Refracting the Cross: African Relational Thought as a Challenge to Western Christian Soteriology

This study examines the marginalization of the Cross within African inculturation theology and argues for its reinterpretation through African relational ontology. While existing scholarship has largely focused on Christological models such as Christ as Ancestor and Healer, the Cross remains under-theorized as a resource for peacebuilding within African conflict contexts. Drawing on African concepts of vital force, communal equilibrium, sacrificial mediation, and relationality, the article contends that conflict in many African societies represents not merely political disorder but the rupture of moral and communal harmony. Through qualitative textual and contextual analysis of theological literature, African philosophical thought, and conflict studies scholarship, the study reinterprets the Cross as a mechanism of relational restoration that reconstitutes fractured communal life and renews social equilibrium. The article further demonstrates that an inculturated theology of the Cross repositions the Church as an active agent of reconciliation within conflict-affected communities across sub-Saharan Africa.