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Illegal logging in Africa and its security implications.

Saturday, 1 October 2022 8:00

Illegal logging is a growing feature of transnational organized crime in Africa, often facilitated by the collusion of senior officials, with far-reaching security and environmental implications
for the countries affected.

African countries are estimated to lose $17 billion to illegal logging each year. This is part of a global market with an economic value of $30 to $150 billion. The net profit from the illegal charcoal trade alone in Africa is estimated to be as much as $9 billion, “compared to the [$]2.65 billion worth of street value heroin and cocaine in the region.”
High-value timber species are in immense global demand, with the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) reporting that Africa’s share of rosewood exports to China rose from 40 percent in 2008 to 90 percent in 2018.

Illegal logging also amplifies the effects of climate change by worsening deforestation and reducing biodiversity. This is especially apparent in the Congo Basin and peatlands, comprising one of the world’s largest carbon sinks. If disturbed, it could release the equivalent of 20 years of U.S. fossil fuel emissions.

Timber trafficking has also fueled security threats from organized criminal groups and violent extremist organizations. Trafficking networks based in Tanzania and the Democratic Republic of the Congo linked to the Ahlu-Sunnah Wa-Jama and other militant groups in Mozambique, for example, were making an estimated $2 million per month from illegal logging in 2019.

Illegal logging also accelerates corruption. In the Republic of the Congo, national legislation limits the export of certain rare hardwoods to just 15 percent of a logging company’s annual production. However, collusion between political and business actors has led to the rule often being flouted. Not only does this cost Congolese citizens the benefits of their natural resource wealth, the degradation of the forest also deprives local communities of a sustainable source for their economic livelihoods.

Illegal logging is part of a vicious cycle of opaque governance, exploitation, and insecurity that privileges the profit-seeking of select state officials and foreign actors. These patterns reduce the legitimacy of the government overall, further contributing to instability and violence.

Illegal logging is most prevalent in the tropical rainforests of Africa, where demand by foreign actors for rare hardwoods has dramatically increased. The most significant driver of illegal logging in Africa is the Chinese market for teak, redwood, and mahogany. China’s trade with West African countries for high-quality hardwood soared between 1995 and 2010. After exhausting that market, demand extended to Central and East Africa, and countries like Cameroon, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, and the Republic of the Congo became major exporters.
Currently, Uganda is a transit hub for approximately 80 percent of illegal timber from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) that passes through East Africa.

Illegal logging in Africa happens through both small-scale and commercial operations. The actors involved correspond to the four types of organized criminal actors tracked in the ENACT Organized Crime Index: criminal networks, state-embedded actors, foreign actors, and “mafia style groups” with well-known organizational identities and coercive control over territory.

Criminal networks are often aided and abetted by high-level state actors who use their positions to facilitate the illicit timber trade.
Criminal networks may, for example, secure control of and profits from the artisanal trade by purchasing commercial concessions through their government connections, acquiring fake permits, or reusing
legitimate permits.

Organized criminal activity can happen at any stage of the supply chain, during extraction, milling, transportation, marketing, or profit laundering. Artisanal or small-scale loggers are typically the extractors of high-value wood that supply trafficking groups, as their operations are more informal and have lighter regulations and oversight than those for commercial loggers.
Porous borders help traffickers to launder illegal timber across borders where they falsely declare the tree species to pass it off as legal.

Political elites collude with foreign actors, enabling illegal logging, and using the international financial system to move the profits they make out of their countries and into private bank accounts. This contributes to the public losing out on an estimated $88 billion in illicit financial flows that leave the African continent yearly.

Why Illegal Logging Matters for Security
First, the illicit timber trade can fuel conflict and instability by providing resources for violent actors and spreading corruption. During the civil war in Liberia, timber trafficking was one of warlord Charles Taylor’s prime means of financing. It also facilitated Taylor’s support to the Revolutionary United Front in neighboring Sierra Leone.

When the Seleka rebel coalition took over in Central African Republic (CAR) in 2013-14, international timber traders paid them at least 3.4 million euros in protection fees to continue their harvesting and exporting operations. This reinforced the rebels’ presence and also facilitated arms trafficking. After the Seleka lost power, Anti-Balaka militias were also reportedly paid to provide protection.

