Encounter of Religions in Papua New Guinea—Toward a Relationship between Christianity and Original Traditions

Abstract

The text introduces Papua New Guinea as a region where an encounter of various cultural and religious traditions occurred in the last several centuries and which still happens today. Christianization has posed a significant cultural change that has taken place recently and at the same time as modernization. Using examples from Papua New Guinea, the study demonstrates that although Christianity can dominate in a particular society, elements of original Indigenous religions can exist in parallel or can create a syncretic synthesis. The aim of the study is to analyze the types of this coexistence and to identify the factors of maintenance and transformation of Indigenous traditions as a result of Christianization as part of the process of globalization. The study is a contribution to the discussion on the forms of world Christianity.