Christ & Caribbean Culture(S)

Christ & Caribbean Culture(S)
Author: Gabriel Malzaire
Publisher: AuthorHouse
Total Pages: 94
Release: 2015-06-30
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 150492004X

This book focuses on the Caribbean church in its attempt to unravel the significance of the Christ-Event in the Caribbean context. The Challenges for the Catholic Christian in the New Millennium (Part I) articulates the major concerns of the Caribbean church under three main themes, namely, relevance, authenticity, and evangelization. These are presented as the evangelical posture needed for the contemporary period. Christ and Ethnicity in the Caribbean (Part II) attempts, through the use of the notion of the incarnation, to unravel the concept of Christ as Saviour in the Caribbean context. It attempts to show that genuine Caribbean theology is a reflection on the Christ-Event in the lives of its people. It is geared toward helping Caribbean Christians develop a greater sense of self-worth. It purports that Christology must be related to the identity of a people if it is to engender effective pastoral action. Toward a Caribbean Christian Civilization (Part III) gives a comprehensive view of the Caribbean reality in which Christianity is lived. It takes into account the influence of the history of the region, the effects of colonialism, the evolution of its culture(s), its ethnic composition and the dispositions that surrounded it, the challenge of traditional religious elements, and the moral question in its varied dimensions. Finally, it presents some suggestions on what a Caribbean Christian civilization should look like if it is to carry out the mandate of Christ. A Theological Reflection on "Bamboo Bursting" in the Caribbean serves as a postscript. It unravels the meaning of this pre-Christmas pastime in some of the territories of the Caribbean. Short though it may be, the collection provides a fair understanding of the Caribbean churchs experience and its responsibility to be a leaven in the midst of God's people in its particular context.

Obeah, Christ and Rastaman

Obeah, Christ and Rastaman
Author: Ivor Morrish
Publisher: James Clarke & Company
Total Pages: 138
Release: 2022-10-27
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0718847474

This is a book about an extraordinarily rich and varied culture - a culture in which 'most of the religio-political movements of the world are to be found epitomised in some form'. In tracing the Jamaican people's search for an identity through these movements, this book places the modern cult of Rastafarianism in the broadest of historical contexts. Obeah, Christ and Rastaman reflects the author's careful, scholarly approach, his delight in a fascinating, colourful subject and his deep, humane regard for a people 'who have, over the years, suffered incredible degradation and suppression'.

Nation Dance

Nation Dance
Author: Patrick Taylor
Publisher: Indiana University Press
Total Pages: 238
Release: 2001
Genre: Music
ISBN: 9780253338358

Dealing with the ongoing interaction of rich and diverse cultural traditions from Cuba and Jamaica to Guyana and Surinam, Nation Dance addresses some of the major contemporary issues in the study of Caribbean religion and identity. The book’s three sections move from a focus on spirituality and healing, to theology in social and political context, and on to questions of identity and diaspora. The book begins with the voices of female practitioners and then offers a broad, interdisciplinary examination of Caribbean religion and culture. Afro-Caribbean religions, Hinduism, Judaism, Islam, and Christianity are all addressed, with specific reflections on Santería, Palo Monte, Vodou, Winti, Obeah, Kali Mai, Orisha work, Spiritual Baptist faith, Spiritualism, Rastafari, Confucianism, Congregationalism, Pentecostalism, Catholicism, and liberation theology. Some essays are based on fieldwork, archival research, and textual or linguistic analysis, while others are concerned with methodological or theoretical issues. Contributors include practitioners and scholars, some very established in the field, others with fresh, new approaches; all of them come from the region or have done extensive fieldwork or research there. In these essays the poetic vitality of the practitioner’s voice meets the attentive commitment of the postcolonial scholar in a dance of "nations" across the waters.

Caribbean Theology

Caribbean Theology
Author: Lewin Lascelles Williams
Publisher: Peter Lang Incorporated, International Academic Publishers
Total Pages: 252
Release: 1994
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780820418599

Five full years before the momentous meeting of EATWOT in Dar-es-Salaam in 1976, Caribbean thinkers had met in Trinidad to register the region's need of a contextual theology. Caribbean Theology scrutinizes the gradual but crucial development of theology within the context of the Caribbean since 1971. It examines the charge that the gradualness of the process is due to the insidiousness of missionary theology from which Caribbean theology seeks disengagement. The book further assesses the viability of this indigenization by drawing its many seminal and abridged offerings for interpretation and serious reflection into a systematic whole.

Crucial Issues in Caribbean Religions

Crucial Issues in Caribbean Religions
Author: Mozella G. Mitchell
Publisher: Peter Lang
Total Pages: 292
Release: 2006
Genre: Foreign Language Study
ISBN: 9780820488639

Crucial Issues in Caribbean Religions concentrates on the effects of intersections in the Caribbean of major world religions such as Christianity (both Catholicism and Protestantism), Judaism, Islam, and Hinduism, with indigenous religions such as Caribs and Arawaks, and African-derived religions such as Lucumi (Yoruba/Santeria/Regla de Ocha), Regla de Palo, Vodun, Obeah, Rastafari, Orisa, or Shango in Trinidad. Closely examined are the social and economic problems and issues of exile, slavery, oppression, racism, sexism, ethnocentrism, cultural dominance, religious diversity, syncretism, popular religiosity, religious and spiritual imperialism, continuity and change, survival techniques in the face of attempts at eradication by religious powers, interreligious dialogue, and the quest for universal spirituality.

