2011-11-26 10:13:01

Fr Lombardi SJ: Benedict XVI and a hope for Africa


Below is the English translation of Fr Federico Lombardi, SJ's weekly editorial.

In his remarks ahead of the signing the post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation, Africae munus, Pope Benedict XVI referred to the pair of gates that stand hard by one another on Benin’s Atlantic coast: the “Gate of no Return” and the “Gate of Salvation”. An appalling physical reminder of the offence against human dignity that is slavery, the Gate of no Return was the one through which slaves used to pass on their way to the ships that would carry them into servitude. The Gate of Salvation is next to the first. The Catholic faithful built the Gate of Salvation to commemorate the coming of the first evangelists to those same shores – from which place they spread the Good News of Christ’s victory over sin and death throughout the whole of west Africa. “[T]he Church in Africa,” said Pope Benedict, “is called to promote peace and justice. The Gate of No Return, as well as that of Salvation, remind us of this duty and impel us to combat every form of slavery.”

Commentators not suspected of partiality toward the Catholic Church have said that there is no clearer or more complete document on the situation and the problems facing Africa, than the new Exhortation. It is a document as striking for its realism as for its respect for the dignity of the African peoples. Africae munus arises from a genuinely African way of thinking: one that is nevertheless permeated by the Christian message and therefore at once genuinely African and truly universal; a way of thinking that opens a horizon of commitment for the future. A European journalist friend movingly told in me that, in Benin, he felt that as a Catholic he really does belong to a universal community. The Pope, as representative of Christ, is the spiritual head of Christians from every nation and every continent. The way the Holy Father was received in Benin showed quite clearly that his visit brought great hope to the peoples of Africa: a continent the Pope sees as a “spiritual lung” for humanity – and perhaps this is a notion worth westerners’ attention.







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