water, etc., which is not healthy for the orgnisms residing in these water bodies. There is also the pollution of the air, land and water bodies with toxic substances and noise which impair the normal functioning of the ecosystem by spreading tropical diseases, extreme weather condition, crop failures, poor crop Introduction African Ecological Spirituality Edited By: Ikechukwu Anthony KANU, OSA, PhD xi today. Pope Francis (2015) articulates the need for a wholistic approach to ecological crisis thus: We urgently need a humanism capable of bringing together the different fields of knowledge, including economics, in the service of a more integral and integrating vision. Today, the analysis of environmental problems cannot be separated from the analysis of human, family, work-related and urban contexts, nor from how individuals relate to themselves, which leads in turn to how they relate to others and to the environment. There is an interrelation between ecosystems and between the various spheres of social interaction, demonstrating yet again that the whole is greater than the part (no. 141). This is very important given the place that the human person occupies in the world or the universe. The human person is not just like other existing realities; and this is not in any way meant to disregard the integrity of other existing realities but to emphasize the central place of the human person in the ecosystem. The promotion of urbanization, industrialization and communization at the expense of the human person without whom such a promotion has no value is not sustenable (Delaney, 2009). Focusing on the rights of human persons as equal 'citizens' of this earth, Francis (2015) adds that: "human beings too are creatures of this world, enjoying a right to life, and happiness, and endowed with unique dignity. So we cannot fail to consider the effects on people's lives of environmental deterioration, current models of development and the throwaway culture" (no. 43). Interestingly, in the face of all these, Africa is today united by the consciousness that individual destinies are caught up with the health of natural systems at the national, regional and continental levels. This Book of Readings on African Ecological Spirituality: Perspectives in Anthroposophy and Environmentalism A cursory glance at the historical development of African anthroposophy, reveals that African earth-based spiritual traditions and innovative spiritual practices that are emerging in response to the painful realities of climate change, mass extinction, biodiversity loss, and the disruption of local and global ecosystems have for long not received the attention that it deserves. This work, therefore, would become one of the greatest ornaments and lights in the world of African eco-spirituality as it responds to questions that are long overdue from the world of African spirituality.

International Journal of Religion and Human Relations Vol 12(1), 2016

African Traditional Religion recognizes the sacred quality of the ecological system because it serves as dwelling place for divinities, deities, spirits as well as the medium through which the sovereign or Supreme Being (God) can be reached. It has been discovered that the influence of modernism and secularism has created an irrevocable havoc and devastation to the ecological system and unspeakable catastrophe to African Traditional Religion. The objective of this paper was to examine the African ecological philosophy as a practice and ideology of resolving the present world ecological problem. This article adopts phenomenological method. The work recommends that both government and traditional societies should put serious measures to check the wanton destruction of the ecological system.

Kervan. International Journal of Afro-Asiatic Studies, 2019

Human impact on natural environment has seriously increased over the last few centuries. However, it is only from the mid-twentieth century that a greater sensitivity has developed around environmental problems. With an eye on the development of the African environmentalism, the paper considers the reaction of some African writers and their efforts towards the conservation of physical environment and climate change through their literary works as narrative and poetry genres.

Religion & development/Religion and development, 2024

In Africa the environment is sacrosanct and treated with great respect, particularly in communities where traditional beliefs and practices prevail. The sacredness of the environment is based on the African people's fundamental belief that the spiritual and the secular worlds are two sides of the same coin endowed with divine power and presence. As a result, the line of demarcation between the two worlds is blurred. They complement each other in the sense that each derives its meaning, significance and importance from the other. Since the natural world is imbued with the divine, it is considered an extension of the supernatural world. In the absence of written legal frameworks, the environment, in indigenous communities, is protected through religious beliefs and practices. This article analyses the basic approaches of the African people towards nature and their fundamental belief that the environment is an integral part of God's creation and must therefore be preserved and conserved for future generations. The article notes that in contemporary Africa the emphasis on material values is leading towards the total destruction of the environment, thus putting humanity at the intersection of self-destruction -something that needs to be avoided at all costs. Religion & Development 2 (2023) 445-462

Association for the Promotion of African Studies, 2021

AFRICAN ECO-THEOLOGY: MEANING, FORMS AND EXPRESSIONS

2020

Using an interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary approach, this study investigates the ecotheological contributions of three main interlocutors from East and Southern Africa, namely Samson Gitau, Kapya Kaoma and Jesse Mugambi, all of whom are African theologians. The three theologians seek to address ecological degradation from an African ecological perspective, by drawing on African Indigenous Knowledge Systems and African Christianity and Religiosity. The contributions of the three theologians in their respective chapters enable the study to identify the systems and practices that are under-researched and not utilised even though they are ecologically sensitive systems. Owing to a number of factors, African Indigenous Wisdom Knowledge Systems have not been adequately explored. African Indigenous Wisdom is a body of knowledge systems with ecological overtones. From a theological and African religiosity perspective, Gitau, Kaoma and Mugambi highlight the need for natural theology to be adopted by the Church as an institution. Gitau stresses the importance of relations based on the African concept of God, humanity and creation. The study addresses the gap in the existing knowledge by drawing on the main interlocutors to investigate the ecological crisis and by adopting an interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary approach. According to this approach, as applied by Gitau, Kaoma and Mugambi, the indigene's systems are not adequately explored and churches in Africa are ecologically insensitive. African churches ought to embrace Indigenous Wisdom Knowledge Systems and form an African eco-theology. The study has brought to the fore the ecological overtones of African religious belief systems and African Christianity that, together, provide the basis for Christian ecological ethics inside and outside the faith community. Gitau, Kaoma and Mugambi condemn the Church as an institution and other voices for not taking a leading role in addressing contemporary ecological issues.

This article argues that as humanity is now changing the composition of the atmosphere at a rate that is very exceptional on the geological time scale, resulting in global warming, humans must deal with climate change holistically, including the often overlooked religion factor. Human-caused climate change has resulted primarily from changes in the amounts of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, but also from changes in small particles (aerosols), as well as from changes in land use. In Africa, the entire relationship between humans and nature, including activities such as land use, has deep religious and spiritual underpinnings. In general, religion is central to many of the decisions people make about their own communities' development. Hence, this contribution examines religion as a factor that can be tapped into to mitigate negative effects of climate change, discussing climate change and religion in the context of development practice. It argues that some of the difficulties encountered in development, including efforts to reverse global warming in Africa, directly speak to the relegation of African cosmovision and conversely of the need to adopt new epistemologies, concepts, and models that take religion into consideration.

2019

There has been a hot debate around Christianity’s complicity in environmental destruction for some fifty years. The reasons are mainly to do with the so-called dominion mandate in the book of Genesis and the propensity for Christianity to “disenchant” the environment, that is rid it of spiritual agency. This has led to a comparison between Indigenous Religion and Christianity with respect to the environment with the former being the saint and the latter the sinner. Eco-theologies have emerged during this time in order to mitigate the negative influence of Christianity. These have in many cases attempted to emulate some aspects of Indigenous Religions. In the African context there are signs that the Christian mission continues to have negative effects on the environment and this raises the question of what would constitute an appropriate African Christian theology of the environment.