African Christianity in Britain: Diaspora, Doctrines and Dialogue

Chike draws upon several sources in this scholarly yet accessible discourse. Harvesting material from two main sources - Africa and Britain, he contrasts the differing approaches to understanding the Christian faith by African Christians living in these two different cultures. His resulting research provides a rich source of data that he analyses to present several insights into the peculiarities of African Christianity. One of his many conclusions is that African Christians living in Britain are being persuaded by western way of thinking with regards to interpreting the Christian faith.Chike's work explores the approach of African Christianity to hermeneutics (interpreting the bible), Christology (the nature and person of Christ), soteriology (doctrine of salvation) and general theology (understanding of God).The research confirms and challenges some well held presumptions about African Christianity. It proposes that African Christianity trusts God to guide by his Spirit in interpreting the bible rather than leave it to a method. It also asserts "African Christians refer to `Jesus Christ' significantly less than they refer to `God'".This interesting book shows wide research and uses many primary sources. The main frailty I found in the work is the author's reluctance to distinguish between African Independent Churches (AIC) and Newer Pentecostal Charismatic churches (NPCs) [See Anderson  African Reformation: African Initiated Christianity in the 21st Century  and Ogbu  African Christianity: An African Story ]. Chike does make a fleeting reference to new African Independent Churches (p.46 - 47), another name for NPCs, but given that most of the research was done on NPCs, which is understandable given that not many AICs wrote books, the difference should have been made clearer. This neglect to differentiate has resulted, in my opinion, in a blurring of the progress made in African Christianity with the rise of NPCs and their interaction with global Christianity.Overall, I would say that `African Christianity in Britain' makes a very good read, is highly informative and does not shy away from pinpointing the strengths and weaknesses of African Christianity.