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Religious Beliefs and Spirituality in Gabon

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Christianity, Protestantism, Islam and traditional indigenous religious beliefs are the major religions being practiced in Gabon. Apparently, many Gabonese practice combined elements of Christianity and their traditional indigenous beliefs. There are Gabonese bishops that serve in Roman Catholic but they still heavily rely on foreign clergy, and to be specific they greatly depend on French Holy Ghost Fathers. Elements of Christianity are practiced by an estimated 73% of the country’s population, and this includes the non-citizens. Moreover, 12% practice Islam wherein 12% to 15%are foreigners while the 10% continue to live by the traditional beliefs they inherited from their ancestors and the remaining 5% identify themselves as having no religion or atheist.

Muslim is a minority in Gabon and the former president El Hadj Omar Bongo Ondimba was a member of this minority. The synergetic religion called Bwiti, which is mainly based on a secret society with the same name, brought solidarity among Fang and was introduced in the early 20th century.

At present, foreign missionaries continue to be active in the territory. This is in connection with the constitution stating freedom of religion. The Gabonese government respect freedom of religion of its citizen and according to the US government there are no societal abuses and any form of discrimination attributed to differences in religious beliefs in 2007.

For other information, Islamic, Catholic, and Protestant denominations put up both primary and secondary schools in Gabon. The Ministry of Education of Gabon sees to it that these religious sectors meet the same standards set for public schools.