Missionaries of Africa
Rome Synod

Seán O'Leary M.Afr.
Auditor

The Synod an Alternative view,

Dear Friends,

A friend of mine (John Ashworth) sent me this. Archbishop Charles
Palmer-Buckle is actually staying in the same house as I (The
Missionaries of Africa's house) and 4 times a day we travel together to
and from the Synod in a specially provided Vatican bus.
While much of the following interview concentrates on church issues,
the wider audience might be interested in his comments on
reconciliation (near the beginning) and on international NGOs vis a
vis African culture (near the end). I also include an intervention
which first mentions the idea of a council of "Peace Elders" (2,
below).

1. Ghanaian archbishop says church has failed Africa

Instead of synod of bishops, why not a 'pastoral congress of the
universal church'?

Oct. 14, 2009
John L. Allen Jr., National Catholic Reporter (USA)
http://ncronline.org/news/vatican/ghanaian-archbishop-says-church-has-failed-africa

Rome

Here's an exercise to try sometime: Find any random cross-section of
twenty people who know something about Catholicism in Africa, and ask
them to tick off five names of the most impressive African bishops
they know. The odds are fairly good that the name of Archbishop
Charles ("Call me Charlie") Palmer-Buckle of Accra, Ghana, will
surface with some frequency.

Palmer-Buckle, 59, is taking part in the Synod for Africa as a papal
appointment. A leader in peace efforts in Ghana and a veteran of the
international Catholic scene through his work with groups such as
Caritas Internationalis and Catholic Relief Services, Palmer-Buckle is
widely considered to be among the heavyweights of his generation in
the African hierarchy.

He sat down for an interview with NCR on Wednesday, over lunch in a
restaurant near the Vatican. Palmer-Buckle is known for both candor
and good humor, and both were on display as the conversation ranged
across a wide range of topics: women in the church, tribalism in the
appointment of African bishops, the surprisingly ferocious talk within
the synod about a perceived "assault" on the family in Africa from
Western NGOs (including Palmer-Buckle's claim that faulty condoms are
being dumped on Africa), and the strong spirit of self-criticism
percolating among the African bishops.

On that score, Palmer-Buckle pulls no punches; looking at an Africa in
which practicing Catholics are often as guilty of corruption and
violence as everybody else, he says simply, "We have failed."

Palmer-Buckle also put an intriguing proposal on the table: Instead of
a synod of bishops, why not hold a "pastoral congress of the universal
church," in which laity, especially women, would be full participants?

The following is a transcript of the conversation.

Can you list what's struck you as the big ideas from the synod so far?

I would say we are touching the very sore spot of Africa, which is its
need for reconciliation. It's going to be the agenda for the next
number of years in Africa. It's already begun. I myself was involved
in Caritas, where we started talking about reconciliation in Africa as
far back as 1996-97. It's now been taken up on the global level, with
a special focus on Africa. I can see that it's going to be one of the
apostolates in which the church will have to be involved.
Reconciliation, in this sense, goes beyond the work for justice that
the church is already doing.

First of all, that reconciliation has to be individual, personal. How
can I feel good about myself, in spite of myself, all the mistakes and
all the rest of it? Then comes reconciliation not just as an
individual, but as an African, accepting myself and my culture for
what it is. What are the lights and the shadows? Our people need
self-esteem and self-dignity, to know that they have something to
contribute. I have to feel good not only in my skin, but where I come
from, I need to experience all that as richness. Of course, we also
have to admit what we have as weaknesses.

The next stage is to move onto the people with whom we live, who are
divided by so many things, and learn how we can bring about unity,
because there's strength in unity. That is going to be the most
important thing … more reconciliation even than justice.

Have you heard anything concrete by way of a new strategy or method to
promote reconciliation?

Probably one of the more interesting things I heard came when one of
the presenters said that a lot of the African bishops have had
experience bringing about reconciliation, either in their diocese or
in their country. Can we not create synergy, with a ‘Council of
Elders' who would be ready and available to bring their experience to
bear wherever there is a crisis?

It would be modeled on the group of elders in South Africa founded by
Desmond Tutu and Nelson Mandela?

