Overview
Before his conversion to Christianity, A.E. Orobator was raised in the practice of traditional African Religion animism. This repository of African religion, he maintains at its heart a deep belief in the livingness of creation is the soil in which both Christianity and Islam have taken root.
In this fascinating book based on the prestigious Duffy Lectures delivered at Boston College, Orobator examines the living interplay between African Religion, Christianity, and Islam in Africa. He argues that the religious experience and spiritual imagination of Africa offer wisdom capable of renewing the global community of believers. Among these gifts: a deep consciousness of transcendence in day-to-day living; reverence towards human and natural ecologies; and a holistic understanding of creation and shared responsibility of stewardship for the universe.
Agbonkhianmeghe E. Orobator is dean and professor of theology at Santa Clara University, CA. He grew up in Benin City, Nigeria, practicing traditional African religion. After visiting the local Jesuit parish as a teen for Easter vigil Mass, he became enamored with Catholicism and the Jesuit Order. He saw the works of the American Jesuits as fully devoted to the service of others, resonant of an African anthropology of Ubuntu that teaches “a person is a person through other persons.” He joined the Jesuits in 1986 and was ordained in 1998.
Fluent in four languages, Dean Orobator received his Ph.D in theology and religious studies from the University of Leeds in England, his MBA from Georgetown University, and his licentiate in sacred theology from JST-SCU, from which he also received an honorary doctorate in 2012. He previously served as provincial superior of the Jesuits of the Eastern Africa Province, and has taught theology and religious studies at Hekima University College, St. Augustine College of South Africa in Johannesburg, and Marquette University in Milwaukee. He serves on the board of directors of Theological Studies and the editorial board o Marraige, Families, & Spirituality.
A member of the board of directors of Georgetown University, Dean Orobator is author of Theology Brewed in an African Pot; Religion and Faith in Africa: Confessions of an Animist based on Duffy Lectures he delivered at Boston College, and The Pope and the Pandemic: Lessons in Leadership in a Time of Crisis, a Catholic Media Association award winner. He is also editor of The Church We Want: African Catholics Look to Vatican III and co-editor of Feminist Catholic Theological Ethics: Conversations in the World Church,” and a member of the editorial board of the journal Marriage, Families & Spirituality.
