130 - The Churches of Africa: Future Prospects

The Churches of Africa: Future Prospects
Edited by Claude Geffre and Bertrand Luneau
New York, Concilium, Seabury Press, 1977. 120 pp. $4.95.

In an introductory editorial, the editors of this volume point out that the Catholic churches of Africa represent more than forty million members. "These are churches which for the most part have their own African hierarchies and possess a moral authority which often exceeds the numerical importance of the community … [but] it is not certain that they will mature to the status of unique and irreplaceable members of the Church of Jesus Christ." In a series of nine essays written by Africans and ex-patriates, by bishops and priests, the editors attempt to discover a reason for the uncertainty of the future of the Catholic Church in Africa.

The writers are Roman Catholic, and they write about problems in the Catholic Church. Yet it is clear that their basic concern is the same as that facing the Protestant churches of Africa. While Protestants may have handled certain aspects of the problem more positively, other aspects have been creatively handled by the Catholic Church. But the concern is common to all Christian churches: Can the churches of Africa break through the imposed theology of western missions, a product of western culture and hellenistic philosophy, while maintaining faithfulness to the gospel of Jesus Christ?

The writers tackle the central theme from various perspectives: the historic, pastoral, theological, cultural, the laity, and the local church. This theme might be stated as a question: Can the Roman Church become the universal church? The answer to this question may significantly affect the church in Africa.

After a hundred years of evangelization, ex-patriates still represent the majority of the clergy. In Zaire, for instance, with a Catholic population of over nine million, there are 675 Zairois clergy and some 2,500 ex-patriate missionary clergy. Yet when the regional Conference of the bishops of Central Africa and Cameroun drew up a motion in favor of a clergy to include married men and submitted it to the 1971 Synod of Rome, "Thunder began to rumble down from the heights of Olympus and it became advisable to put these desiderata in low profile."

At the same time there is a tendency to conserve and preserve "received formulae and institutions" that work in favor of the status quo. The word "service" has been introduced as a means of further justifying missionary presence. Thus the practice of missionary days places the young churches inside a vicious circle, which both works from and tends toward a white ideal.

It is no wonder that some leaders call for "the orderly departure of missionaries from Africa." Others follow the Call for a Moratorium of the All-Africa Conference of Churches. African bishops, however, have

132 - The Churches of Africa: Future Prospects

made their position clear: "The missionaries should take no account of these deceptive voices which claim that the time for missions is over or which consider missionaries should be treated as aliens."

The book suggests two reasons for this position of the bishops. One is financial. At the time of African political independence, national churches were given total responsibility for their dioceses. This was followed by "a certain disinvolvement" by western churches in economic matters. Money allocated by Rome became very important, and third-world bishops have found difficulty in obtaining funds from this source after "expressing highly personal ideas."

The second reason suggested is that the church in Africa is truly committed to the concept of the universal church. The African Christian is a person in search of identity. The Roman Church is reluctant to allow the local church to enter into dialogue with African culture and the result is angry churches. They are angry because they seem faced with closed conclusions: that western theology has exhausted the theological possibilities and all that has to be done is to exploit them. To ignore the older theologies would be theological error, but to follow them slavishly, and to adopt their theological conclusions, is just as wrong.

Thus Africans are turning more to the Bible than to the dogmas of the Roman Church. They are hearing the Word of God as the gospel for them today. As Bishop Sanon states in his essay: ". . . theology arises from the discernment of spirits and from dialogue between preachers and evangelized Christians declaring their acceptance of and their faithful response to the Word of God. The life problems which awaken the questions and responses of the faithful ought by right to be treated first and not relegated to some subsidiary position."

Most of the writers in this volume suggest that dialogue between Rome and the African churches is essential to move beyond the present impasse; others suggest it will be very difficult to hold such dialogue. As African churches struggle to shake off the overlay of western culture Christianity, their goal is for the local church to become "alive and active to the extent that it becomes fundamentally self-sufficient both in its own inner life and its missionary obligations … to build a Church with the capacity to survive and grow even in the most critical conditions imaginable." Such a development can occur only as a result of the life of faith which must be "for every people the coming of the incarnation of the Word of God." To achieve this end "there must be a total reassessment on the one hand of the cultural patrimony of black Africa, and on the other of the vocabulary and content of the "theological superstructure of the West which has for so long distracted us from the 'kerygmatic infrastructure.' "

Bishop Sanon closes his essay with a comment which should be thoughtfully considered by the church in the west: "It is perhaps in this sense that the young churches are evangelizing, or will evangelize, the old churches: not by lending them personnel and still less equipment, but by humble witness to a new understanding of the Church."

133 - The Churches of Africa: Future Prospects

This book is important reading for those interested in Africa. Yet, it is more important for American pastors and theologians who are caught up in our affluent culture and overlook how our lives distort the gospel we confess.

Paul A. Hopkins
Liaison with Africa, The Program Agency
United Presbyterian Church
New York City, New York