Du vin nouveau dans de vieilles outres: parcours d'un dissident du Christianisme Céleste (Bénin)

Abstract

This case study examines the patterns of dissidence within an independent African church that was deeply scarred by conflicts that accompanied the struggle for the right to succeed the founding prophet. Gontran Marcos is typical of visionary prophets who, in the name of the bitter struggle against sorcery, break with the mother church in order to found their own. But the umbilical cord is seldom completely cut, and the pattern of dissidence and exclusion seen here co-exists easily with more ecumenical strategies, illustrated here by the inter-faith marriage of Marcos.