Exactly, yes. That's one of the ideas I found very enriching. I myself
had the opportunity of sitting in Ghana on the National Reconciliation
Commission, which was two and a half years of hard work. There was a
lot of research into the causes of disaffection and division,
including social difficulties, tribalism, all of which is exacerbated
by politics and politicians. The question of how to help people get
beyond that is now the most important thing.

Your point is that there's a wealth of experience among the bishops
themselves that could be pooled and made available in a more
deliberate way?

Yes, that's it.

Yesterday Cardinal [Peter] Turkson [of Ghana] said that the synod
fathers "have heard the cry of women." What does that mean?

I must say that it's coming through even more strongly in the small
groups. In the first place, this is a synod of bishops, and one has to
admit that by its very nature, it has excluded not only women but
laity in general. So the lay people who have been invited are now
beginning to make an impact, and they would love to be a part of the
synod. I'd like to believe that if Rome would evaluate the
contribution of the auditors, the lay men and women and the rest, we
might probably move from a synod of bishops into something more like a
pastoral congress of the universal church.

In which laity would be full participants?

In the Code of Canon Law, where it's a pastoral congress, normally all
categories of the church will have to take part. As long as it remains
a synod of bishops, let's put it this way – the rules and the
regulations limit not just the contributions of laity, but even the
priests. I believe the cry of women is actually the cry of the laity
as a whole.

Of course, what most speakers have been talking about isn't just a
greater role for women in the synod, but in the church and in society.

They're asking something that's very, very relevant and right-on. I'm
asking myself how we're going to implement that.

Good, because I was just about to put that very question to you.

Definitely, women constitute about 55 to 60 percent of African
society. They constitute about 70 to 75 percent of the church, the
people who actually show up and are there. Yet when it comes to the
leadership, they are a negligible minority. How are we going to take
them on board?

In the United States today, 25 percent of diocesan chancellors are
women. Are there any women who hold that job in Africa?

African society has always been very, very patriarchal. Just look at
politics in Ghana. In our last parliament, out of 230
parliamentarians, I think fifteen or so were women. In this current
dispensation, it's less than ten. Why is it that they won't let women
into power? It's because that system of patriarchy is still not open
to the idea of complementarity. It hasn't been brought into the
ordinary ways of life, nor, in many ways, into the church.

So there aren't any female diocesan chancellors in Africa?

No, not that I'm aware of.

Might that be one option to consider?

Yes, I think we have to.

Another idea that's come up is creating women's affairs offices in
dioceses. Does that strike you as helpful?

In the government in Ghana, on the political scene, there's a ministry
for women's affairs. Why not do it in the church? It's very relevant.
We have been a bit oblivious to the role of women by thinking in the
church that the religious sisters took it up, but in reality the
religious sisters were only there to do auxiliary services.

That was Sr. Harry's point in the synod, that they want to do more
than just cook and clean.

Exactly.

Her idea was that women religious ought to be members of church bodies
such as parish councils. Do you agree?

Canon law stipulates that a parish council must be representative, so
there's nothing against their being on them. If there's something
that's blocked it, it's a male mentality that has kept women out.

I just finished a diocesan synod in Accra, and we made sure that every
parish was represented by two people: one had to be male, the other
female. When we had another meeting to discuss the synod findings, I
insisted each parish have three delegates: one male, one female, one a
young person. There were about 200 delegates at the synod, and about
45 percent of the people who attended were women. Of that 45 percent,
quite a lot of them were very young women.

[The need to hear women] is a fact from which we can't run away. The
only thing is how to make it effective, not just as decorative. People
say we want to be there, we want to be represented, but the tendency
is to bring them in just as choreography. That's not it. Bring them
because they're qualified, because they have something to contribute.

That's one of the things I'm finding difficult, even among the
religious. I told the religious when I went to my first diocese, in
Koforidua, that I was not going employ them simply because I must
employ sisters. I would hire them because they're qualified. I didn't
want them to come to wash the dishes or the altar cloths. I want to
employ you in my office, but if I'm going to do that, you must be
qualified. If I'm going to hire you to be in charge of religious
education, you must be qualified, and I'm going to pay you a good
salary for it. Initially, some of the sisters thought I was trying to
get rid of them. Some of them had been washing clothes or taking care
of altars of teaching catechism just because they were nuns. I told
them, no, I want you to have the qualifications.

