Anglican-and-Pentecostal-Prayer-in-East-Africa-Final-Copy

However, before going into the differences in prayer between these two different denominations, a common understanding must be provided.. Prayer is one of the oldest practices of religio

East African Ecumenical Prayer: Anglican and Pentecostal

Dr FosterIssues in Global Christianity

BIBH 640.W1May 3, 2014

The global center of Christianity has shifted from its beginnings in the Middle East, across Europe, and south to the African continent.1 The expressions of Christianity have changed

as well as it encountered different cultures around the world Yet the differences are not only due

to the spread of this faith, but also to the denominations that have sprung from within

Christianity It is in each of these denominations that different expressions of Christianity arise; some churches emphasize this over that, while others say these words during worship rather than those words Yet, could there be a stark difference between the language and practices of

Christians who, although identified as two different denominations, find themselves within the same geographical region? The following is an exploration of prayer among both Anglican and Pentecostal Christians in some East African contexts- namely Ethiopia, Kenya, and Tanzania

However, before going into the differences in prayer between these two different

denominations, a common understanding must be provided The author will give a brief

overview of prayer first, in order to show the framework of prayer from which this paper

operates Then, a short history will be given first of the Anglican tradition, then of the

Pentecostal tradition The rise and spread of each is important in understanding where these two traditions stand now Included in this brief historical synopsis of each of these traditions will be

an examination of the major theological tenets of each tradition, as well as, and more pointedly for the purposes of this paper, how each views or understands prayer in a very general sense Next, a short historical account of Ethiopia, Kenya, and Tanzania will be provided for the reader

in order that he or she might better understand the current religious situation within this country Finally, the paper will move to intended and identified purpose of comparing the prayers of Christians in Anglican churches and of Christians in Pentecostal churches in these countries

1 Todd M Johnson, “Christianity in Global Context: Trends and Statistics,” Pew Forum.

Prayer is one of the oldest practices of religion in general, dating back to the time of Jesusand his ministry, and even before the common era.2 Thus, Christianity cannot claim prayer as a solely Christian construct or invention However, although prayer may be universal to religion as

a whole, prayer has become a pillar in the Christian faith across all of its denominations As Charles Hodge asserts, “A prayerless Christian and pulseless man are alike impossible.”3 We see the importance of prayer in Christianity through the multiple examples seen in both the Old and New Testaments, through the different illustrations of prayer and discussions on prayer from the founding mothers and fathers of Christianity,4 as well as through, (to borrow Brandon’s

language), humanity’s need to communicate with the supernatural and the divine, prayer has found a strong presence in the Christian faith. 5

Prayer within the confines of Christianity is often defined as “communication with God.”6 These exact words are given in The New Dictionary of Theology as a description and

discussion of the theology of prayer.7 The ability to communicate with God rests on the

2 There are many examples of prayer throughout the Old Testament, (the Psalms, the prayers of the kings, etc.); Examples of prayer are also seen outside of the Christian circle, and even outside of the circle of the Abrahamic

faiths, (Greek and Roman religious practices) ; For more on this idea, see S.G.F Brandon, ed., “Prayer,” The

Dictionary of Comparative Religion (New York: Charles Scribners Sons, 1970), 507-509 Also see Charles W

Nienkirchen, “Prayer,” The Dictionary of Christian Spirituality (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2011), 166 Also, John

R Tyson, ed., Invitation to Christian Spirituality (Oxford: University Press, 1999), 388.

3 Charles Hodge, “Conference Paper” (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1879), 293.

4 Origen, On Prayer, Life as Prayer, How to Pray; John Cassian, On Prayer, Continuous Prayer; St Francis, St

Francis’ Prayer Before the Crucifix, An Untitled Prayer (Francis); Thomas Aquinas, On Prayer; Desiderius

Erasmus, The Weapons of Christian Warfare; Thomas Cranmer, Prayer for the Whole State of Christ’s Church,

Prayer of General Confession, Prayer of Humble Access; Teresa of Avila, Mental Prayer, The Prayer of Union;

George Herbert, Prayer; Jeanne (Madame) Guyon, The Prayer of Simplicity; Hannah More, Prayer; Walter

Rauschenbusch, the Social Meaning of the Lord’s Prayer; Karl Barth, The Problem of Prayer, Prayer as a Gift of

God, Prayer as a Human Act, A Pastoral Prayer; Mother Teresa, Prayers All but the first of these are examples

given from flipping through the table of contents looking for the word ‘prayer’ or things related to prayer in Tyson, vii-xv.

