The Spirit of Unity Must Enter Public Life

Africa does not lack religious language in public life. Political meetings open with prayer. Leaders seek the blessing of clergy. Prophets announce national destinies. Churches mobilise voters, host candidates and speak about righteousness in government. Yet our nations remain vulnerable to corruption, ethnic suspicion, political patronage, institutional weakness and public anger. The difficult question is therefore not whether Pentecostals are present in public life. It is what kind of public life our spirituality is helping to produce.

A peer-reviewed article published on 16 July in the African Journal of Pentecostal Studies brings this question into sharp focus. Botshelo Ramoshaba and Lufuluvhi Mudimeli offer a Pentecostal theological analysis of South Africa’s government of national unity. Its appearance coincides with the opening today of the International Association for Mission Studies Assembly in Pretoria under the theme “Walking Together in Mission: Facing Global Challenges for a Sustainable World.” These are not identical projects, and neither provides a simple political formula. Together they signal a timely direction: Pentecostal theology must speak not only about power from above, but also about how Spirit-formed people live, deliberate and serve together amid difference.

Pentecostal theology begins with the conviction that the Holy Spirit creates communion. At Pentecost, people do not lose their languages; they hear the mighty works of God across their differences. The miracle is not uniformity. It is intelligible witness,…