This is a fascinating model. I have often been bothered by the fact many Kmtyw traditionalists in the U.S. compartmentalize their engagement with Kmtyw culture, interpreting it in the same way that occurs in western religion. I have found it difficult to understand why the practice of Yoruba medicine, martial culture, communal and familial principles, food science, and so forth does not occupy an equal place alongside of the practices of divination, sacrifice, and so on.
The Yoruba, like other Kmtyw groups, built comprehensive social systems. The process of re-Kmtywization is supposed to facilitate the reconstruction of these comprehensive systems, not superordinate the practice of "religion", while subordinating the process of building the other institutional frameworks needed to sustain life.
I'm not saying that traditionally the Yoruba had "religion", but once removed from the social fabric of the traditional contexts, reinterpreted within a Western ontology, and made the locus of Kmtyw cultural engagement it becomes compartmentalized and thus "religion".
Nonetheless this offers an interesting model. It reminds me of some of the concerns that I have had when people have made overtures to me to become a "priest" in this or that "spiritual system". The form of cultural work that we are engaged in cannot be compartmentalized. It must be totalizing and comprehensive answering (or potentially answering) all of the quandaries that face us as a people.
From Orisa Lifestyle Academy:
QuoteFor people who are strictly religious adherents, it is a common and acceptable to take the position that, just because the practice of Orisa devotion has originated from the Yoruba people, it doesn’t need to be associated with Yoruba language and culture.
QuoteHowever, for those of us who identify as Yoruba descendants, it is quite impossible to compartmentalize our spiritual consciousness as something different from our cultural identity. This is based upon the fundamental understanding that identity is destiny.
http://www.orisalifestyle.com/ (http://www.orisalifestyle.com/)