In the DRC, the Allied Democratic Forces and several other militant groups in the east have been involved in the illegal timber trade, which serves as a conflict financing mechanism.

In Senegal, where there has been a low-level insurgency since 1982, the Movement of Democratic Forces of Casamance (MFDC) has sustained its operations almost entirely through profits from illicit logging of rosewood. The Gambia’s former dictator, Yahya Jammeh, used parastatal companies to illegally traffic timber from both the Casamance and Guinea-Bissau, supporting an insurgency in the former and bolstering political allies in the latter.

Second, government corruption and illegal logging are mutually reinforcing. Given that logging involves heavy equipment and networks of forest roads, illegal logging relies on high-level government collusion to persist. Illicit financial flows from timber trafficking, in turn, further entrench these senior officials as well as provide ongoing incentives to abuse public power for private gain. The illicit flows represent lost tax revenue that could have been used for public services. This creates a vicious cycle that threatens the rule of law and fosters mistrust between governments and citizens.

Illegal logging, therefore, should be considered both an outcome and driver of government corruption. For example, in Equatorial Guinea, Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mangue, son of President Obiang, profited immensely from the transport and export of rare hardwoods. As the Minister of Agriculture and Forestry, he not only sold some of his country’s forests to private companies but also used a shell company linked to the ministry to charge fees for processing, loading, and transporting timber.

In Guinea-Bissau in 2013, crackdowns on security sector officials involved in drug trafficking—including the head of the armed forces and the navy chief—led other military officials who had been trafficking narcotics to deal in timber instead. In 2019, Gabon’s Vice President and Minister of Forestry were part of a rosewood trafficking scandal that allegedly led to their sacking.

In 2021, the Zambian Anti-Corruption Commission seized 47 trucks illegally laden with rosewood bound for the Namibian and Zimbabwean borders. This seizure is just one of the latest high-profile instances of illegal logging that has allegedly been facilitated by certain ministers and family members of former President Edgar Lungu.

Third, illegal logging diminishes livelihood opportunities for ordinary citizens. For instance, illegal logging contributes to deforestation, which exposes communities to environmental degradation and economic hardship. Without viable legal options to earn a living, communities may face stronger incentives to engage in illegal logging. Furthermore, the clandestine nature of illegal logging operations at the local level can increase vulnerability to human trafficking, systems of debt bondage, sexual exploitation, and child labor. Excerpts – (Photo: 123rf.com)

C. Browne, Catherine Lena Kelly, and Carl Pilgram
Africa Centre for Strategic Studies.

Ancient methods.

Saturday, 1 October 2022 8:00

Madj lights the flashlight on his head, tying hooks and lures to the ends of the lines. The space on board is narrow and the two fishermen work seated, to avoid dangerous jolts to the hull.

Crouching on the opposite sides of the dugout, one facing the other, the two men look at each other in silence and, in a dance of ancient gestures, they slide lines tightly between their fingers into the water. Rhythmically they raise and lower first one arm and then the other, making the lines crawl along the edges of the hull, which follows their swing. Wide grooves left on the sides of the boat testify to countless fishing trips like tonight’s.
Despite the handfuls of sand thrown overboard, another technique for attracting predators from the deep sea, the first abundant hour of fishing brings no prey. “Sometimes you don’t have time to throw the sand as they begin to bite. Others, on the other hand, spend hours without taking anything. Fishing is like that”.

“It seems like a lucky evening!”, says Madj

Madj, to keep up the morale of the crew, sings songs in Wolof. Bouba nervously lights yet another cigarette, starting to heat the embers for coffee on an improvised stove, made from an old, moped tyre and a perforated aluminium plate. The breeze blows crackling sparks of coal onto the surface of the sea. Even on the pirogues around, the fires of the improvised grills gradually light up.
Suddenly the young captain stands up, dangerously rocking the boat. In the rush to haul it aboard, the first squid escapes his grasp, splashing ink in his face. But it is only the prelude to an hour of abundant fishing, with several large squid (and a cuttlefish) caught one after the other.
The same good luck that night was also enjoyed by the other boats anchored in this bay, with young fishermen (some alone, others in pairs) who celebrate by sharing coffee, cigarettes, and laughter with the nearby pirogues. “It seems like a lucky evening!”, Madj rejoices, without stopping to bring to the surface fish which, before being thrown at his feet, twist on the hooks spraying black slime.