After about three or four years, some of the sisters woke up to the
fact that we need qualifications, we need on-going formation, we need
to go and study. So, I started to send some of them to go and study,
which gave them self-esteem and dignity. When they came back and
offered their service, they were doing so because they were qualified,
not just because the bishop put them there. They could come up and
say, ‘My Lord bishop, this-and-that is what we have seen,
this-and-that is what must be changed.' Now, the person in charge of
education is a sister, because she's a qualified teacher. The person
in charge of my finances, the second-in-command, was a sister, because
she's a qualified person. I didn't just take them on because they're
women. I don't believe in constituent assembly representation. I
believe in finding professional qualified people.

For many bishops, they're asking themselves [about empowering women],
how to do it? I would say, train them, in ways consistent with their
background and interests, and then you can use them over a period of
time. One problem with the religious, and this is a complaint from a
number of bishops, is that you train them with the idea of getting
five years of service. After two years, their superior comes to you
and says, we need them. Then you ask, why waste my money training
these people? We want to say, look, sisters, I'm going to give you
training and you will work for me for five years. After that, you move
on and let somebody else come in. That's the attitude: train them and
let them be of service.

When it comes to professional work, such as finances and
administration, they were very many lay women who are already well
trained and very competent. If we can pay their salaries, let us use
them.

Speaking of sending religious women abroad for training, Cardinal
Turkson mentioned yesterday that at times those experiences haven't
worked out very well because some of the religious women stayed abroad
and "ran into problems." What do you think he had in mind?

To be honest with you, my experience has been more with priests who
don't come back than with sisters. I'm more familiar with that. There
are a few cases of sisters sent overseas who left religious life,
because they went into environments where the emphasis was strongly on
emancipation and feminist movements and so on, and they imbibed so
much of it that they didn't continue in religious life. Those,
however, are exceptions. I'm more worried about priests who stay away,
because it's easier for them than for sisters. It's frankly easier for
a priest, after his training, to find a better place to earn a living
and stay abroad.

You don't hesitate to send sisters abroad?

It's only now that I'm in charge of a diocese that has a religious
congregation of sisters, who are under my authority. I decide,
together with their superiors, where they are going to go and what
they are going to do. The truth is that they decide, and I normally
give my consent to it. I would say that I don't see any difficulty,
because they're already made good arrangements. They have sisters who
can go three years, four years, and come back. We're working hand in
hand. They're in New York, also Brooklyn, a few of them are in Osh
Kosh, Wisconsin, and some of them were in New Orleans when Hurricane
Katrina hit.

Ethnicity has come up a great deal, including ethnic divisions inside
the church. Some bishops have talked about problems that can occur
when a bishop is appointed from outside the dominant ethnic group in a
given diocese, including resistance from his own priests. How common
is that?

I would say that we began talking about inculturation, which then
became ‘Africanization.' Now, the concept of ‘Africanization' has
descended into a certain form of tribalization. It's a problem.

You mean certain groups feel, ‘the bishop should be one of ours.'

Exactly. It comes from the fact that people haven't really understood
the ecclesial nature of the church, the Catholic nature of the church.
They easily bring the social context, the social underpinnings, into
the church. There's an awareness, that's positive in my opinion, about
a renaissance in African cultures and African awareness. But now it's
running the risk of becoming a kind of Balkanization within the
church, which is quite dangerous.

What are you doing about it?

When I look at the church in Ghana, we have now reached a state where
we are nominating a generation of bishops that are not necessarily
from the particular tribe of their area.

How are they being received?

One or two little difficulties here and there. For instance, I'll use
myself as an example. My father was Ga, and that's the indigenous
tribe localized in Accra. My mother is from Nzema country, near the
Ivory Coast border, on the coast. Even though I was a priest in Accra
before I became a bishop in Koforidua, which is part of Accra, when I
was being transferred to become the Metropolitan Archbishop of Accra,
some people wanted to say that I was not a Ga, and they didn't want a
Fanti … they thought I came from my mother's tribe. Whoever did that
obviously did not know my ancestry, but this is to tell you that it's
there. Whether it came from the church, or from political influence on
the church, is another thing that we have to find out.

