State, Religion, and Tradition in Angola

Abstract Angolan independence, proclaimed in 1975, instituted a one-party, socialist-oriented revolutionary regime that vowed to create a nation of workers under a secular state with freedom of worship. However, such a framework existed only on paper. A generation gap opposed Protestant, mission-educated leaders to younger agnostic and atheist militants trained in socialist countries. The government acted to circumscribe the public space of churches and enforce compliance with the heavily contested new order, but also promoted certain denominations as a tool to build hegemony. Further complications arise from African religious practices not being deemed religion but tradition, pointing both to superstition and obscurantism on the one hand, and to the cultural corpus of nation-building on the other. This paper posits that the study of secularity in Angola does not fit into the usual theoretical dichotomy but must take into account the intersections and interplay of tradition with both religion and the state.