Dear Friends,
This week, please join us in prayer for Dr. Daniel Dama in Benin.
Located in West Africa, the Republic of Benin is home to over 14 million people. Approximately 52% of Beninese are Christians, 25% are Muslims, 18% follow traditional faiths, and 5% report no religion. In this tropical nation, much of the economy relies on agriculture and exports like cotton and palm oil. Along with the shores of Togo and Nigeria, Benin’s southern border forms part of the historic Slave Coast, where millions of Africans were forced into slavery between the early 16th and late 19th centuries.
Dama graduated last month with his PhD in Intercultural Studies from Fuller Theological Seminary! In response to religious extremism and ethnic conflict in his context, Dama’s research offers peacebuilding and missional resources using Christian and Muslim Fulbe folk music. In Benin, around 9% of the population belongs to the Fulbe tribe, a large and influential ethnic group with 30 million members worldwide. Dwelling mostly in West and Central Africa, the Fulbe are predominately Muslims, and around one-third live as nomadic herders. Dama also founded Africa Sings, an NGO that builds peace and witnesses to Christ through music. Scholar Leaders supported Dama’s doctoral studies through Leader Studies and the Brian Prinn Memorial Fund.
In 2020, Dama published an article that distinguishes the Western peacebuilding model, focused on conferences, lectures, and resolutions, from the African model, focused on community and kinship. In 2021, he contributed a chapter on the arts in Africa in a collected volume titled The Resilient Christian Leader: Experiences, Strategies & Opportunities in Times of Crisis. In 2019, Fuller Studio featured Dama’s story and ministry in A Song in His Heart. Dama and his wife Esther have four children: Rejoice, Muusa, Sambo, and Miriam.
Dama shares the following message:
Hi Scholar Leaders,
I graduated from Fuller Theological Seminary on Saturday, June 10. Thank you so much for your tremendous support throughout this fascinating journey.
Praises
1. I am so grateful to God for sustaining my life and the lives of my loved ones. He restored my health and granted me the grace to complete my doctoral program with distinction.
2. Praise God for opening doors for Africa Sings, a peacemaking ministry using arts and music in Benin. It is an NGO that I founded and registered with the Benin government.
In May 2023, Africa Sings initiated a peacemaking and reconciliation event that brought together around two thousand people, including the king of our region, his entourage, and Beninese government representatives. Africa Sings performed music and led seminars on peacemaking and reconciliation based on intrinsic African values to reconcile farmers and cattle rearers. The results were amazing. People withdrew their cases from the courts and angry people abandoned their resentment so that mutual forgiveness happened immediately.
Prayer Requests
1. Pray for God to prosper my ministry and grant me the grace to use Africa Sings to expand peace and reconciliation movements through the arts and music across my home continent of Africa, where conflicts of all kinds seem to be multifaceted and lingering.
2. The leadership of my Church in Benin has asked me to design some courses for our seminaries and theological institutions. Pray for insights.
3. Pray for my trip to Côte d’Ivoire in August for a teaching assignment at Centre Evangélique de Formation en Communication pour l’Afrique (Evangelical Communication Training Center For Africa).
In Christ our Peace,
Daniel Dama