Is there an informal policy about the nomination of bishops from
outside the dominant ethnic group?

I believe there's no written policy. The nuncio doesn't actually make
the appointments, because he relies on what the bishops give him. We
all, in the name of ‘Africanization' and ‘inculturation,' veered too
far in the direction of ethnic preference without thinking of the
consequences. It's only now we're beginning to realize that using that
as a yardstick is certainly against the idea of being a ‘catholic'
church.

Is the pendulum today swinging toward naming bishops from outside the
dominant ethnic group?

The policy should be to find the best guy, period. We bishops have a
duty to start educating our priests and laity to know that we must
transcend the confines of ethnicity in the choice of leadership. It
has to be the guy who's best qualified, and we shouldn't see it
through a tribal lens.

Some say that the hold of tribalism is weaker on younger Africans,
especially those who live in cities.

I think that's normal. The young people are more exposed, they've
travelled more, they're not trapped in their own little corner. They
tend to be a little more cosmopolitan than the generation before. But
very often, they're misused by the older generation, especially to
cause violence. They're the ones who are incited by the older
generation to go and fight because this guy's from our tribe and that
guy's from our tribe. They're doing it without having stopped to think
seriously about why they should be involved.

There's been considerable talk about the family. Several bishops have
described an insidious Western assault, linking it to NGOs. How much
reality is there to that? Is there really a Western campaign to
corrupt African values?

We don't only suspect that there is a campaign, we think it's
deliberate. It's not necessarily ‘Western,' but it's coming from the
West, from a particular lobby that sees African values on the family
to be a danger to what's called the ‘new global ethic,' which is being
propounded by the UN, by the World Bank, by the IMF, and even by the
European Union.

By a ‘global ethic,' you mean a liberal social agenda … pro-abortion,
pro-gay, etc.?

That is the new global ethic that's being talked about. Think about
countries not being admitted to the European Union because they have
not put into their constitution acceptance of gay unions as equal to
marriage. That tells you there's something wrong. When you hear that
Belgium decided to talk in parliament about the pope's comments on
condoms [during his March trip to Africa], is that an issue for
parliament? Can you imagine? Where is freedom of speech, of religious,
of association? The pope is free to express his opinion. Why should a
parliament make that a government issue? It's difficult for me not to
believe that there's an agenda.

In Ghana, on the ground, do you see NGOs carrying this agenda forward?

Sure, yes. They're not only trying to influence parliament, but
they're out there corrupting the young. I know of NGOs that are not
only supplying condoms, they're also supplying lubricants for boys who
want to engage in homosexual relations. I know it. They're handing
them out, for free. I know workers for NGOs who hang around with boys
in order to introduce them to homosexual relationships. In those
cases, I don't want to believe it's the NGO's agenda, but the workers
are letting their own tendencies go in as a normal thing to be
accepted.

The idea is ‘I'm okay, you're okay,' and they are pumping it down the
throats of our people. For our people, with all due respect, the idea
a lot of the time is that anything coming from Europe and America is
better than what we have. There was a young girl working with an NGO
who came to me and said, ‘Archbishop, the church must speak out
against these things. I work at this NGO and they ask us to go out
there and supply condoms, lubricants, and the rest of it. When we ask
them why, they tell us it's none of our business.' What's happening is
against our culture, and nobody will convince me that there isn't a
deliberate agenda.

What's the solution?

I am waiting for the synod to come to two conclusions. First, we need
serious advocacy. We need to target those NGOs and those particular
individuals, and tell whoever brought them in there that they're
persona non grata. We must be ready to give proofs. I had a case of a
guy who was doing things totally contrary to the teaching of the
church, and he actually worked for a Catholic group. I told the other
bishops, we have to move this guy out.

There's an overwhelming danger, especially because of the current
vulnerability of our youth. They're supposed to be the ones who
tomorrow will hold the flag of the family. Most of the young people
are so vulnerable to these NGOs and what they are propounding. They
want jobs, they want security, some of them want to travel out, some
of them want to be identified with modern culture and the rest.
They're the most gullible, and they're the ones who are to become the
future of the African family. The risk is that they will have no
values to uphold.

