Africanews Documents, Reflections, Perspectives.Compiled and edited by African Faith and Justice Network under the direction of Maura Browne, SND Orbis Books, 1996, 286pp, paper $21.95, ISBN 1-57075-038-6 Reviewed by Paul Donohue The path through this first comprehensive treatment of the historic 1994 Special Assembly for Africa of the Synod of Bishops visits more optimism than not. The deliberatively positive outlook of the book identifies how the Church in Africa is moving forward. The expression "the assembly has ended, but the Synod has begun," aptly puts in words the thrust of the volume. For the sake of history, the book collects the reservations of many rank and file members of the Church in Africa concerning the preparatory process and the Synod assembly. The opening section also includes a historical analysis of the African context.
This is followed by some documents of the Synod, and then the reflections of various authors regarding the African Church and the Synod. The concluding part of the book has other authors looking at the future of the African Church. The Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation brought to Africa by pope John Paul II in September 1995 is published in its entirety in the appendix. The volume contains passionate defences of the African religious experience and of the African Church. For example, Bishop Peter Sarpong of Kumasi, Ghana, in small group discussions with bishop-delegates at the Synod explained that "our ample use of such words as polygamy, paganism, heathenism, fetishism, animism, idolatry, and primitive to describe African Traditional Religion demonstrates a wrong view of African religion and African life."
Bishop Sarpong went on to say: "these were not just misnomers, but that it was totally unjust to use such words to describe a reality that in essence is as good as any religious experience. These words, therefore, should be dropped once and for all." It is not just the Synod which comes to life in the pages of this book, but the very continent of Africa itself. Father Jean-Marc Ela's contribution is an example. Ela begins by noting that two months before the beginning of the Synod, the magazine JEUNE AFRIQUE pointed out that Africans are poorer than ever.
According to Ela, Africans have no problems in recognizing this fact. Indeed, Ela writes: "because of our situation, Africa must be perceived at its heart to be one of the privileged poles of liberation, that is to say, one of the principal places where God will speak to the Church and to humanity."The Church in Africa is struggling with the question how to celebrate God in a world where more and more people die because poverty is instituted in a structural manner. The International Monetary Fund and the World Bank "are not benevolent societies," writes Ela. Such ideas appear to find confirmation in the writings of other persons in other fora. For example, in a recent article Patrick Bellegarde-Smith, a Professor of African-American studies at the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee, wrote: "Blacks today are the end-product of 500 years of contact and unequal power relationships with the European class system. But a better world is within our collective grasp."Thus the book keeps alive the context in which northern theologians "acknowledge the countless wrongs inflicted on African people . . .
We confess having both individually and communally contributed in various ways to existing social structures as well as to ecclesial paternalism." Many religious, clerics, and lay people signed this admission of guilt. The signatories did not include members of the curia, but did include well-known persons such as Giuseppe Alberigo, Walter Buhlman, Pedro Casaldaliga, Norbert Greinacher, Bernard Haring, Wolfgang Hoffman, Erwin Krautler, and Hans Kung, to name a few. Sister Maria Rita Matiku, who attended the Synod as an auditor, notes that the style and wording of the individual authors were retained, including the noninclusive language, "revealing the bias of male contributors."
She continues, "while this is rapidly changing, women are still grossly under represented in decision-making and leadership positions in local churches throughout the continent." The fourth and final part of the volume, arguably the most important, looks to the future. Here the authors put flesh on the expression, "the assembly has ended, but the Synod has begun."Laurenti Magesa sets the tone: "whoever you are, wherever you may be, initiate, insist on, and sustain dialogue about the implementation of the Synod. In dialogue lies the hope that the whole process has not, and will not, be in vain." Bernadette Mbuy-Beya outlines a new heaven and a new earth in her contribution on "Women in the Churches in Africa." Renato Kizito Sesana in a chapter on mass media writes on how the faithful followers of Christ need to look on their work "not simply as transmission of information, but as evangelization of the new culture emerging in Africa." The contribution entitled "The Synod of Hope at a Time of Crisis in Africa" written by John Mary Waliggo identifies ten topics which show that the African church is moving forward. Peter K. Sarpong wraps up the forth part of the book with a look at some of the work that needs to be done in the African Church. The appendix has the apostolic exhortation "The Church in Africa."
The book is an important one for those in the English-speaking world interested in this continent. Unfortunately, like many books published by Orbis, there is no subject index at the end of the volume. Attentive readers will note the singular distinction achieved by New People Media Centre in Nairobi, Kenya. Nearly 15% of the articles reproduced in this volume originated from the Centre. No other institute or publication achieved equal prominence. Soon after the Synod, however, the leadership of the Centre was changed. This volume is a snapshot of Africa on the threshold of the third millennium. The continent has a 2000-year relationship with Christ and Christianity, beginning with Simon of Cyrene who carried the cross of Jesus. Changes will inevitably come to the continent and to the Church. Comparison of Africa as it emerges in the next millennium can be measured against this snapshot.
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