Traditional Religion and its Impact on the Practices of Apostolic and Zionist Churches in Zimbabwe

Academic Paper from the year 2020 in the subject Theology - Miscellaneous, Nations University, language: English, abstract: The objectives of this study are twofold. First, the study seeks to understand the history of traditional religion and Christianity in Zimbabwe and how African Traditional Religion (ATR) has survived to today. Second, the study aims at bringing to light those practices from ATR that have been adopted by the Apostolic and Zionist Churches in Zimbabwe. This study attempts to understand the practices that the Apostolic and Zionist churches have borrowed from ATR.

Traditional religion is core to Zimbabwean people and its impact has been felt by many Christian churches in Zimbabwe. Churches that are affected most are Apostolic and Zionist churches. These churches have promoted syncretism because they have mixed practices from African Traditional Religion (ATR) and Christianity in their worship and practices. While there have been attempts, especially by mainline churches, to extinguish traditional religion in the country, the efforts paid less because traditional practices are in the DNA of Zimbabwean people. This paper uncovers the practices found in Apostolic and Zionist churches that are strongly believed to have been borrowed from ATR. Most African Initiated Churches (AICs) have some elements of ATR within them. This work attempts to trace the history of ATR in Zimbabwe and expose those practices in AICs that are believed to have been copied from ATR.