Religion and History in Gabon

Christianity reached the Gabonese coast with Protestant missionaries in 1842, followed in 1844 by Roman Catholic missions that France actively promoted among the Mpongwe and neighbouring peoples as part of its colonial project. Catholic missions built much of the territory's early schools and clinics, and Catholicism became and remains the largest single religious affiliation, professed today by a majority of the population.

Gabon passed from French Equatorial Africa into an autonomous republic within the French Community in 1958 and reached full independence on 17 August 1960. Christian institutions carried over largely intact through that transition, and Gabon's postindependence leaders, drawn mostly from Catholic and Protestant backgrounds, have generally kept the churches close to the state rather than in open conflict with it.

Alongside the churches, indigenous traditions including Bwiti, practiced chiefly among the Fang and Mitsogo peoples and recognized by UNESCO as intangible cultural heritage in 2022, have continued as a distinct strand of Gabonese religious life alongside them.