Content warning: There is one mention of an abusive partner in this article.
As an African woman, 25-year-old Vanessa* from Nairobi, Kenya never related to Christian traditions and the concept of a white Jesus. To her, everything about the teachings felt foreign, abstract and tied to the history of colonialism in Africa, which made her feel uncomfortable about subscribing to such a religion.
This was fuelled by the aspect of constant communal worship, as is common in many African churches, and as an introvert, she felt left out during church services.
“I didn’t like the loud worship services and preferred something quieter,” she says. “I would rather stay at home and have a private worship session instead of attending church service and risk being deemed as an outcast because I didn’t prefer that way of worshipping.”
The insistence on blind faith also discouraged her from going to church.