Religion in Africa: ‘The church fills the gap when states fail the poor’

I've travelled across much of sub-Saharan Africa for the purpose of meeting families and communities, described as living in "absolute poverty". Each time I expect to be confronted with images of despair and hopelessness I could not be more wrong. Children giggle uncontrollably at "the westerner" trying to say hello in their local dialect, and women living with HIV radiate hope and faith for a better tomorrow.

Herein lies an unlikely, but obvious coupling – faith and international development. Beyond the visible infrastructure of schools and hospitals the efforts at the local grassroots level often remain overlooked and forgotten. Yet it is here that church networks extend into the darkest city slum and the most remote rural areas, beyond the reach of even the most robust NGO 4×4.

It's here – at the epicentre of food security, famine or flood disasters, at the heart of the Aids pandemic – that the church is having the greatest impact. It is here that the church offers the greatest potential in helping to scale up wider efforts for poverty reduction.

The church is one of the few movements that is both local and global. It draws from an impressive portfolio of highly professional church-based organisations and denominational structures robust enough to fill the gap when states fail in their duty to provide vital services for the marginalised and poorest in society. As an international network it also has the ability to mobilise hundreds of thousands of people worldwide to lobby policy makers to take up their responsibilities to eliminate poverty and provide those basic rights and services for all. …