Heilung in der Nigerianischen Kirche

eng: The ever increasing quest f or healing in the Nigerian churches has become a problem in the Catholic circle because the church authority thinks some 'healers' use unorthodox and heathen rituals to mislead the people. Our aim in this work is to show that the quest for healing in the churches can best be understood from the perspective of the religious world view of the people. Using the world view of the Igbo (an ethnic group in south east of Nigeria) as an example, the work illustrates that the concept of sickness and the healing methods in the traditional society are bound up with world view. We suggest that some problems attributed to one cause or another in traditional African society might be psychological or psychosomatic in nature. Elements of a belief system could be used as means of expressing some underlying psychosocial conflicts. Psychological problems and conflicts are general human problems that could be found in any culture, but their expressions, manifestations and actualization depend on the culture concerned. Our opinion is that most of the problems confronted in the healing ministries are expressions of some emotional and interpersonal conflicts in the social context of the individuals. Some cases usually considered as 'spirit phenomena' are akin to 'dissociation phenomena' which arise in particular social settings. These are often ways of coping with emotional trauma. Our conclusion is that the major issue the church authority fails to see in the problem of healing is the unresolved conflict between Christianity and the culture. It is time the church started facing the real social problems of the country. There is a serious need for a change in the methods of evangelization and in the theological formation.