Browsing by Author "Mwania, Patrick"
Now showing 1 - 6 of 6
Results Per Page
Sort Options
- ItemThe African Woman as an Agent of Evangelization: Her Role and Function in the Mission Activity of the Church in Africa(Shaker, 2009-12) Mwania, PatrickIn this book which is a product of doctoral dissertation presented to the Faculty of Theology of the Philosophisch-theologische Hochschule, St. Augustine, Germany, the author, Patrick Mwania, underscores the fact that African women have not only been beneficiaries of the Good News of salvation but, equally and faithfully so, carriers and agents of the same. The book reviews the Church in Africa in terms of her efforts at evangelization, especially in relation to the role women play as agents of evangelization.
- ItemInterface between African’s Concept of Death and Afterlife and the Biblical Tradition and Christianity(Tangaza University College, 2016-05) Mwania, PatrickFrom whatever perspective one approaches it, death is a mysterious reality that is certain in human existence, though humans battle with its unpredictability and inevitability. This unpredictability and inevitability of death fascinate and frighten the broad range of humanity. There is an ingrained denial of the gruesomeness and finality of death. Despite its ambiguity, it is a phenomenon, conceived differently depending on cultural, ideological, or idiosyncratic orientation. In the medical world, death is defined as a cessation of breath and heartbeat whereas as a philosophical reality, death is seen as the cessation of the integrated functioning of the human organism. In short, death from whatever perspective is hard and challenging project. This study is an attempt to understand death and afterlife according to the African traditional world view and how it relates to the Biblical and Christian traditions
- ItemThe Quest for African Theology: From Theology as a mere Intellectual Enterprise to Theology as Lived Experience(Tangaza University College, 2013-03) Mwania, PatrickSince the mid-20th century, African theologians have been working to develop what can truly be calledAfrican Theology, a theology that is contextual and founded on the African cultural worldview. A major challenge that affects this enterprise towards an articulation of an authentic African theology is the fact that although a lot has been done already to develop this theology that speaks to and addresses contextual African situations, most of all these efforts has remained at the intellectual level among the theologians and hence has not been translated into the everyday lives of the African Christians. African Theology seems to be merely a classroom theology, a theology that is limited to the walls of academic institutions, an engagement popular only among a small group of intellectuals whom Orobator would call professional Christians. It is only when African Theology leaves the shelves of academic libraries to enter the homes and hearts of the majority of African Christians today that it can be said to truly impact on the lives of African Christians. The task that lies behind this article is, therefore, an attempt to articulate some reflections on how African theology can leave the classroom as its place of confinement and become expressed in the daily lives of the African Christians.
- ItemReligion and Spirituality in Healing and Psychotherapy An African Perspective(Tangaza University College, 2016-07) Mwania, PatrickIn the African traditional worldview, everything that happened was seen in the light of vital force, the principle of life, either in the physical existence or in the spiritual form of it. Life is an institution that was so important in the Africa and anything that did not support life, anything that was opposed to the principle of life was therefore dreaded, unwished and indeed punishable. Whatever was against the principle of life was considered evil against which serious measures were taken to fight it. Obviously in the Kamba traditional society illness, sickness and any form of misfortune – indeed anything that appeared to threaten human life and human existence was considered evil to be eliminated. Anything that violated the principle of peace and harmony in the community was considered evil; everything that promotes harmony, community peace, the well being and the life-force of the community was considered as something good and a social value for that matter. This study is an attempt to understand the concept of illness and sickness according to the African traditional world view of the Kamba community in Kenya as a case study.
- ItemReligion and Spirituality in Healing and Psychotherapy: An African Perspective(Philosophisch-Theologische Hochs, 2016) Mwania, PatrickIn the African traditional worldview, everything that happened was seen in the light of vital force, the principle of life, either in the physical existence or in the spiritual form of it. Life is an institution that was so important in the Africa and anything that did not support life, anything that was opposed to the principle of life was therefore dreaded, unwished and indeed punishable. Whatever was against the principle of life was considered evil against which serious measures were taken to fight it.
- ItemWisdom and Sagacity in African Traditional Conflict Management Processes and Systems(Tangaza University College, 2014-09) Mwania, PatrickFor centuries until recently, the black man’s mind and the African culture have been conceived by the Europeans as extremely alien to reason, logic and various habits of scientific inquiry. This mentality is felt all through as one reads books by Western philosophers about Africans. Kwame (1995) writes “… As far as the east is from the west so far is Africa removed from philosophy. The West is the home of civilization and philosophy. Africa is the home of wild trees, wild animals, wild people and wild creatures” (p. 69). Since Africans were at some point in history considered as incapable of critical individual intellectual activity, anything like African philosophy was construed as constituting a contradiction, a self-contradiction. Africans lack intellectual faculties and as such they are not able to engage in any philosophical activity. For the Europeans anything African could not be rational hence philosophical, neither could anything philosophical be African. Levy Bruhl is one of those who held such a conception of Africans as he says that African mind is pre-logical and not conceptual, and because of this the African mind, can with a lot of ease accommodate a contradiction. For him the African mind can entertain several propositions which the European mind would straight away reject as absurd (cf. Ochieng’ Odhiambo, 1995, p 7). The German philosopher Emmanuel Kant too is quoted saying that the African person is quite black from hand to foot a clear proof that what he says is stupid. He further observed that the difference between the white race and black race appears to be as great in regard to mental capacities as in color. These are just but a few examples to show the way how the people from the West thought about Africans as backward, irrational and a people without a history. It took a lot of courage and hard work for some African thinkers and scholars of the 19th century and beyond like John Mbiti, Placide Tempels, Odero Oruka etc to get up and fight against this intellectual and ideological slavery by endeavoring to prove that Africans like other human beings are rational and as such are capable of philosophical activity. This presentation is an attempt to join in the fight of many African thinkers and scholars to prove that rationality and critical thinking and hence a philosophical mind is a universal human endowment and traditional Africans were not an exception. There existed in traditional African culture wise men and women, folk sages who helped the community to understand and to interpret the realities of life in different circumstances.