Tomorrow is another day
The night is far gone, and the rising wind penetrates under the numerous layers of clothes of the two fishermen, who pull the wax suits out of their backpacks. Madj tries to rest, perched in the bow on the wet top of the anchor, while his companion alternates teapots of coffee with toasted cuttlefish tentacles. On the horizon, moved by the rolling waves, persistent cold lights burst into the dark: “Those are the foreign fishing boats”, comments Madj, who is unable to sleep.

Upon returning to the port, Madj looks at the sun that returns to peep out behind the buildings of Dakar.

“We must be on our guard because if they arrive at full speed, they do not see us from up there and risk ramming us, as has already happened to many other boats”. Fortunately, the large boats flying European and Asian flags remain offshore tonight, without disturbing the fishing for the pirogues, which continues, with unusual success, until dawn.
Upon returning to the port, Madj looks at the sun that returns to peep out behind the buildings of Dakar, puffing wearily and pulling on a woollen hat. The tense features of his face break into a smile only when his bare feet and the bucket full of squid touch the fresh sand of the shore. All that remains for this exhausted man is to entrust the catch to the sellers of the Soumbédioune market, return home, wash, smoke, and rest for a few hours, before the next trip to sea. (Photos: Michele Cattani)

Andrea de Georgio

Music. Lido Pimienta. To the Rhythm of Cumbia.

Saturday, 1 October 2022 8:00

Mention Colombia and one immediately thinks of cumbia: a rhythm, an atmosphere, a dance, a way of singing, a synthesis
of the essence of a people.

A people still struggling to find a balance and social pacification between modernist and traditionalist thrusts, between terrorist regurgitations, the ever-untamed violence of drug traffickers and a complex interracial coexistence, since the population is composed largely of whites and mestizos (85%), to which, however, must be added blacks and mulattoes (10%) and Amerindians (5%).
A difficult and bloody land, where there are those who try with difficulty to switch from the cultivation of coca to that of coffee, but who have to clash almost every day with an underworld obviously striving to maintain their power and to deal with situations of exploitation from which it is difficult to get free.

CC BY-SA 4.0/ProtoplasmaKid

This dualism between glimmers of light and the dark abyss is the main nourishment of Lido Maria Pimienta Paz, one of the emerging artists of the ‘new’ Colombia, even though she migrated to Canada at a very young age. Lido was born in 1986 in Baranquilla, a Colombian metropolis of nearly two million inhabitants, a stone’s throw from the Caribbean Atlantic. She did not have an easy childhood, complicated by the death of her father when she was only six years old. She migrated to Toronto but maintained ties with her country and it was there that she began to be noticed on the world-music circuits.
In fact, her voice and her expressiveness do not have much that is Western; on the contrary, her voice – at once persuasive, penetrating and rich in nuances – rather recalls the Afro-Caribbean tradition.

CC BY-SA 4.0/ Lawnya Vawnya

Moreover, she proudly claims her roots in the Wayuu, an indigenous people who have always settled in the area between Colombia and Venezuela.
Lido Pimienta debuted in 2010 with the album Color, and her latest album in 2020, Miss Colombia, from Anti Records, is establishing her as one of the most relevant talents in contemporary ethno-music. In this new adventure in the recording studio, Lido sings about her complex relationship with the motherland and with her origins, but also the female condition and the pain that it causes her to see her own country wounded by racism, still anchored to patriarchal and male chauvinists, and impoverished by corruption.
A frustrated and angry love overflows from her lyrics, while the music does not renounce references to the eternal cumbia, the inalienable essence of Colombian culture.

CC BY-SA 4.0/ Tsaorin

It should be noted that the record was mostly recorded outdoors: partly in her Canadian home, partly in the evocative setting of San Basilio de Palenque (a village about fifty kilometres from Cartagena), as a symbol of indigenous freedom, since there the first Colombian slave community managed to achieve independence from the Spanish empire in 1661, even before Colombia itself.
Certainly not a casual choice for a woman who has always made freedom, racial pride, and dignity the pivot of her being and her way of expressing herself through music. (Open Photo: Lido Pimienta CC BY 2.0/ Matthew Wordell)

Franz Coriasco

Setting Sail.

