On the growth of Christianity in Africa

Nine years ago, Thomas C. Oden, in “How Africa Shaped The Christian Mind: Rediscovering the African Seedbed of Western Christianity” (2007), wrote about the tremendous growth of Christianity in Africa toward a half billion African Christians:

“There soon may be almost a half billion Christians in Africa. Now estimated at over four hundred million (46 percent of the total African population of 890,000, according to the Pew Forum), and rapidly growing, a significant proportion of global Christian believers at this time are residents of the continent of Africa. David Barrett projects the continuing growth rate to 2025 as 633 million Christians in Africa.”

Interestingly, as Christianity is/has declined in Western societies, Christianity is growing exponentially in African societies. I’m wondering about the contributing factors to this “Christian increase” in continental Africa. Many thinkers believe that Africans are going back to their “Christian roots.”