Fragile Wars: Anti-Ecumenism in a South African Church

Ilana van Wyk

Journal of Southern African Studies, 2018, vol. 44, issue 2, 269-281

Abstract: In South Africa, where ecumenism historically characterised popular Christianity, the post-apartheid entry of certain Pentecostal Charismatic Churches (PCCs) has introduced decidedly anti-ecumenical tendencies. This article focuses on one such church, the Universal Church of the Kingdom of God (UCKG), a PCC of Brazilian origin. Under the rubric of spiritual warfare and a politics of suspicion, UCKG preachers urged believers to take up both visible and invisible arms against ‘unbelievers’. These injunctions made for fraught interpersonal relationships, especially in socio-economic conditions where believers were fundamentally dependent on large social networks. For many believers, however, such visible strife did not mark a radical break in their social imaginary; ‘fighting’ bravely exposed a hitherto uncontrolled social reality, while the UCKG’s anti-catholic sentiments promised protection from, and control over, the fragility that marked adherents’ social and economic lives.

Date: 2018
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/03057070.2018.1415069 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:cjssxx:v:44:y:2018:i:2:p:269-281

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/cjss20

DOI: 10.1080/03057070.2018.1415069

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Southern African Studies is currently edited by Ralph Smith

More articles in Journal of Southern African Studies from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().