Polls show that in most African nations, the opposition to things like
abortion and gay marriage is overwhelming. Is it possible that some of
the talk of the influence of Western NGOs exaggerated?

To cry wolf, maybe you've got to exaggerate a bit to get people's
attention. But there's no smoke without fire, and there's a fire.
We've got to worry about that fire.

What would be the motive for these groups to try to subvert
traditional African values?

This is where we believe the Western world has adopted the idea, ‘I'm
okay, you're okay.' Ironically, anything that challenges that idea
isn't okay and must be battled. It not only must be battled, but
extirpated.

I can't help but look at the fact that the pope comes to Africa and he
talks about condoms as an issue. In the Catholic church, we offer
three methods to help solve this problem of AIDS in Africa: "A",
abstain; "B", be faithful; "C", chastity, which is in consonance with
traditional African values. Those Planned Parenthood people, they're
only talking about condoms. By the way, they know full well that the
condoms devoted to Africa are sub-standard.

Many African bishops say that … how do you know the condoms are
sub-standard?

I'm ready to give you proof.

It's not just urban legend?

I know it for a fact. The condoms they bring are sub-standard, and
there's no quality control. Some of these companies, Durex and the
rest, are benefactors of groups such as the Planned Parenthood
Federation. They don't check [these condoms], it's all for free, and
they just bring it to Africa. The environmental conditions in Africa
are such that those latex forms that the use in no time go rotten, or
they have expired.

Because they sit on the docks too long?

Exactly, and people don't even know whether they have expired. In the
final analysis, they're doing more harm than good.

Of course, a cynic might say you're supposed to be against using
condoms under any circumstances. Isn't it a bit ironic for a Catholic
bishop to complain that the condoms arriving in Africa aren't good
enough?

Because we're concerned about our people. We're not worried about the
condoms, we're worried about the people. It's injurious to the people.

Finally, let's talk about governance. Complaints about corruption,
bribery, and so on, have come up a lot. Church leaders have been
talking about those things for an awfully long time, without much
apparent success. What makes you think this synod will change that
track record?

I don't think we're going to change the track record yet. I think we
are becoming aware of the fact that as a church, our Catholics have
not been adequately prepared to be able to make choices in favor of
Christ. Every country has said that wherever there was corruption, our
Catholics were among the corrupt. Wherever there was civil war, our
Catholics were among those who were instigating the violence. So, the
church feels we have failed. We've not had a real social impact. I
think we're going to go away from here concerned that we need to do
more about our own faithful, our Catholics, particularly our Catholic
politicians. We need to accompany them, particularly in terms of the
church's social teaching.

You think the problem is that political leaders don't know the
church's social teaching? At least at a rudimentary level, it's hard
to imagine any African president doesn't know that the church is
against taking bribes – which would suggest the problem isn't really
with a lack of information, wouldn't it?

I think we're trying to look more into ourselves, where we have
failed, than the leaders themselves. We as a church should know
better.

Knowledge must not remain in the head, it must descend into the heart
and it must move the limbs. I would say we're going to leave here
convinced that we have evangelized them in the head, but we have not
touched the heart. Christianity has not become a real way of life,
it's always remained an intellectual choice of some sort. It's not on
the intellectual level that we have been found wanting. We've been
found wanting in the heart. The theme that Jesus Christ is our
reconciliation, our justice and our peace, means that we will have to
make sure that our Christians themselves are truly reconciled, and go
out to bring about the message of Christ.

We as a church are going to go away from here more with work on our
hands, than blaming others. We're not going to blame them. We're
agreed that we have a lot more homework to do.

If the priority is formation, does that mean putting more emphasis on
shaping good families, parishes, schools, and so on, and not so much
on political activism and social justice advocacy?

I wouldn't make it an either/or. I would make it a both/and. I believe
strongly that we need to lay better foundations, but the foundations
must already be acting upon the situation before it gets out of hand.
We're going to do our lobbying ourselves, our prophetic role of
talking about what's wrong, we're going to go see the politicians and
see where we can influence what's left. At the same time, we have to
prepare people so that in the future the people themselves can be the
ones to take decisions and take up that prophetic role.