Saturday, 1 October 2022 8:00

The sun is about to set behind the houses that, in the distance, appear on the opposite side of the bay from the small port of Soumbédioune, when Madj adjusts his hat and waves to his friend Bouba.

It is the signal to set sail. It is time to load the latest equipment on board and, with a tireless collective movement, slide the pirogue from the beach until it touches the Atlantic Ocean.
Many, like Madj and Bouba, hurry to leave the shore before evening falls. The crossing in the open sea, with its big long waves that lift the fragile wooden boats from below, takes only about ten minutes.

Madj and Bouba circumnavigate the island to reach one of the best squid fishing areas: the bay of the inlet that penetrates the southwestern side of the island.

The ancient engine, with Bouba at the helm and Madj at the bow, coughing over the whistling of the wind and the crying of the seagulls. The spikes of the rugged cliff of Sarpan Island appear before their eyes like the back of a dinosaur lying in the water. The Madeleine Islands are an archipelago made up of two volcanic rock formations, Sarpan and Lougne, which is only a few miles off the west coast of Dakar.
Followed on sight by several other pirogues, Madj and Bouba circumnavigate the island to reach one of the best squid fishing areas: the bay of the inlet that penetrates the southwestern side of the island.

“The colour depends on the moon. When there is a full moon, we put the red LEDs and create a shadowy space” say Madj.

After careful observation of the seabed, Madj drops anchor, trying to predict where the wind will rise from during the night. Meanwhile, Bouba, still aft, fiddles with a 12-volt battery, torches and electric cables. This type of traditional fishing is practised with the help of lamps lowered a few meters deep to attract fry and nocturnal predators, such as squid. “Once upon a time people used to fish with fires lit on boats. I saw it done when I was a child. Today, however, we use coloured Chinese LEDs”, says Madj.
In a matter of minutes, the last lights of the day give way to a disarming darkness. The sounds and glares of nearby Dakar are lost beyond the cliff. Under each canoe shaken by the current, the ocean lights up with blue and green lights. “The colour depends on the moon. When there is a full moon, we put the red LEDs and create a shadowy space”. A surreal atmosphere, accompanied by the powerful cry of flocks of birds perched on the wall of the island. (Photos: Michele Cattani) – (AdG)

Laurenti Magesa. An Ancestor of the Church in Africa and the universal Church.

Saturday, 1 October 2022 8:00

The renowned African theologian Prof. Fr. Laurenti Magesa died on 11 August, in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. “A giant of African Theology.”

He was known as the pioneer of African Theology. Laurenti Cornelli Magesa grappled intelligently and faithfully with African existential contexts. He shared this mission with other African theologians: Jean-Marc Ela of Cameroon, Bénézet Bujo of the Democratic Republic of Congo, Bernardin Muzungu of Rwanda, Charles Nyamiti of Tanzania, and Agbonkhianmeghe E. Orobator of Nigeria. Magesa heard the Christological question of Jesus in the Synoptic Gospels: “And you, who do you say that I am?” (Mk 8:27+; Mt 16:15+; Lk 9:18+) and he felt the need for an intelligent and sincere African response.

In his farewell words at the funeral of Prof. Magesa, Bishop Michael Msonganzila of Musoma diocese to which Rev. Magesa was incardinated, summed up Magesa’s life with the following words: “Magesa kept asking Africans: And you, Africans, who do you say that Jesus is?” Isn’t this the substance of Magesa’s numerous writings? How can we characterize Magesa’s Magna Carta as found in What Is Not Sacred?
And what can I briefly say in a few words about Magesa beyond what his books say about him?
In The Post-Conciliar Church in Africa: No Turning Back the Clock (2016), Magesa examines the reception and rejection of Vatican II (1962-65) in the African Church. He invites his readers to realize that “this Council did not see itself as the end of a process, but rather as a beginning. It opened, not closed, doors – whether doctrinal or disciplinary – for ongoing reflection, for the possibility of ever-improving knowledge and understanding.” Magesa’s robust Ecclesial vision offers a stimulus for African (Catholic) Christians to keep reflecting deeply and implementing the message and treasures of the Council. He invites his reader to grasp “the scope, meaning, and implications of the Council for the Church and people of Africa.”