5 Brandon, 507.

6 For more on this definition of prayer, see Donald G Bloesch, The Struggle of Prayer (Colorado Springs: Helmers

& Howard, 1988), 50-66.; Also see, Wayne R Spears, The Theology of Prayer (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House,

1979), 7-9.

7 D J Tidball, “Prayer, Theology of,” The New Dictionary of Theology (Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 1988),

526-527.

understanding and belief that the Christian God is a relational god, and desires a personal

relationship with those who would choose to follow him.8 Thus, prayer is most commonly understood in Christianity as the open line of communication between the Christian adherent andthe Christian God Prayer is an expression of the “dynamic, transformative, dialogical

relationship between humans and the triune God…”9 Prayer is the way in which Christians both ask God for blessings and cry out to God in pain and sorrow; it is where Christians can openly express each and every possible human emotion imaginable to God.10 As Donald G Bloesch putsit:

Christian prayer is born out of the realization that human beings in and of themselves are incapable of saving themselves from the forces of darkness within and about them In genuine prayer, we come to God with empty hands trusting solely in his mercy…we do not bring God offerings that can win his favor, but we do bring before him the petition of

as prayers for sick friends or family members, for financial blessings, or even for praise and thanksgiving to God for God’s work in their life For the purposes of this paper, the following five categories of different types of prayer will be considered as the framework for prayer:

see John S Mbiti, Concepts of God in Africa (London: S.P.C.K 1970), 194-212.

13 Adele A Calhoun, Spiritual Disciplines Handbook (Downers Grove: Intervarsity Press, 2005), 203-255.

adoration, confession, intercession, petition, and thanksgiving.14 Yet it does not only provide a means of communication between humans and God, nor does it just function as a way for

humans to ask their gods for blessings, but prayer also serves a cathartic role in the lives of humans.15 This cathartic function or role of prayer is precisely why prayer is practiced across religions It is a human desire to pray, and the practice of praying serves to fill a cathartic

function that one cannot find elsewhere

Thus, Christianity and prayer are very much enmeshed in one another Although it cannotand should not be thought of as a Christian construct, prayer has become a central focus and practice of Christianity Not only are the adherents to Christianity humans, and therefore have this desire- this “irrepressible yearning”- to pray, but they also find this cathartic role or function filled by the practice of prayer Christians are also given, through prayer, the chance and

opportunity to communicate with their God; prayer is a place where the creator and the created intersect As a result of this intersection, prayer is the place where Christians are able to ask God for blessings, to pray for others, and to listen to God Even more, Christians are given the

example of prayer throughout the Bible, both in the Old as well as in the New Testament And finally, at the very basic and very frank level, Christians are called to pray, and to pray often, time and time again throughout the Bible Thus, prayer is now central to Christianity, and has, (since the third century), been a major area of study and thought within the Christian circle.16

14 K E Kirk, et al., eds., “Prayer,” The Westminster Dictionary of Christian Spirituality (Philadelphia: Wakefield, 1983), 307-313 ; For more on each of these individually, see John Macquarrie, “Prayer: 1 Adoration,” The

Westminster Dictionary of Christian Spirituality, 307 ; Gordon S Wakefield, “Prayer: 2 Confession,” The

Westminster Dictionary of Christian Spirituality, 308 ; Michael Hollings, “Prayer: 3 Intercession,” The Westminster Dictionary of Christian Spirituality, 309 ; George Appleton, “Prayer: 4 Petition,” The Westminster Dictionary of Christian Spirituality, 311 ; A Michael Ramsey, “Prayer: 5 Thanksgiving,” The Westminster Dictionary of Christian Spirituality, 312.

