Christian and Muslim Missionary Methods: Contextual Africanisation of Religious Practices to Strengthen Interfaith Relationships in Uganda

In Uganda, it is a religious offence for a Christian to become a Muslim and for Muslims to convert to Christianity, or for either party to seek social support from opposition religious institutions. It is against this backdrop that this study examined the extent to which Europeanised Christianity and Arabised Islamic missionary methods can be contextualised and Africanised to strengthen interfaith relationships in Uganda. Literary interpretation, thus, a mechanical arrangement of word-for-word reproduction was relied on. The findings revealed that the pulpit missionary market environments, including congregation worship centres, social media platforms, community social functions, and educational institutions, are sites of religious discrimination. In Uganda, there are separate legislated aims and objectives for Christian and Islamic religious education curricula in primary schools. Young people who subscribe to the same Black culture are forced to study their parents’ religions, which in one way has created serious roadblocks to Christian-Muslim interfaith coexistence. Yet Ugandan society is endowed with rich social traditions that have not been integrated with the Europeanised education curriculum, Christianity, and Islam to respond to indigenous intellectual needs. In Uganda: a) there are literary works that provide intellectual underpinnings aligned with African values, morals, beliefs, and practices; b) there are orality tales projected through songs, sermons, proverbs, riddles, wise sayings, myths, legends, customs, and conversations; and c) there is symbolism which is expressed in indigenous arts, dramas, sculptures, rituals, shrines, sacred places, religious objects, festivities, dance, music, and names of people and places. However, humanities and sciences taught in religious communities and educational institutions are a foreign culture crafted. The concepts passed on to the local people leave them detached from their traditional language expressions. Africanisation of Christianity and Islamic practices, then, needs to be considered seriously by policymakers, without which, discrimination, religious provocations, destruction of property, and merciless killings are most likely to skyrocket in the country.