The Double-Edged Cross: Missionaries and the Erosion of Traditional Life in Uganda

The arrival of Christian missionaries in Uganda, as in much of Africa, marked a pivotal moment, a meeting point between distinct worldviews. While their stated aim was the propagation of the Gospel, their encounter with Uganda’s rich and deeply rooted religious and cultural traditions was often fraught with misunderstanding and a pervasive sense of superiority. Despite the sophisticated spiritual heritage they encountered, many missionaries harbored a profound contempt for the African way of life, viewing it as inherently backward, inadequate, and even devoid of true religious understanding. Echoing sentiments common across the continent, some early missionaries, like Robert Moffat in Southern Africa, went so far as to claim a near absence of religious structures and a coherent concept of a Supreme Being among Africans (Moffat 1842:224-245). This perspective, unfortunately, equated non-Western cultures with degradation, barbarism, ignorance, and spiritual darkness (Moffat 1842:224).

The overarching desire of many missionaries was not simply religious conversion but a complete cultural transformation. They urged Africans to renounce their ancestral customs and embrace Western ways of life. This attitude is starkly captured in J.J. Freeman’s observation, highlighting the missionary desire to isolate African converts, even those with Christian parents, from their “home habits, customs and occupations,” fearing they might retain an “love of a life among the flocks and herds” deemed characteristic of the “natives” (Mackenzie 1887:264).

This desire for cultural abandonment was often intertwined with the burgeoning colonial project. For many missionaries, the adoption of Western religion and culture by Africans was seen as a crucial step in facilitating the extension of European colonialism. The motive, consciously or unconsciously, was to mentally prepare Africans for the impending takeover by the colonizers (Magorian 1964:17). The aim was to cultivate a generation of African children who would grow up alienated from their own identity, Europeanized in their thoughts and behaviors, thus softening their resistance to colonial rule from a young age. As Jean Comaroff and John Comaroff have extensively documented in the context of Southern Africa, for many European missionaries, the lines between Westernizing the world and converting it to Christianity were blurred (Comaroff & Comaroff 1991:40-47). Influenced by this understanding, missionaries often spread Christian values and Western civilization as inseparable entities, with Western civilization, Christianity, commerce, and colonization frequently perceived as intrinsically linked.

Conversely, African traditions and cultural practices were largely deemed inferior, uncivilized, and primitive. Imposing their own culture on the Africans was, therefore, often seen as an integral part of the missionary mandate to “civilize” them. God, in this context, was often presented in a foreign idiom, as if the indigenous people lacked their own rich and expressive languages (Amadiune 1997:98). Viewing this as part of their divine mission, missionaries often cooperated with the colonizers in undermining the very religious institutions upon which ancient African cultures were founded (de Vries 1978:2).

In Uganda, this dynamic played out in various ways. Missionaries often strategically targeted traditional rulers, hoping that the conversion of figures like the Kabaka would lead to a cascading effect, with their subjects following suit. This approach was seen as a way to prepare the ground not only for religious conversion but also for the acceptance of colonial authority. This mirrors David Livingstone’s belief in Southern Africa that missionary work had a vital cultural role: “to leaven the alleged primitiveness of African society with Christian western culture” (Martin 1989:7). Indeed, many missionaries in Uganda, mirroring their counterparts elsewhere on the continent, believed their way of life embodied universally applicable values and saw it as their moral duty to “civilize” the Baganda and other ethnic groups, a “civilization” that invariably meant the adoption of European values, standards, and lifestyles. They often regarded themselves and their nations as divinely chosen, tasked with rescuing Africans from perceived backwardness, heathenism, and superstitious influences, aiming to bring African customs into conformity with Western norms (Martin 1989:8).

The weakening of the power of traditional chiefs was often seen, intentionally or unintentionally, as a necessary step in dismantling African political and cultural systems, making way for Western influence. While the text focuses on Botswana, similar dynamics were at play in Uganda. For instance, instances of resistance from traditional leaders to missionary teachings could be met with pressure, sometimes subtle, sometimes more direct, from the emerging colonial administration, which often found common ground with the missionaries in their desire for societal transformation. Missionaries might not have always directly called for the removal of Ugandan chiefs, but their advocacy for Western systems of governance and their critique of traditional authority structures often indirectly contributed to the erosion of chiefly power. They might have sided with Christian converts who challenged traditional norms or advocated for policies that undermined traditional authority in the name of progress or Christian morality.

Through this gradual weakening of traditional authority, missionaries hoped to create an environment more conducive to the spread of their religious and cultural values. This partly explains instances where missionaries might have implicitly or explicitly supported Christian rulers or factions in cases of disputes with their non-Christian counterparts, seeing them as allies in the broader project of Westernization and Christianization.

Evidently, the efforts of many missionaries in Uganda, as elsewhere in Africa, were geared towards weakening traditional authority, its inherent values, its very being, and its potential for self-determination. In their drive for evangelization, they often became unwitting allies, or even active proponents, of the colonial process. They frequently insisted that converts to Christianity should also adopt Western cultural practices as an integral part of their new religious life. In doing so, as Toyin Falola argues in a broader African context, even campaigns against practices like polygamy were often part of a larger strategy to force Africans into a Western mold, a key element in seeing indigenous populations fully integrated into the colonial vision (Falola 2000:159).

The example of Livingstone persuading Sechele in Botswana to abandon his wives, cited by Tlou and Campbell, illustrates how such seemingly religious interventions could have profound and disruptive consequences for the traditional political, social, and economic fabric of African societies, creating an environment more amenable to Western ways of life (Tlou & Campbell 1997:187). In Uganda, similar pressures on marriage customs and other social norms undoubtedly contributed to a reshaping of traditional life under the influence of missionary teachings and the encroaching colonial order.