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BIBTEX RIS

The Challenge of Africa

1979; University of Illinois Press; Volume: 12; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês

10.2307/45224772

ISSN

1554-9631

Autores

M. Neff Smart,

Tópico(s)

International Development and Aid

Resumo

The city was Lagos, Nigeria, in the early 1970s.The place was the upstairs cinder-block apartment of Sabath Umoh, branch president of the Lagos "Mormon" church.On the card table pulpit was a black, hard-cover Bible alongside a well-worn Lowell Bennion manual, The Church of Jesus Christ in Ancient Times.It was time for Sunday School.Sixteen persons were present, all black Nigerians.Independently of Salt Lake City they had organized a branch of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints of Nigeria.Shortly after my arrival at the University of Lagos, I had been invited to attend the meetings.Now I was the Sunday School teacher.They sang the opening song, "What a Friend We Have in Jesus," as it never was sung at my ward in Utah, with an earnestness and fervor that brought tears.We knelt for Brother Umoh's opening prayer.It was forceful, graceful and punctuated by "amens" which suggested unanimity.

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