Religion, Culture, and Tradition in the Caribbean

Religion, Culture, and Tradition in the Caribbean
Author: Hemchand Gossai
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Total Pages: 320
Release: 2000
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9780312232429

The Bible is the most widely read and influential book in the Caribbean. It seems to be everywhere and in every thing. The Bible has been used to name, claim, oppress, and exploit natives and the diaspora populations in the Caribbean, and it continues to define Caribbean reality and morality in the 21st century. In this anthology, scholars analyze the most fundamental assumptions and practices derived from different readings of the Bible at different epochs in Caribbean history. It tells a gripping tale of the struggle of ethnic peoples to find meaning, existence, and reality in a world they did not create.

Home Away from Home

Home Away from Home
Author: Delroy A. Reid-Salmon
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 245
Release: 2014-12-18
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1317490525

An estimated two-thirds of Caribbeans live outside their homeland. 'Home Away from Home' identifies the different forms of Caribbean diasporan identity and argues that the faith Caribbean people brought with them into the diaspora plays a central role in their development. The study provides a theological interpretation of the diasporan experience, and outlines the principles of diasporan theology and the distinctiveness of its church. Focusing on the Caribbean diaspora in the US, and analysing aspects of the Caribbean British diaspora, the book forges a Black Atlantic theology. The volume also engages with wider discourse on the Black diaspora to offer an inclusive Caribbean diasporan ecclesiology that overcomes Black African-American/Euro-American binaries.

Caribbean Religious History

Caribbean Religious History
Author: Ennis B Edmonds
Publisher: NYU Press
Total Pages: 281
Release: 2010-06-01
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0814722504

The colonial history of the Caribbean created a context in which many religions, from indigenous to African-based to Christian, intermingled with one another, creating a rich diversity of religious life. Caribbean Religious History offers the first comprehensive religious history of the region. Ennis B. Edmonds and Michelle A. Gonzalez begin their exploration with the religious traditions of the Amerindians who flourished prior to contact with European colonizers, then detail the transplantation of Catholic and Protestant Christianity and their centuries of struggles to become integral to the Caribbean’s religious ethos, and trace the twentieth century penetration of American Evangelical Christianity, particularly in its Pentecostal and Holiness iterations. Caribbean Religious History also illuminates the influence of Africans and their descendants on the shaping of such religious traditions as Vodou, Santeria, Revival Zion, Spiritual Baptists, and Rastafari, and the success of Indian indentured laborers and their descendants in reconstituting Hindu and Islamic practices in their new environment. Paying careful attention to the region’s social and political history, Edmonds and Gonzalez present a one-volume panoramic introduction to this religiously vibrant part of the world.

Caribbean Theology

Caribbean Theology
Author: Howard Gregory
Publisher: Canoe Press (IL)
Total Pages: 142
Release: 1995
Genre: History
ISBN: 9789768125095

This timely collection explores critical issues facing theological education in the West Indies, with special attention to the current status and content of Caribbean theology. Contributors represent a number of mainstream Protestant traditions (Anglican, Moravian, Baptist, Methodist, and Presbyterian) and approach their topics from a variety of specializations (Biblical Studies, Church History, Social Sciences, Pastoral Care, and Christian Education). Howard Gregory, who is the president of the United Theological College of the West Indies, has done an exemplary job of representing the diversity of theological opinion at the conference as well as highlighting some common concerns of participants. All participants, Gregory points out, acknowledged a pressing need to address practical aspects of pastoral care and to identify priorities specific to the Caribbean region. In addition, all participants underscored the need for renewed commitment to the task of developing and teaching an "authentic" Caribbean theology, although there is considerable disagreement as to exactly what an " authentic" Caribbean theology should be. --

Rebecca's Revival

Rebecca's Revival
Author: Jon F Sensbach
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 315
Release: 2009-06-30
Genre: History
ISBN: 0674043456

Rebecca's Revival is the remarkable story of a Caribbean woman--a slave turned evangelist--who helped inspire the rise of black Christianity in the Atlantic world. All but unknown today, Rebecca Protten left an enduring influence on African-American religion and society. Born in 1718, Protten had a childhood conversion experience, gained her freedom from bondage, and joined a group of German proselytizers from the Moravian Church. She embarked on an itinerant mission, preaching to hundreds of the enslaved Africans of St. Thomas, a Danish sugar colony in the West Indies. Laboring in obscurity and weathering persecution from hostile planters, Protten and other black preachers created the earliest African Protestant congregation in the Americas. Protten's eventful life--the recruiting of converts, an interracial marriage, a trial on charges of blasphemy and inciting of slaves, travels to Germany and West Africa--placed her on the cusp of an emerging international Afro-Atlantic evangelicalism. Her career provides a unique lens on this prophetic movement that would soon sweep through the slave quarters of the Caribbean and North America, radically transforming African-American culture. Jon Sensbach has pieced together this forgotten life of a black visionary from German, Danish, and Dutch records, including letters in Protten's own hand, to create an astounding tale of one woman's freedom amidst the slave trade. Protten's life, with its evangelical efforts on three continents, reveals the dynamic relations of the Atlantic world and affords great insight into the ways black Christianity developed in the New World.