Constraints and Prospects of Inculturation in Kenya

Abstract

The inculturation process in Kenya has been challenged by internal and external sources. Internally the process has been destabilized by the Kenyan socio-religio cultural structures which are patriarchal: men have been the only proponents of the inculturation progression. Issues of ethnocentricism, discrimination and prejudice have affected the process by locking the ministers in their tribal cocoons; a situation which has been of late been fueled by political activists and some religious leaders have explicitly expressed their support of a Christianization phenomena have immensely affected the inculturation process in Kenya. In the event of the Kenyan people accepting the western Christianity wholesomely, they forget and abandon their cultural identities. A number of westerners view the Kenyan culture as empty, pagan and primitive without acknowledging their morality and relations to the Deity before the inception of Western Christianity. Communication technologies, computerized systems and swift currents of economy have also affected the inculturation process in Kenya. The process of inculturation has been challenged in all these aspects but it has been able to survive because it is a heavenly initiative that people may receive the Gospel message in their native culture, tongue, art, language, syntax and form. The study borrows Nasimiyu’s (1986) Vatican II conceptual framework. Data were collected from priests, church members and leaders from both protestant and catholic churches in Kenya.