The mission for Africa

The Church of Africa told Pope Benedict about their concerns at the Second Synod of Bishops for Africa in October 2009. Three years later, the Holy Father came to Africa to present the continent with his apostolic exhortation Africae munus (“The Commitment of Africa”), which follows Pope John Paul II’s synodal exhortation of 1995, Ecclesia in Africa.

Africae munus provides the Church with a blueprint for its salvific mission and for its relationship with the world.

The document gives witness to new realities within Africa’s Church. Pope Benedict acknowledges that “Africans are today missionaries on other continents”, and pays due tribute to them.

He notes the great numbers of vocations on the continent, and urges the African Church to form its future priests not only in matters of theology and spirituality, but also to help them “develop a correct understanding of their own culture while not being locked within their own ethnic and cultural limits”.

The pope encourages the African laity, the “ambassadors of Christ” (2 Cor 5:20), to be active participants in the Church’s mission, and asks that “centres of biblical, spiritual, liturgical and pastoral formation be organised in the dioceses”.

In 2009 the bishops of Africa noted that the rapid increase of Catholics on the continent was not matched by a depth of understanding of the faith. Pope Benedict in his exhortation encourages catechists, and stresses that it is fair that they should be paid for their labour, in as far as their material circumstances require relief.

But it is in posing the challenges of social justice where Africae munus must energise the African Church in particular.

In words which should resonate among the poor in South Africa, Pope Benedict writes that “given the chronic poverty of its people, who suffer the effects of exploitation and embezzlement of funds both locally and abroad, the opulence of certain groups shocks the human conscience” and encourages the Church to work towards a just economy.

The challenge for the South African Church, and those who share this perspective, resides in making this message heard above the din of affluent populists who use the anger of the poor to profit their political aspirations.

At the 2009 synod, the bishops of Africa did not mince words when they demanded that multinational corporations operating in Africa stop “their criminal devastation of the environment in their greedy exploitation of natural resources”, and referred to “a tragic complicity and criminal conspiracy of local leaders and foreign interests”. Pope Benedict clearly shares the feelings of the African Church in this regard, even as he couches them in more diplomatic language.

The pope makes it clear that to foster hope for a better future on the continent, the Church in Africa must be rigorously and fearlessly prophetic in preaching the Social Gospel.

Pope Benedict also endorses the synod’s call for the empowerment of Africa’s women. Noting the discrimination of the continent’s women and ancestral practices that degrade them, the pope writes: “Unfortunately, the evolution of ways of thinking in this area is much too slow. The Church has the duty to contribute to the recognition and the liberation of women, following the example of Christ’s own esteem for them.”

For all its problems, Africa is a vibrant and forward-looking continent. Pope Benedict recognised this when in an address to political leaders in Benin he criticised “the fruit of a bleak analysis” of the continent and the “reductionist and disrespectful points of view which lead to the unhelpful ‘objectification’ of Africa and her inhabitants”.

The fast-growing Catholic Church has a prophetic role to play in Africa’s life and development. Africae munus, written by a pope from Europe who has listened closely to the African Church, will serve as a guide in that mission.

Pope Benedict closes Africae munus with his wish for the continent’s Church: “May the Catholic Church in Africa always be one of the spiritual lungs of humanity, and become daily an ever greater blessing for the noble African continent and for the entire world.”

We, the Church of Africa, must work to make it so.