15 See James, 361.; Also see Donald E Miller and Tetsunao Yamamori, Global Pentecostalism: The New Face of

Christian Social Engagement (Berkley: University of California, 2007) 146.

16 Prayer is seen throughout the Bible, but Christian writers and theologians have also spent much time and energy thinking about and discussing prayer Nienkirchen says, “Systematic discussions of prayer first appeared in the 3 rd

century when three prayer treatises were authored by three North African church fathers within fifty years of each other Tertullian, Origen, and Cyprian each composed full-length prayer treatises that included a commentary on the

Prayer is major part of Christianity, and can be expressed in a variety of ways The five categories listed above help to narrow down the understanding of prayer to be discussed here There is much more that could be said on prayer, specifically in relation to ways of prayer, (whether rehearsed or extemporaneous; whether in a group, in corporate worship, or in a private

setting; whether one is talking to or even at God, or one is listening to try to hear God’s voice),

on specific words and language used during prayer, and even on posture taken during prayer However, most of these differences in prayer will be touched on later in this paper With this categorized understanding of prayer, this paper will now move forward toward comparing prayers of Anglican and Pentecostal Christians in East Africa, but will first examine the rise, spread, and current status of both Anglicanism and Pentecostalism

The Anglican Tradition:

Anglicanism was officially created in the early to middle sixteenth century, amidst the chaos ensued by the creation of The Church of England, and its ‘separation’ from the Catholic church When the king of England, King Henry VIII, desired an annulment from the Roman papal office of his marriage to Catherine of Aragon, and when the pope refused to give such an annulment to him, he created the Church of England Laws were passed that officially and legally set this church beyond the jurisdiction of the Roman Catholic Church and the Roman see.However, since this split was from the Catholic tradition and since this was the tradition that Henry VIII and the rest of England was familiar with, there was not much change to be seen initially In fact, as Spinks says, “The result was that by 1536 the English church was an

independent Catholic church.”17 He goes on to say that although this new church aimed to abolish “popular devotional practices…until the death of Henry VIII, the Latin Catholic rites

Lord’s Prayer, extolled as the perfect condensation of the gospel.” Nienkirchen, 169.

17 Bryan D Spinks, “Anglicans and Dissenters” in The Oxford History of Christian Worship (Oxford: University,

2006), 492.

remained the norm of public worship in the English church.”18 It was not until the late

seventeenth century, (1689), under the reign of Elizabeth I, that the Toleration Act was passed, and the national church of England became a fully separate and established church in its own right.19

It is through the effort to form a unified church of the state, an effort which was a reactionagainst and separate from the Roman Catholic Church, that the Church of England emerged Granted, at this same time, there were other Christian “greats” reacting against the Catholic Church, (such as Martin Luther, John Calvin, and Ulrich Zwingli).20 However, the creation of theChurch of England was a separate and distinct action from the Protestant Reformation, arising mostly out of the will of the king of England.21 And this new sect was created, in order for the king to obtain a divorce from his wife, yes, but also for nationalistic and political purposes.22

Regardless of the exact and precise reason or reasons why, the Church of England was established in this time, and it appointed Thomas Cranmer as Archbishop of Canterbury on March 30, 1533.23 Upon installation, Cranmer immediately set to work on further severing connections between the Catholic and the Anglican church, translating and publishing the litany

in English instead of Latin in 1544 as it had been in the Catholic church.24 Archbishop Cranmer

then published many other reforms to the liturgy including the Order of the Communion, and the

Book of Common Prayer.25 This latter publication was originally very simply a rendering of “the old services…into English,” but officially replaced all of the Latin Catholic rites on Pentecost

25 Spinks, 494 ; The Book of Common Prayer went under two revisions during the time of Cranmer For more on

this, see Spinks, 494-497, and Jacobs 57-59.

