Dogon, Ampari

The Dogon built their first villages in caves along the great Bandiagara escarpment, partly to protect themselves from raids by Fulani herders who captured people to enslave them. This refuge in the rock kept them isolated and wary of strangers, and helped form dozens of small communities, each eventually speaking its own language.

After the power of the Fulani was contained, the Ampari were able to spread across the plateau and the plain. This movement expanded their farmland and their contacts with other peoples, and opened the way for changes that continue to this day.

Ampari life revolves around the land. They grow millet, sorghum, rice, peanuts and vegetables, and onions are the most important cash crop on the plateau. They also raise animals. On the escarpment, farming has always demanded ingenuity: the soil for the gardens was carried up from the plain, patient work that spans generations.

Their social organization is made up of small villages, where families and neighbors depend on one another for planting, harvesting and festivals. Living in communities so small and distinct has created a strong sense of place: each village keeps its own customs, and loyalty to the group weighs on every important decision. Water is a daily concern in such a dry land.

For centuries the Ampari resisted Islam and kept the traditional religion of their ancestors, tied to the veneration of spirits and ancestors, to the rites of the land and the harvest, and to the customs that bind each family to the history of the village.

Today most already identify as Muslim. With modernization, many conclude that the traditional religion is no longer enough and, with no other alternative at hand, embrace Islam, while part of the old practices remains alive. In a few villages, where missionaries or local Christians who returned home lived out their faith visibly among their neighbors, Christianity has also emerged as a path.

The Ampari language is small and poorly documented, and the translation of Scripture into it has begun, but still has a long way to go. Many understand neighboring languages and use those of wider circulation in the region, but it is in the language of the heart that the Word touches most deeply. There is much to do in translation, audio recording and literacy teaching, so that every family can hear and read the Scriptures in Ampari.

For the Ampari, belonging to the village and following its religion go together, and changing faith can be seen as breaking with family and ancestors. The distrust inherited from centuries of outside threats makes approaching them slow. The lack of complete Scriptures and of materials in their own language, geographic isolation and the small number of local churches mean that many have yet to meet someone who could present Jesus to them clearly in their own language.

One very concrete need is for safe, constant drinking water, in a dry region with few resources, where current sources can cause illness. There is also a need for support for agriculture, health and education for families in the most remote villages.

On the spiritual side, the Ampari need someone who will live out and proclaim the gospel patiently in their language, accessible Scriptures, and small communities of faith that grow within their own culture, without requiring anyone to stop being Ampari in order to follow Christ.

The gospel has already reached some Dogon subgroups, including the Ampari. In some villages where believers lived out their faith visibly, Christianity has grown. In Kani-Gogouna, for example, the church grows every week, the Christians are already thinking about a larger building, and attendance at the mosque is dropping. These are small signs, but real ones, that the good news is finding open ears.