Our First Church Experience in Ouagadougou

Our first couple of days in Ouagadougou (pronounced Wah-gah-doo-goo) have gone well. We are learning our way around town and have already been to a couple of grocery stores, the pharmacy, a market, two restaurants, and an ice cream shop. Unfortunately, I (Mary Beth) got really sick on Friday night (I’ll spare you the gory details), so I couldn’t participate in some of the shopping adventures on Saturday. I am feeling fine now – it must have been a 24 hour virus of some sort. Also, we have had some trouble falling asleep at night, due to jetlag, heat and mosquitoes, but it hasn’t been too bad.

Today we attended a Baptist church located close to a university. The service was pretty similar to a typical Baptist church in the U.S., except for one noticeable difference: it lasted about 2 ½ hours!

Here are some other similarities and differences:

There was a choir, complete with blue and white robes and a choir director. The difference: the women wore hats, and the entire choir danced in unison throughout the performances.

A praise band, complete with drums, keyboard, and electric guitar, led the music. The difference: this congregation of clapping Baptists actually had rhythm.

The song words were projected, but not through PowerPoint: words were handwritten or typed on transparencies, then projected onto sewn-together strips of cloth using an overhead projector.

As guests, we filled out visitor registrations cards. The difference: at the end of the service, they called out the name of each guest and had us stand and be recognized. After the service was over, all guests went to a short meeting where church leaders presented information about the church.

And, as in most Baptist churches, offering plates were passed around. The difference: people could also walk to a bucket in front of the altar and place a special offering in there. We’ve been told that in some West African churches, everyone dances to the front of the church to place their offering in a box – plates aren’t passed at all.

The people at the church were very friendly and some of them spoke English. In order to get more exposure to French, we plan to attend their weekly youth meetings (in Africa, youth groups include people aged 20-35ish, and sometimes includes married couples as well as singles). In addition, we hope to do a trade off with some university students – they can practice their English skills with us, if they also let us practice French with them.