African Spirituality
In one of his most notable and brilliant writings, What Is Not Sacred? African Spirituality. Prof. Magesa explores “the beauty of the spirituality of African religion and its enduring gift to Christianity as a light, not a shadow.” Magesa pays theological attention to indigenous African Spirituality and Christian Inculturation in Africa and this is his book’s greatest gift. He wrestles intelligently with important theological questions as they pertain to African life, such as the nature of God, revelation, and the meaning of life itself. Some scholars have taken Magesa’s What Is Not Sacred? as the Magna Carta of African Theology. Indeed, he makes it clear that “The African understanding of spirituality can be seen as human participation in the total, universal existence, the whole of human existential experience in the world” (p. 40).
He explains that there is no experience devoid of God’s self-communication, that is devoid of grace. Whatever exists, does so because of God’s grace. No one can live life without the experience of that grace. Here Magesa joins the German Jesuit theologian, Karl Rahner’s concept of “Uncreated Grace.”

Every human experience is an encounter with grace. In this Magna Carta, Magesa awakens Africans and all who read him from their dogmatic slumbers and enlightens them with the understanding of important themes in Africa’s spiritual patrimony. His major concern is to show how underestimating this patrimony “has weakened the impact of the missionary endeavor of evangelization on the continent … He laments the fact that the traditional African spiritual worldview, which should have been the cornerstone in building a Christian edifice, is deeply rooted in the culture of its recipients, was disregarded.” He exposes the treasures of African spirituality and relates them to the supernatural. He invites the African to enter into communion with the empirical world which is transcendental and sacramental.
He describes the different ways in which the traditional understanding of life shapes the attitudes of the African. For Magesa, “there is an inter-connectedness between life and the transcendental that forms the spiritual model of the African mindset.”
Magesa’s pedagogy, obvious in What Is Not Sacred, is to assist the reader to discover or at least to have a sense of what African Spirituality can offer to deepen Christianity rooted in the cultural heritage of Africa. Magesa’ writings demonstrate with clarity that for anything to be considered truly Christian in African Christianity, it should be born and rooted in the African indigenous approach to God and to the message of the Gospel. Any attempt to circumvent this path by using one not born into the African cultural patrimony is doomed to fail. “Other spiritual traditions can inspire but cannot replace the basic shape of African spirituality” (What Is Not Sacred, p. 107).

Tanzania. Two young maasai warriors in traditional dress are standing in the savannah and talking to each other. One holds a ritual horn. 123rf.com

The implications of this Spirituality are tremendous. For Magesa, particular attention to African Spirituality can further the promotion of justice, good governance and interreligious dialogue. Magesa uses the “Ubuntu factor” to stress the quality of relationships between humans and nature, to prioritize tolerance, respect and coexistence in those places where reconciliation is still unattainable. Our mutual dependence and cooperation must promote social inclusion as opposed to “unhealthy competition and obsession with individual accomplishments, which are often attained at the expense of the well-being of others or the environment” (150). What is Not Sacred is Magesa’s enduring legacy. Tolle et lege (take and read), if you desire to have some key glimpses of Magesa’s hopes and joys, pains and anguish in What is not Sacred? African Spirituality.
Of particular note is that some African theologians have equally named his Anatomy of Inculturation: Transforming the Church in Africa (2004) as the Magna Carta of African Theology of Inculturation.

For further insight into Magesa’s academic biography, let me also share, albeit in an illustrative way, his authored books which can inspire present and future readers’ attention. African Religion in a Dialogue Debate: From Intolerance to Coexistence (2010); Rethinking Mission: Evangelization in African in a New Era (2006); Anatomy of Inculturation: Transforming the Church in Africa (2004); Christian Ethics in Africa (2002); Le Catholicisme Africain en mutation: des modèles d’église pour un siècle nouveau (2001); African Religion: The Moral Traditions of Abundant Life (1997), translated in German as Ethik des Lebens: Die afrikanischeKultur der Gemeinschaft; and The Church and Liberation in Africa (1976). Prof. Laurenti Magesa also co-authored others books: How Theology Serves: Reflections on Professor Peter Kanyandago’s Contribution to African Theology. (2021); Democracy and Reconciliation in African Christianity (1999); The Church in African Christianity (1990); Jesus in African Christianity (1989); and African Christian Marriage (1977). What often stands out in his authored and co-authored works, which always focused on Africa, is that Magesa’s study of African Christianity is that “although religion in the African mindset provides solutions to almost everything that concerns human life, Christianity has not been presented and received that way. Inculturation is therefore not an option but a necessity.”
Magesa published over two hundred articles in various peer reviewed academic and popular journals and as a chapter-contributor in books since 1975 to his death on August 11, 2022. Magesa received numerous awards, notably PhD Honoris Causa from DePaul University, Chicago, USA in 2018; US Mission Award as Distinguished African Theologian in 1998; and Xavier Univeristy’s J. Bruegeman Chair Award in 1995.

