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Paper short abstract:

Drawing on research conducted in two African churches in Brussels, this paper explores their unequal success in their quests for public recognition. In particular, the Church's position in the landscape of migrant churches seems to give them dissimilar access to politicians and administrations.

Paper long abstract:

The quests for recognition of "African" Churches in Brussels prove to be quite diverse depending on the Church's position in the landscape of "migrant" churches. In fact, their centrality or marginality in this environment can position those Churches as either interlocutors with politicians or administrations, thus progressively increasing their political capital, or leave them at the extreme margins of the religious field. This paper will draw on research conducted in the Celestial Church of Christ, which has only one small parish in Brussels frequented mostly by Nigerians, and in the Nouvelle Jérusalem, which is the most important "African" Church in Brussels, attended mostly by Congolese (DRC), some of whom have high levels of formal education. By comparing the two profiles, I will show that their unequal success in obtaining public recognition in the Belgian context can be explained, in particular, (a) by their size, (b) by the importance of the ethno-national population that forms the majority of their faithful (persons of Congolese origin being much more numerous in Belgium than persons of Nigerian origin), and (c) by the style of Christianity they profess. Actually, Pentecostalism (as is the case in the Nouvelle Jérusalem) is probably a more classical and 'efficient' theological base to join a religious network and to escape full marginality, than the African prophetic origin of the Celestial Church of Christ.