Some Yoruba people are not attached to their old traditions this day and age. The school system is largely British in structure and the Nigerian (Afrikan, in general) race for "modernity" is almost always a race to Westernization or at the very least a race to some sort of foreign ideal. For instance,a friend of mine's father (chezaray's)is Yoruba and was born and raised in Nigeria but now lives in the States. When asked if he was familiar with "Oshun" (the orisha) he said "I've heard of it. It was a river that some of the 'old' people left food in every once in awhile." "Old" is not necessarily a term for the elderly but also a term for people who practiced the "old" ways. He did not even realize that the people were leaving ritual offerings. Thus in that case he was clearing not taught the old ways and religiously was raised in foreign belief systems.

Another reason could be that Christianity could SOCIALLY offer more benefits to certain people. I'm going to universalize right now. I think that it will always be the case where a complex social group (i.e. large body of people where a variety of roles are played, some of which are solely or primarily dedicated to preserving the group as a whole) will possess some sort of system where a certain faction will be dispossessed at some level. There will be those with power and prestige and those without. In any given system, the easiest way for the dispossessed to not be dispossessed anymore, is to not follow the current regime and social order. On this level foreign ideas and beliefs will often prove attractive to the persons of lower status in a society. Hell look how christianity was STARTED!

Christianity (as opposed to Ifa AND Islam) IS the religion of modernity and so-called "forward-thinking" in much of West Afrika. Christianity and Western culture go hand-in-hand in this region therefore technology always follows Christianity.

Nevertheless, certain traditions among the yoruba people maybe less desirable to some more than others and thus any other perspective may appear attractive. One tradition of some Yoruba groups was the practice of paying a sort of "redemption"/burial fee to priests of Sango if a relative died by being struck by lightning. Lightning was(is) a weapon of Sango and if one was killed by it then the person was suspected of having committed wrong of some sort. Therefore if the relatives did not want the wrong to come on them then they would have to pay a costly price priests to redeem the victim and bury him/her. Now what if the relatives were poor? Clearly Christianity my serve as a way out of having to pay the priests money that they don't have to appease Sango's ill-temper. Surely, Jesus will forgive but Sango will not.

Lastly, being that the Nigerian colonial system owes its creation to the knowledge of its "motherland," the U.K., then its obvious which religion is the one of power.

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"the real pyramids were built with such precision that you can't slide a piece of paper between two 4,000 lb stones, and have shafts perfectly aligned so that you can see a tiny aperture through dozens of these mammoth blocks