Papua New Guinea: blind spots
‘Does God’s Spirit tell us who caused a person to die?’ the pastor asked. Another wondered: ‘if we fast and pray will God show us why a person got sick?’ Such questions dominated the Q&A session among a group of evangelical pastors in PNG in May and illustrate the confusion in the churches.
Before Christianity came to the Western Province of PNG in the 1950s, families and tribes were often in bitter disputes, blaming each other for causing death and disease, taking revenge and eating their dead enemies. Though the gospel radically changed things, there is huge slip in the churches back into a culture of blame and revenge.