Sunday, June 9, 1549.26

Yet, how did a denomination which started in England, and is even named “The Church

of England, (ecclesia Anglicana),” become one that is present and has lasted outside of the

borders of England? As Chris Hefling points out,

for a hundred years or so, the Prayer Book remained within the British Isles It was introduced in Ireland and Scotland early on…its migration overseas began in the

seventeenth century, as English settlers took their Anglicanism with them to newly founded ‘plantations’ and colonies.27

As this denomination continued to spread throughout the world, the title ‘Anglican’ itself “began

to have the enlarged, non-geographical meaning it now has,” and the Book of Common Prayer

“began to be translated into more and more non-European languages.”28 More pointedly,

however, its spread into the region of East Africa “was influenced by the different characteristics

of two mission societies”: The Church Mission Society (CMS), and the Universities’ Mission to Central Africa (UMCA).29 Eventually, as the mission continued to spread throughout the African

continent, “A United Liturgy for East Africa, known as the East Africa United Liturgy (EAUL)”

was created in 1965 and approved a year later.30 In fact, according to Mombo, the Anglican tradition has spread so much throughout East Africa that the 20 different countries within this region are represented by nine different “provinces of Anglican communion,” and that each of these countries had a greater Anglican influence in 2006 than “little or no organized Anglican presence.”31 Although it may be small in comparison to some other denominations present in this

26 Spinks, 494-495.

27 Charles Hefling, “Introduction: Anglicans and Common Prayer” in The Oxford Guide to The Book of Common

Prayer: A Worldwide Survey, edited by Charles Hefling and Cynthia Shattuck (Oxford: University Press, 2006), 3-4.

28 Hefling, 4.

29 Esther Mombo, “Rites and Books in Africa: Anglican Liturgies in Eastern Africa” in The Oxford Guide to The

Book of Common Prayer: A Worldwide Survey, edited by Charles Hefling and Cynthia Shattuck (Oxford: University

Press, 2006), 277.

30 Mombo, 279 ; The EAUL was not available as a resource while writing this paper, but is apparently available on Amazon currently for $35.00.

31 Mombo, 278.

region, the Anglican church definitely maintains a presence among these countries.

It is the idea of a common book of different prayers that began the idea of this paper Especially in contrast with extemporaneous and spontaneous prayer, having a set book in which the whole of the congregation can use to pray seems odd In fact, these two would seem to be at opposite ends of the spectrum from each other: one is a well thought-out, revised, written book

of prayers for an individual or a group of people to follow along with and read from; the other is prayer spoken impromptu and ‘on the spot.’ Granted, it is not the case nor should one assume that the prayers listed in the Common Book of Prayer are the extent of prayers that Anglican adherents pray As Charles Hefling is very quick to point out, “The Prayer Book is not a prayer book, in the sense of a collection of separate prayers It is more like a playbook, the ‘script’ actors use for performing a play.”32 While there are pros and cons to both approaches in praying, and while this paper aims to explore just that, it will now shift to a discussion over the start and spread of the Pentecostal movement

The Pentecostal Tradition:

The Pentecostal tradition has its origins in Topeka, Kansas with Charles F Parham’s Bethel Bible School It is suggested as a fairly young movement, (as opposed to Anglicanism or even Catholicism), starting just one hundred and thirteen years ago on January 1, 1901.33 In the midst of one of Parham’s lessons on the connection between speaking in tongues and baptism in the Holy Spirit, the class is recorded as gaining the gift of glossolalia, (or tongue speaking) This message and movement was then picked up by William J Seymour, (who had sat outside the

32 Hefling, 1.

33 Stanley M Burgess and Gary B McGee, “The Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements: Introduction” in The

Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements (Grand Rapids: Regency Reference, 1988), 1-3 ; Although

this is the date most often attributed to the rise of the Pentecostal Movement, recent scholarship has found

Pentecostal expressions of faith before this date from around the world, suggesting that perhaps the similar

expressions of Pentecostal faith found in the Bible never actually stopped after the first century For more on this

view, see Stanley M Burgess, “Introduction” in The New International Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic

Movements (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2002), xv.

classroom and had heard and witnessed these things), to Los Angeles, California Here, Seymour preached in his Holiness style, proclaiming the message about this phenomenon, and calling for revival It was in this context that the more well-known and more familiar connection with Pentecostalism is seen- Azusa Street.

