Law Religion Health And Healing In Africa

The Covid‑19 pandemic was global in its spread and reach, as well as in its medical, social and economic effects. In many respects, the global effort to “flatten the curve” produced a flattening of experience around the world and a striking coincidence of similar experiences in countries the world over. The identity, simultaneity and uniformity of experience were also manifest in common concerns at the intersection of law and religion in many nations around the world, including Africa. The lockdowns and closure of religious worship centres – churches, mosques and religious organisations of all sorts – raised questions of freedom of religion and the related concern for freedom of assembly, along with concerns about the relation of religion to science and public health, religious channels of communication and religious provision of social services. After all, health, communications and social services are all areas in which African religious organisations play key roles. Potential tensions around these issues raised further considerations about the nature of religion-state relations, the status of religious authority and whether religious and state actors would work together or at odds in addressing the Covid‑19 pandemic.

There is a great need for healing in Africa. This need is in itself no different elsewhere in the world, but it is greatly determined by the involvement of religious communities and traditions. Faith communities and religious institutions play a major role in assisting African believers to find health, healing and completeness in everyday life.

Black Americans are more likely than Whites to die of cancer and heart disease, more likely to get diabetes and asthma, and less likely to get preventive care and screening. Some of this greater morbidity results from education, income level, and environment as well as access to health care. But the traditional medical model does not always allow for a more holistic approach that takes into account the body, the mind, the spirit, the family, and the community. This book offers a better understanding of the varieties of religiously-based approaches to healing and alternative models of healing and health found in Black communities in the United States. Contributors address the communal aspects of faith and health and explore the contexts in which individuals make choices about their health, the roles that institutions play in shaping these decisions, and the practices individuals engage in seeking better health or coping with the health they have. By paying attention to the role of faith, spirit, and health, this book offers a fuller sense of the varieties of ways Black health and health care are perceived and addressed from an inter-religious perspective. Community and religion-based initiatives have emerged as one key way to address the health challenges found in the African American community. In cities such as Atlanta, Baltimore, Dallas, and Oakland, residents organize exercise groups, teach one another how to cook with healthy ingredients, and encourage neighbors to get regular checkups. Churches have become key sites for health education, screening, and testing. Another set of responses to the challenge of Black health and healthcare in the United States comes from those who emphasize the body as a whole—body, mind, soul, and spirit, often drawing on religious traditions such as Islam and African-based religions such as Spiritism, Santeria, Vodun (aka Voodoo), Candomblé, and others. Understanding the issues and the various approaches is essential to combating the problems, and this unique volume sheds light on areas often overlooked when considering the issues.

A shared interest of law and religion is the advancement of human flourishing, yet there is no common understanding of what it means for humans to flourish and the means by which to attain a flourishing life. The concept of human flourishing is especially important for Africa, where community and national development compete with forces of conflict and scarce resources. In the broadest sense, the concept of human flourishing focuses our attention on having a comprehensively good or worthwhile life, but various religious and legal traditions suggest different norms for measuring the quality of life and designing the institutional structures that could best facilitate and preserve it.

The present book engages three fields; namely, African traditional religion (ATR), Catholic religion and biomedical sciences in their endeavor to sustain health and well-being. It proceeds from the conviction that faith-healing is an essential element of theological bioethics. The discipline of theological bioethics reflects on the questions that arise in medicine and treatment of illness, and issues related to human biology, decisions to be made in case of this or that pain or disease, including the discernment on the normal and paranormal phenomena that could affect people of faith. The search for spiritual powers, as they are related to the not-yet-born, to the living, and to the dead is a crucial question to Catholic bioethics and pastoral ministry. This work considers that complex issue without pretending to offer a definitive answer. It relies on Catholic bioethics as a multi-disciplinary approach illumined by faith to propose some criteria for making a discernment regarding powers of spiritual healing which are claimed in today's Christian Sub-Saharan Africa.

In our time the study of law and religion is emerging as a wide-ranging and vital academic discipline, with increasingly urgent implications for society at large. Lying at the intersection of a variety of other disciplines ? law, theology, religious studies, political science, sociology and anthropology, to name only the most obvious ? the field of law and religion is generating a burgeoning volume of interdisciplinary and trans-disciplinary research and study. The current volume is proof of this. The discussion of the relationship between law and religion, as seen from a variety of perspectives in Africa, underscores the critical importance of the issues involved in the everyday life of all citizens. It is accordingly vital for governments to take note of the scholarly results that are produced. We hope that this volume will contribute to this aim.

Bachelor Thesis from the year 2000 in the subject Theology - Practical Theology, grade: 1,0, , language: English, abstract: In this essay I will look at the medical system of the people of Kongo in Lower Zaire. My account is based on the fieldwork done by John M. Janzen among the BaKongo in the late 60s, early 70s. He offers a concrete description of six cases and examines them. I chose a typical case of these, namely patient Lwezi. Diagnosis and treatment of a BaKongo patient are skillfully directed by the institution of therapy management group, a group made up of the kin of the patient, which takes care of the well-being of the ill. This institution is strongly influenced by the cosmology of the BaKongo and is vital for the therapy. The major features in Lwezi's healing-process were the therapy management group, the paternal blessing and the payment of the bride price, each of which I will refer to in the following sections. Many people think that the healing practices of traditional societies are irrational, but I will show that for the BaKongo medical practices must engage with the supernatural in order to guarantee healing. To anthropologists and many non-BaKongo, the medical system in Lower Zaire appears to consist of various medical traditions, be it the traditional BaKongo therapies or the Western conventional medicine. The general perception is that the latter is not only universally applicable but might eventually replace traditional medical practices. I will show that only by taking into account the BaKongo way of healing, especially the therapy management group with its unique perception of illness and healing, is successful cure of these people possible.