You would agree that teaching a Catholic to pray the rosary, or to
adore the Eucharist, to be a good parent and a good spouse, is itself
a service to social justice?

It sure is. For example, it's a chance to teach them that if you go to
the Holy Eucharist, and you take the body and the blood of Christ,
that blood of Christ running in your veins should influence your
choice when it comes to ethnicity. It should influence a general
brotherhood, because that blood is thicker than tribal blood.

In the end, you're optimistic about the synod?

I was very happy to experience what would formally be called ecclesial
communion and solidarity. There are bishops from the United States,
from Latin America, from Australia, from Asia and Europe, and from
other parts of the world. All of them have made it clear that we have
the same problems, to different degrees, and therefore we must work
together.

All of them made it clear that we're here to listen to what are the
real problems on the ground, so that when we approach them, they know
why we're asking for this or for that. We're not just interested in
‘solidarity' in the sense of money and support, but also, for
instance, lobbying. We might ask the American bishops to approach an
American mining firm that's causing mayhem in Ghana. We might ask the
Australian bishops to talk to an Australian firm that's causing an
ecological disaster in Ghana. It's more meaningful because they know
it, they've heard it. I believe that when we leave here, this
ecclesial solidarity will be moved onto a more activist plane, a
lobbying kind of plane.

Apart from that, most of the bishops are amazed at the vitality of the
African church, the vocations that are coming up and so forth. What we
would say is, why don't you help us train the priests and you can have
some of them to take care of your parishes if you don't have
seminarians? I'm looking at the case where we have seminaries in
Ghana, and sometimes our professors are less qualified. Europe has
them, American has them – so give us professors, take care of their
financial commitments and so on. Then we can train our priests, and
some of them can come and work for you. Or, maybe we can move to
another plane where we can send some of our seminarians to Germany, to
Ireland, to England, to America … train them, keep some, and send the
rest back to us.

Keep ten percent, and we'll take the rest?

My hope is that it will get to a point where there is real communion
and solidarity. For me, this is a moment of kairos, it's a moment of
grace. I'm not here only worried about the woes of Africa. This synod
gives me the impression of a family that sits to look at their teenage
son or daughter, who is full of idealism, creativity, energy … full of
life. But if we do not help this child to grow and mature properly,
this energy can become destructive. They're here to help us to look at
what we have as potential, and how to direct that potential for the
greater good, not only of Africa but the entire church. I see the
problems more as challenges, as opportunities for the whole church. I
think each of the regional synods will take on a more universal
character, I see it coming. … I'm an inveterate optimist.

* * *

2. Synod intervention by Rev. Fr. Seán O’LEARY, M.Afr., Director of
“Denis Hurley Peace Institute” (SOUTH AFRICA)

The Denis Hurley Peace Institute (DHPI) was set up by the Southern
African Catholic Bishops' Conference (SACBC) to share with others the
tragic story of South Africa's past, a past that was based on
constitutionalised racism; the miracle of the transition that ushered
in the dawn of a true democracy and the arduous challenges of
construction, reconstruction and reconciliation, which is at the very
heart of the work of the Church in South Africa today.

Experience has shown us that the enormous impact the Catholic Church
has on the continent is rarely felt in conflict situations. The
Church's attempts at conflict intervention remain fragmented. We need
to support more Bishops and dioceses at the coal-face of conflict. In
this very room there is a wealth of experience of people from conflict
areas that have kept the hearts of their people alive with hope, over
long years, in situations of near despair. These are our unsung
heroes!

The suggestion the Southern African Catholic Bishop Conference makes
is to identify key people (Bishops, Clergy, Religious and Lay-People)
who would be trained to intervene in peace monitoring, peace
negotiations and sustaining fragile peace structures.

At the outbreak of any one conflict or potential conflict, two or
three of these trained people would be invited to intervene in the
country in question, primarily to support the local Church on the
ground.

The idea would always be to support the local Church.

This would become our very own group of 'Peace Elders' and would be
established as a direct consequence of this august Assembly.

Not wanting to give the Pontifical Commission for Justice and Peace
more work, but I would see them as the most competent authority in the
Church to organize such an initiative.

Seán O'Leary
seanol@fastmail.fm