Abstract

Faith-based Organisations have been at the forefront of a growing interest of the intersection between religion and development. Their value has been recognised as both pragmatic and, perhaps more contentiously, also 'spiritual' in nature because of advantages arising from faith itself. For many FBOs, religion is far more than an 'essential component of identity … it is a source of well-being'. In this manner, FBOs challenge the modernist assumptions of traditional development theory, which view the spiritual and physical domains as separate. In fact, for some FBOs, 'spiritual faith provides the fuel for action'. This paper reports on an aspect of the empirical findings of a South African study and explores both the way in which Christian FBOs understand their Christian identity and the way in which they articulate this through their use of scripture as a motivating or an envisioning tool.