Original Research
Pentecostal theology regarding disability in African neo-Pentecostalism
Submitted: 01 August 2023 | Published: 19 January 2024
About the author(s)
Mookgo S. Kgatle, Department of Christian Spirituality, Church History and Missiology, Faculty of Humanities, University of South Africa, Pretoria, South AfricaAbstract
The Pentecostal approach to disability is currently informed by the imposed healing, deliverance, and performance of other miracles, particularly among neo-Pentecostals in Africa. This is also informed by the neo-Pentecostal pastor’s radical approach to the aspect of healing in Pentecostal theology. Therefore, instead of addressing disability from the point of environmental, social, and technological aspects, neo-Pentecostal pastors either impose healing on the disabled body, or blame them for a lack of faith. This in a way presents some power dynamics between the abled neo-Pentecostal pastors’ bodies and the disabled congregant bodies. This article uses a critical theory, to argue that the development of the Pentecostal theology of disability should take cognisance of the environmental, social, and technological factors. When this is done, a Pentecostal setting in the form of a church service, crusade, or revival will not become a place of imposed healing and deliverance, but an environmentally, socially, and technologically friendly one, that is conducive to those living with a disability.
Contribution: This article highlighted the importance of the environmental, social, and technological factors in the construction of a Pentecostal theology of disability among the neo-Pentecostal churches, in an African context.
Keywords
Sustainable Development Goal
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