Nigeria, Christianity in

Nigeria, Christianity in. The first Christian contact with peoples now included in Nigeria came with Portuguese missions in the 1470s. The modern Christian phase dates from the 1840s. Between 1843 and 1845 the CMS and Wesleyan Methodists entered Yoruba country at the request of Yoruba former slaves who had been converted in Sierra Leone and returned home. In 1846 a Presbyterian mission from Jamaica was established in Calabar. More significant was the establishment at Abeokuta of CMS missionaries, joined in 1850 by American Baptists. From 1857 S. A. Crowther headed a mission to the Niger and Benue riverine peoples, establishing Churches in the Niger Delta and among the Igbo. RC work resumed in 1868 when the Society of African Missions arrived in Lagos. Among the Southern Nigerian people Christianity spread widely. After 1918 indigenous Churches stressing prophecy and healing developed a model of the Church distinct from that introduced by the missionaries. Since the Nigerian Civil War (1967–70) there have been many new charismatic Churches and evangelistic movements.

Northern Nigeria is mainly Muslim. The CMS and RC missions, however, extended their work to the North and two Protestant agencies were specifically devoted to the area: the Sudan Interior Mission, from which the Evangelical Churches of West Africa derive, and the Sudan United Mission, from which the eight Churches in the Fellowship of Churches of Christ in Nigeria derive. Christians form a significant minority in Northern Nigeria.