ALADURA IN THE CITY: EXPLORING HOW THE CHERUBIM AND SERAPHIM NAVIGATES CITY DYNAMICS IN NIGERIA

This paper discusses how the Cherubim and Seraphim (C&S) navigates the complex city dynamics within the context of time and space and how both the church and the city shape and reshape one another in Nigeria. The C&S is a major brand of Aladura Christianity, which emerged as a prayer group and metamorphosed into major and countless number of minor strands of churches that bear the name “Cherubim and Seraphim” as prefix or suffix. The C&S navigates a diverse, competitive, and dynamic religious landscape where the changing city life of modernisation and globalisation influence how the church practices its faith. Such influence offers the church a wide range of opportunities and challenges in every city where it exists. Education, media technologies, social services, security challenge and economic depression are major indicators of how the church negotiates its relevance and visibility within the city. The paper posits that the interaction between the C&S and its cities of existence stimulates considerable resilience and positive impacts on the both sides.