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The great world's religions coexist
in Kenya with the native beliefs. This cohabitation not only shows
up within communities or villages, but even in a single person.
The individual spirituality is sometimes a blend of elements from
different cults, in a way that any of the religions adopts a unique
character in Kenya. Approximately 66% of Kenyans are Christians
(38% Protestant, 28% Catholic); about 26% are adherents of indigenous
religions; 7% are Muslim. Among the Asian community there are Hindus,
Sikhs, Parsees, and Bahais are 1%.
Christianity was brought by European
missionaries that started settling in the country during the 19th
century. Christian missionary activity began in Kenya's hinterland
when its interior was opened to rail travel between Mombasa and
Uganda. Conversion works were developed in parallel with health
and education, resulting in the fact that christian religion expanded
in a similar extent to schools and medical care. Due to the English
influence, christian Kenyans are mostly protestant, between 30 and
40% of the population, whereas 20-30% of Kenyans are catholic. Churches
were founded in the 1920s and 1930s, especially in areas where Kikuyu,
Luo, and Luhya predominated, some of which sought to combine Christian
and indigenous beliefs. Most churches tended to be ethnically homogenous
since colonial authorities maintained a policy of allocating a mission
to a particular territory, though this tendency has changed with
increasing communication and mobility.
In Kenya there are also several independent Christian churches that
have broken ties with other Christian or Protestant denominations.
The largest of these independent churches was the Nomiya Luo Church,
whose founder, Johana Owalo, was an early convert to Christianity
in 1900. In 1907 he had a vision in which he was taken up into heaven
by the angel Gabriel. He saw that Europeans and Asians, and even
the popes, were not allowed to enter heaven. Later, he converted
to Islam and began to preach that mission churches were in opposition
to traditional beliefs. His mix of Christian, Anglican, and traditional
practices attracted many followers. In Kenya today there are still
many mission churches. Many worldwide religious groups have a strong
presence. The number of Kenyan clergy has grown in the past years
and most of the Roman Catholic and Church Province of Kenya hierarchies
are Kenyan.
Islam is the oldest of the great religions
in Kenya, since it began to spread with the arrival of the first
Arabs from the year 500 A.D Over half of Kenya's Muslim minority
is of Somali origin. The remainder is largely made up of Galla-speaking
peoples and the Swahili-speaking community on the coast, which has
maintained uninterrupted contact with Muslims from the Arabian Peninsula
since the fourteenth century. Most Bajun are Muslims, as are some
members of the Mijikenda and Pokomo groups. Most of Kenyan muslims
are sunnites. The shiite minority is represented mainly by Kenyans
of Pakistani origin whose grandparents arrived to the coast during
the change of the century to work in the construction of the Nairobi-Mombasa
railway, the great communication artery around which Kenya was formed.
Hinduism, in its diverse varieties,
predominates in the Indian minority. Same as Pakistanis, Hindus
arrived to Kenya as workers serving the British Empire for the railway
works. Those who survived the harsh labour settled in Kenya, especially
in Nairobi and the coast, thriving to become one of the wealthiest
communities in Kenya. Both Mombasa and Nairobi have some grand and
ornate temples, most of them used by part of the Swaminarayan sect,
who are firm devotees of Vishnu.
Traditional Beliefs Although traditional beliefs and practices vary
in detail among Kenya's ethnic groups, they share many general characteristics.
Almost all involve belief in an eternal, omnipotent creator envisaged
as remote from men. The Kikuyu's god is named "Murungu"
or (more frequently) "Ngai", a loan-word from Masai. Ngai
cannot be seen, but is manifested in the sun, moon, thunder and
lighting, stars, rain, the rainbow and in the great fig trees that
serve as places of worship and sacrifice. Colours are also associated
with manifestations of God-black is considered a ‘cool’,
and therefore good, colour, while red and white are bad, ‘hot’
colours Many indigenous religions also recognize spiritual forces
at work in the world that are closer to the living and more involved
in their daily affairs. If men and women please the spirits, success
is assured; if they incur the spirits' anger, illness or evil may
occur. For many indigenous believers, ghosts form a distinct category
of ancestral spirits is thought to return to seek revenge on the
living. Beliefs in sorcery and witchcraft play important roles in
many indigenous belief systems and often persist after conversion
to Christianity or Islam even when other elements of traditional
religions have faded.
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