Azusa Street is the common connection point with the start and spread of the Pentecostal tradition Although some would argue for the earlier beginning with Parham and the Bethel BibleSchool, it was at the Azusa Street mission that much of the Pentecostal theology emerged.34

The excitement that this revival brought spread throughout the land, so much so that “Before long, Pentecostal revivals could be found in Canada, England, Scandinavia, Germany, India, China, Africa, and South America.”35 Thus, Pentecostalism brought with it an unprecedented energy and excitement, and soon spread throughout each of the continents In fact, this growth was so rapid that it by the middle of the twentieth century, the Pentecostal tradition was growing faster than almost every other Christian tradition.36 Eventually, this growth led to the country of Ethiopia and its surrounding countries as well in the 1950’s, as a result of the work of Finnish and Swedish missionaries.37 This initial movement gained speed quickly, and continued to grow and spread, as did a separate “indigenous Pentecostal movement” around the same time.38

Spirituality, then, within the Pentecostal tradition should also be discussed As defined by

The Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements, spirituality is “the pietistic habits of

ordinary individuals.”39 This dictionary then goes on to list “five implicit values” which are seen

34 Burgess and McGee, 3.

35 Burgess and McGee, 3.

36 Burgess and McGee, 3.

37 Jörg Haustein, “Embodying the Spirit(s): Pentecostal Demonology and Deliverance Discourse in Ethiopia,”

Ethnos 76.4 (Dec 2011), 536.

38 Jörg Haustein, “Historical Epistemology and Pentecostal Origins: History and Historiography in Ethiopian

Pentecostalism,” Pneuma 35 (2013), 350.

39 R P Splitter, “Spirituality, Pentecostal and Charismatic” in The Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic

Movements (Grand Rapids: Regency Reference, 1988), 804-805.

throughout and govern Pentecostal spirituality: 1) individual experience, 2) orality, 3)

spontaneity, 4) otherworldliness, and 5) a commitment to biblical authority.40 The author goes on

to say:

The style of prayer and praise is instructive Quite usual is collective oral prayer, all praying at once, mostly vernacular or mostly glossolalic or some mix of the two This pattern expresses the personal experience of each Such collective group prayer is usuallycued by a leader, but it can be emerge spontaneously- in which cases glossolalia often predominates…Fasting often accompanies prayer, but it is rarely mandated for

congregations The raising of hands in joint or individual prayer reflects literal response

to biblical precedents (Exod 17:11-12) and commands (1 Tim 2:8).41

He goes on to introduce ‘proxy prayer,’ as well as other various forms found within this distinct denomination.42 While it is true that not every member nor every church practices every type of

prayer, it is clear that the Pentecostal tradition practices a variety of different worship actions anddisciplines, which can be seen as fitting into and illuminating the five different overarching values identified by Splitter

With this understanding and overview of the different practices of those within the Pentecostal tradition, one can better understand the spirituality of someone who identifies as a Pentecostal It is clear that there are a variety of different practices practiced by the whole of the tradition However, not only do adherents to the Pentecostal tradition perform and practice many different types of worship and have many different expressions of their spirituality, but they also,(very clearly), practice many different forms and styles of prayer As seen above, prayer within the Pentecostal tradition can be done in the form of dancing, proxy prayer, speaking in tongues, praying for healing, praying for freedom from demons for yourself or others, and gaining insight

or wisdom or words of knowledge directly from God or the Spirit Each of these types or

40 Splitter, 804-805.

41 Splitter, 806.

42 Splitter, 806-808 ; Some would argue against the actuality of healing and prayers for healing For more on this,

see Candy Gunther Brown, Testing Prayer: Science and Healing (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2012).