Religious Encounters in Togo: Vodun and the Roman Catholic Church

Abstract:The article discusses the struggle between vodun priests and Roman Catholic missionaries in Togo during the first decades of the twentieth century. I analyze several cases that involved the two traditions and follow the tensions aroused by a new vodun called Goro. Assuming that the Catholic religion is pervaded by the culture of presence, my aim is to show that such religious conflict cannot be fully understood solely as a response to political tensions and personal incertitude engendered by the new colonial order. It needs to be viewed also in the light of a number of concepts that brought the perspectives of the Catholic missionaries closer to those of the vodun priests.