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Lawyer-theologian John Warwick Montgomery told CT that "to identify genuine corruption, you need an absolute standard of values that can only come from a transcendent source. Also, to combat corruption, hearts must be changed, and only Christianity offers the opportunity for personal and societal transformation."

Nigeria (with a TI rating of 1.0-making it the second-most-corrupt nation, behind Bangladesh, among 91 surveyed in 2001) may provide a case study. Jailed by a dictator during the 1990s, Gen. Olusegun Obasanjo wondered if he would be killed. Obasanjo also reflected on his own involvement in bribery and theft. "I felt soiled, a used shoe," Obasanjo has said publicly. A minister told him that Jesus could purify him from his spiritual corruption and set him on a straight path. Obasanjo felt God come upon him and warm his heart. "I felt the shackles gone." In speeches he has said that he also felt "a divine calling to fight the corruption that was killing Nigeria."

There is much work ahead. While Nigeria's adjusted per capita gross domestic product is a painfully low $800 annually, the nation of 137 million people is immensely wealthy from oil (2.2 million barrels pumped daily) and other resources. Unfortunately, much of the wealth goes straight from the ground and into foreign bank accounts. Public opinion polls regularly show that Nigerians are disgusted with the pervasive corruption.

Obasanjo left prison to become Nigeria's president in 1999. He stood on an anticorruption platform he says God gave him. Obasanjo won re-election in April.

In China (TI rating of 3.5), where corruption is called "the rotten or rotting evil" that fractures the state and its people, corruption is a common sermon topic, according to a survey by a Chinese sociologist.

In Latin America the feeling is the same. In Nicaragua (TI rating of 2.4), the Council of Evangelical Protestants (CEPAD) in February held its first protest against government corruption. "The protest took the form of a march, called 'the March of the Brooms,'" says the Rev. José Alguera Palma, CEPAD president. He says this means "the people can sweep the corrupt politicians out of office and elect honest replacements."

During the march, CEPAD distributed an extensive study of corruption with names of government officials and how much they stole-more than $1.1 billion in six months out of the tiny Nicaraguan federal budget. Meanwhile the government claims there is no money to help the poor.

Western governments are starting to recognize evangelical anticorruption efforts. The G-8 agreements with Nigeria, Nicaragua, Peru, and Georgia to initiate model anticorruption efforts could spread to other developing countries. A senior staffer for the National Security Council told CT the anticorruption initiatives fit with Bush's faith-based foreign policy. Nigeria, Nicaragua, and Peru (TI rating of 4.1) have strong evangelical anticorruption movements.

Mikhail Saakashvili of Georgia (unrated by TI, but which the Council on Foreign Relations says is "riddled with corruption") became president after running on an anticorruption platform. Saakashvili told CT, "Our anticorruption efforts are based on our recent experience with an utterly corrupt government and our Christian heritage." Before assuming office, Saakashvili took a "spiritual" oath to fight corruption and rebuild Georgia.

South Korea's Christian Ethics Movement fights corruption, consumerism, and dishonest elections. Co-founder Son Bong-ho says governments and nongovernmental organizations now recognize that their efforts at modernization, poverty alleviation, and economic development have often floundered because bribery, scams, and looting pick the bones of the development projects clean before they can produce results.

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November 2004, Vol. 48, No. 11