When the Price family begins to settle into the village and begin to call it home; they prepare to celebrate Easter. Nathan Price see's Easter as a perfect time to baptize some of the villagers and convert them to Christianity. However, Nathan soon becomes disappointed when his Easter Sunday service clashes with the local Congolese spiritual traditions.
“Bloodstained spears came jingling down the aisle of our church pageant on Easter Sunday it represented progress, I’m sure, but it wasn’t what Father really hoped for. He had envisioned a baptism. The whole point of Easter in July was supposed to be an altar call, followed by a joyful procession down to the river with children dressed all in white getting saved” (Kingsolver 46).
Nate's Take
Nathan was not willing to embrace the local culture of the Congolese, he wanted only to convert all the villagers to Christianity and erase all their ancient customs. Many of villagers use witch doctors as a form healing both spiritually and physically. Nathan saw this as unholy and pagan and must be stopped. Due to his arrogance, Nathan believed he could enter the village preaching the Bible and all the villagers would dedicate themselves to Christianity like he had. Unfortunately, it is not that easy and the villagers rejected Nathan’s colonial religious tactics. A good example in history of this mass colonial conversion failing can be seen in the early American Colonies. When Christian missionaries landed in New England many of them attempted to convert the local natives to their religion. In return the natives retaliated by fighting and killing many Christian missionaries.
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