Faith and Pandemics: Responses of African Indigenous Churches

Abstract

This study traces the resilience of Christian faith during times of global crisis by examining the responses of the African Indigenous Aladura (Praying Ones) movement during the 1918 influenza pandemic alongside those of contemporary Pentecostal and Charismatic churches in Nigeria during the COVID-19 pandemic. It argues that the prophetic impulse which emerged within the Aladura tradition in 1918 foreshadowed the theological and spiritual responses of present-day Pentecostalism. By situating these movements within Indigenous African cosmologies, the study demonstrates how belief in the reality and efficacy of spiritual power continues to shape Christian engagement with disease, suffering, and uncertainty. By employing a comparative historical-theological approach, the article highlights continuities in the use of prayer, prophecy, and ritual as modes of spiritual agency during pandemics. It further shows how Nigerian Christians have drawn upon indigenous understandings of the power of language and spiritual intervention to articulate hope, negotiate fear, and affirm divine sovereignty in the midst of global health crises.