Every Picture Tells a Story (still more on Traditional African Religions)

Here is a graph showing the changes in religious affiliation over the last 110 years in Sub-Saharan Africa:



This is taken from the new Pew Forum report on religion in Sub-Saharan Africa. There is a great deal that could be said about this graph, but I'll just make a few points:

1) Even though the graph puts the current percentage of those adhering to Traditional African Religions at 13%, the report itself actually says that 25% of those surveyed "exhibited high levels of belief and practice" in traditional African religions.

2) If you add up the percentages for Christians, Muslims and Traditionalists you get:

57% + 29% + 13% = 99%

Now the problem here isn't that the total is slightly under 100%, which is merely due to rounding. The problem is that the majority of Traditionalists (including many healers, priests and other leading figures) in Africa are also Christians or Muslims. Therefore the "total" should be significantly greater than 100%.

3) Like the title of the report itself, the title of the graph blatantly attempts to make Traditional African Religions invisible, or at least as invisible as possible. By failing to even mention Traditionalists, the title of the graph leaves out the majority of Africans from before 1955!

4) The percentage of Traditionalists in Sub-Saharan Africa, even if we take Pew's own bogus number of 13%, is the same as the percentage of Muslims in India today.

5) Notice how the monotheists' coercive expansionism in Africa has hit the proverbial wall!!!

Also see:
Traditional African Religions Continue To Thrive
More On Traditional African Religions