This is a well-structured book that makes an argument about different forms of Christianity in Africa and their relationship to modernity. Gifford looks at the bureaucratic world of churches, much of it around development work and juxtaposes this with a charismatic Christianity more interested in miracles and the world of spirits. The former is regarded as largely secularised, the latter presented as magical or enchanted. It is a clearly delineated division that, in Gifford's reading, reflects a basic problem with Africa's relationship with modernity. Modernity is defined along classical sociological lines as the new ‘relatively secularised’ society that took shape in seventeenth and eighteenth century Europe. Modern societies therefore are those ‘marked by individualism’, an ‘emerging middle class' and limits to the powers of the state and other institutions of government. Gifford writes that he is not interested in praising this system, but instead notes that ‘this is the way the modern world operates'. He wants to think about the different ways Christianity might help ‘Africa join that world’ (p. 147).

After an introduction where Gifford sets out the issues addressed in the book, there is a discussion of ‘enchanted Christianity’ looking at the ways people link their life in this world to the spiritual domain. Gifford introduces examples that have made much play in the media inside and outside the continent – the killing of albinos, penis snatching, human sacrifice. He pays particular attention to the writings of a Nigerian pastor, showing how his arguments tie into a sense that Africa's problems are self-inflicted; that there is something wrong with African ‘culture’. The third chapter looks at the career and writings of Oyedepo, the founder of Winners’ Chapel, a church with branches across Africa, Europe and North America. Gifford draws on the testimonies of church members as well as published material and scholarship. Chapter 4 goes by the title ‘Pentecostalism and Modernity’, and focuses on six ways in which Pentecostal Christians demonstrate and measure success. This chapter has less to say on the subject of modernity.

Later chapters look at the Catholic Church in Africa. Gifford shows the turn towards human rights, social justice and development work that has, in his view, disabused Catholicism of some of its earlier hostility toward modernism (Chapter 5). Chapter 6 looks at the role the Catholic Church plays in social development, most obviously in the fields of health and education. Chapter 7 adds the caveat that many ‘African Catholics’ – lay and religious – remain ‘enchanted’ and at a distance from official church teaching. Chapter 8 draws heavily on Paul Bowers's work to show the way the theology of African Catholic leaders links to a broader critique of the west and a reification of ‘African authenticity and self-reliance’ (p. 125).

What is particularly welcome about this study is its description of the Catholic Church, its evolving theology in Africa and its role in development work. This aspect of Christianity on the continent tends to get less coverage in the literature than Pentecostalism or charismatic Christianity. Gifford's book is intended for a wide readership and his discussion of the politics and development in the Catholic Church is important as a counterweight.

I would have liked to have learned more of what Gifford thinks about modernity in Africa. A number of scholars working on Africa have taken their departure from the work of Arjun Appadurai, and there is now a large library of academic work that looks at modernity less as a trajectory against which Africa is to be measured and more as an object to be studied itself. Gifford's classical, sociological definition avoids any discussion of the way modernity is about expectations, debate, ambiguity or space for thinking. These contentions might have been more apparent had Gifford been able to get a sense of what happens in the everyday lives of African Christians, what they do when they are away from the pew or the pulpit. As it is, Gifford draws mostly from religious tracts, church reports and official testimonies, types of evidence where people tend to be more categorical and clear-cut. The debates and ambiguities that surround the way people in Africa encounter modernity are left in the background.

This takes nothing away from the fact that Christianity, Development and Modernity in Africa will be particularly useful to people new to the subject. It offers an important place to start in debating the way Christianity is changing across Africa.