Source: International Mission Board, November 4, 2019
The tension can be felt across the crowd of hundreds outside the palace in Nalerigu, Ghana. They wait in silent anticipation for the Taraana, one of the Mamprusi king’s seven elders, to come out of the hall to present the man the king has selected as chief. When he does, the new chief’s supporters erupt into cheers and applause. The Taraana ceremoniously places a white smock on the chief followed by a bright red cap. Thus begins several days of celebration and ritual as the new chief is “enskinned.”
The Taraana—which translates literally to “peer” or “equal”—is in many senses the king’s right-hand man. However, over the next few days, this Taraana will not be involved in the ritual sacrifices to the ancestral spirits or in the formal Islamic prayers for the new chief. This Taraana is the first in the traditional kingdom of Mamprugu’s seven-hundred-year history to be a follower of Jesus Christ.
Like many West African nations, even though a democratic government runs the nation, there are traditional, tribal chieftaincy structures that are still the authority at the local and, occasionally, even regional level. These local leadership positions are almost always intricately connected to African traditional religious belief systems.
In northern Ghana, chiefs sit on skins (hence the term enskinned instead of enthroned) and those skins are often taken from the animals that were sacrificed to ancestral spirits in a prayerful plea to win the chieftaincy contest. Once in power, a chief will wear magical amulets to empower his rule and protect him from his enemies. He will regularly employ soothsayers and make blood sacrifices to ancestral shrines for guidance.
So the question arises, can a Christian become a chief? Fifty years ago, this was unheard of in northern Ghana.
» Full story (with pictures) reports there are now so many Christian chiefs in Northern Ghana that they formed their own Christian Chiefs Association, working to integrate Christian principles and discourage harmful practices. Read Annual Northern Ghana Christian Chiefs Conference Ends with a Call to Promote Peace (Ghana Broadcasting Corporation).
» Read about the evangelical Ethiopian Prime Minister and Nobel Peace Prize winner again struggling to reconcile opposing forces (Christianity Today).