Answer to Question #323531 in History for smplgrl

Question

Monastic supremacy in the Philippines shows that the Curates with their Prelates maintain a status quo by blackmailing the government leaders that despotism will cause rebellion. On the other hand, they also blackmail the masses to be obedient to the government as the will of God, or to revolt when the government is despotic. With this kind of Christian leaders who founded Christianity in the Philippines, what Christian contribution do we have in our own development of civilization? 

Answer 1

To many European nations, Christianity represented western civilization and the basis for Anglo-Saxon morality. Christianity served as a major force in the partition and eventual colonization of Africa. During the late 19^th century, European nations increasingly vied for global power. In an attempt to augment political and regional influence, nations like Great Britain and France needed a justification for expansion.

Essentially Christianity was a guise by which Western governments justified the exploitation and conquest of African nations. In the poem The White Man’s Burden, poet Rudyard Kipling exclaims, “ Take up the White Man’s burden, The savage wars of peace—Fill full the mouth of Famine and bid the sickness cease”.Originally denoted as a reference to United States imperialism in the Philippines, the Anglos-centric basis of the poem holds true to the root structure of imperialist ideology. Denouncing the religious practices of Africans as witchcraft and heathenism, European nations sought to convert, and then exploit the indigenous peoples of Africa.Furthermore European missionaries called upon the tenants of Christianity to spread what they believed was a just and compassionate doctrine. In practice they were used to degrade the culture and society of the African people. Under the pretense of humanitarian theology, European powers strategically implemented Christianity as a divisive imperialistic tool.