Negotiation and Erosion of Born Again Prestige in Nairobi

Abstract

The social and political efficacy of “Born-Again” identity in Nairobi is fed by the accumulation of personal prestige or symbolic capital emerging from the Born-Again actor’s association with religious and moral virtues. However, this prestige is being undermined by ongoing rumors and scandals, risking disruption of the benefits associated with this morality. In this article, we explore the popular discontent with Born-Again identity and practice, concluding that its prestige in Nairobi is possibly eroding, with risk to its efficacy in mobilizing social and political power.

African and Not Religious: The State of Research on Sub-Saharan Religious Nones and New Scholarly Horizons

“…This association between no religious affiliation and institutional mistrust is in line with findings elsewhere (Kasselstrand, 2019). We can hypothesise that, in many Africans’ experience, such distrust may be the result of controversies such as overemphasis on prosperity teachings, religion's overinvolvement in political affairs, disapproval of fundamentalist trends, or recurring moral scandals by religious leaders who “preach water and drink wine” (Gez and Droz, 2015; Shipley, 2009). While some who have been disillusioned respond by dropping religion from their menu altogether, the negative connotations associated with being an African none mean that most maintain some relations with their religious institutions, if only nominally.…”

Religious tribalism, local morality and violence in Christian Kenya

“…Indeed, beyond their views on other religious forms, these religious puritans are also intolerant towards Christian heterodoxies, which they often brand as 'funny'; in our research, we noted a tendency to attach this epithet to a range of religious forms -both Christian and non-Christiandeemed suspect, as a marker locating them outside the realm of legitimacy. Some maligned groups include 'sect-like churches', 'possible devil worshippers', those 'involved in witchcraft', and those overly engaged with money and the prosperity gospel (Droz 1997;Gez and Droz 2015;Deacon and Lynch 2013). To give one example, we can consider Winners' Chapel -of Nigerian origin but well represented in Kenya -as an example of this struggle for legitimacy through rhetoric of exclusion: while the church tends to employ inflammatory rhetoric against traditional practices and mainline churches, its own legitimacy is itself shaky in the eyes of mainstream Kenyan Pentecostals.…”

“…Stories of men who go to church to pass as devout Christians as a strategy for lulling their target of sexual interest into a false sense of security are examples of how front-stage behaviour can be read as religious moral 'free riding', in which individuals want to maximize gain -the socio-moral capital resulting from passing as highly religious -while trying to avoid participating in paying the costs in the form of moral, ritual, and financial religious injunctions (Anderson and Tollison 1992;Wallis 1991;Hull and Lipford 2010;Cullity 1995). Such manifestations of corrupt religious morals, and Pentecostal hypocrisy in particular, are a favourite topic of public debates, and Kenyans are accustomed to newspaper headlines accompanied by incriminating images of pastors caught pants-down in the company of a married female congregant (Gez and Droz 2015). 14 As Kenyan musician Jaguar sings in a popular song Kigeugeu ('changeable' or 'fickle'), 'I have a pastor who is my neighbour, I trusted my death and my life with him.…”

The Spirituality Approach to Electoral Politics in Africa: Evidence from the Presidential Elections in Nigeria’s Fourth Republic

“…However, scholars like Ayantayo (2009), N'Guessan (2015), Heuser (2015), Gez and Droz (2015), Burgess (2015), Yong (2014), Acheampong (2018), among others, have made significant contributions to the discourse on the spiritual dimensions and manifestations in politics and the electoral process in some African countries. For instance, Acheampong (2018) argues that the politically active engagements of Pentecostals in Ghana have culminated into a shift to the theology of spiritual causality, which is at the root of the development of a distinctive brand of prophetic politics generally referred to as "divining."…”