抄録
This article examines the way in which a group of Aboriginal people in rural Australia have accepted Pentecostal Christianity under a diverse Aboriginal lay leadership. The Christians of this group reject Aboriginal "culture." This, however, does not mean they reject Aboriginality. Drawing upon my fieldwork data and past ethnographies related to the region, I show that their rejection of "culture" is focused upon eradicating their fear of sorcery and promoting attachment to the community and its people. Loss of knowledge related to the sacred places, at which both beneficent magic and destructive magic used to be performed, has enhanced fear as generations have passed. The Aboriginal people have redefined their meaning of "culture" in order to put their primordial past under their control. This article advocates shifting the study of religious change from a dichotomized model that opposes invading Christian moral orders against resisting traditional cultures to one that examines the complex historical development of vernacular Christianity.
