Charting New Paths of Religion in African Migration

Since the 1990s, research on religion and migration from Africa and its diasporas has focused on outcomes in destination countries, often neglecting the generative conditions shaping mobility and immobility. This article advances a new research agenda centred on migration aspirations, capabilities, and integration, expanding the scope to include aspiring migrants and non-migrants. Drawing on Pentecostal-Charismatic Christianity in Ghana and the experiences of Ghanaian Christian immigrants in Canada, it argues that religion is not merely a facilitator of migration but a transformative force that redefines migration itself. Religious ideas, rituals, and networks shape who migrates, who remains, and how migrants integrate into new societies. Beyond physical movement, African migration encompasses emotional, psychological, and spirited mobilities shaped by dreams, prophecies, and divinely attributed intuitions. Overall, this article moves beyond traditional congregational studies of ‘immigrant religion’ to highlight a broader spectrum of religious phenomena in migratory and diasporic contexts.