Adapting Christianity to Africa must engage underlying mentality, not surface rites

Evidence

In the new churches planted in Africa, the most urgent problem is that of adaptation … But if everyone is convinced of the need to incarnate Christianity in the values proper to each civilization, it must be recognized that the efforts made so far have been more on the secondary elements than on the essential … The merit of Father Tempels is to have seen the fundamental problem beyond the superficial details. It is not so much in the gestures, the symbols, the rites that an effort of adaptation must be accomplished as in the mentality, the psychology and the wisdom proper to each people. — Frans Dokman, Beyond Bantu Philosophy_…, 706

Categorization

• DEFINE: Clarifies what ‘adaptation’ vs ‘incarnation’ of Christianity in a culture means theologically — surface gestures vs. deep mentality.
• XREF: This is the theological frame for the whole book’s argument: that Bantu philosophy must be engaged at the level of worldview (force vitale), not just translated rites.