A man of God
Magesa was not just an erudite author of books. He was a friend to many. He was recognized as a man of God to those who met him. He was a pastor for God’s people. He did not seek self-aggrandizement. He was a self-effacing man with unparalleled humility. He taught me that the true value of things is not found in ostentation, but in letting your work speak for itself. Magesa rejoiced whenever he learned of his students’ small accomplishments. He rejoiced as if they were his own and celebrated them with great joy and happiness. When I returned from Boston, USA after having completed my Doctoral Studies, Laurenti took me to a beautiful place to be at ease and relax. From there we went to Serengeti National Park. He did the same for many others. When I was invited to speak at the United Nations General Assembly Hall, Laurenti edited my speech and offered wise advice. His wisdom shared with me, will remain engraved in the archives of the United Nations.

I invited Laurenti to speak at a conference in Rwanda at which he presented a brilliant paper which will be part of a forthcoming book published by Georgetown University Press (2023). The title of his paper is “Learning from a Tragedy: Toward a New Evangelization after the Genocide in Rwanda.” He stated that for about three months in 1994 – between April and mid-July – a systematic massacre of upwards of 800,000 people, mostly ethnic Tutsis, took place in Rwanda in what has become known universally as the Genocide against Tutsi.
Magesa was clear that there should not be any form of moral equivalence between a civil war and a genocide, as many tend to do when it comes to Rwanda. These are entirely different and should be honestly treated differently. It is globally recognized as well that the Catholic Church at various levels was involved negatively in that drama: in its questionable historical methods of evangelization, which created and cemented unnecessary divisions among the Rwandan people, on the one hand, and during the tragedy itself by abetting the violence in some significant cases on the other. If this scar on the church in Rwanda cannot be wiped away completely, it is necessary to learn from it so that it should not be repeated. Such was the essence of his presentation. He emphasized the necessity of memory in acknowledging guilt and repentance for the role the church inadvertently or knowingly played in the sad narrative of the genocide. Most importantly, he suggested that lessons to be learned from the genocide experience should be a basis for a “new evangelization,” not only in post-genocide Rwanda, but for the wider Church in the African continent and, indeed, throughout the world. Here, he joins other theologians such as Emmanuel Katongole who writes that the ecclesial experience of the genocide in Rwanda is a “mirror” to the universal Church.

The challenge for the church in Rwanda at all levels is to discern what is of God, and to establish practices for evangelization and catechetical approaches that will support justice, foster genuine universal reconciliation and lasting peace. As Pope John Paul II said similar words in Pastores Dabo Vobis, “Today, in particular, the pressing pastoral task of the new evangelization calls for the involvement of the entire People of God, and requires a new fervor, new methods and a new expression for the announcing and witnessing of the Gospel.” For this, a new type of leadership is called for: among other things, it “demands … a fruitful cooperation with the lay faithful, always respecting and fostering the different roles, charisms and ministries present within the ecclesial community.”

His Legacy
In November 2021, it became clear that Laurenti could not be the keynote speaker for a webinar on the Synod on Synodality organized by the Symposium of Episcopal Conference for Africa and Madagascar (SCAM) and the Jesuit Conference of Africa and Madagascar (JCAM). This was because his excruciating cancer. Laurenti suggested my name to the conveners of the webcast and he also called me on his phone and said: “Fr. Marcel, you have to do it and I believe you can carry on this work.” Despite his pain, Laurenti followed my speech and he was the first to congratulate his student. In his final days, he urged me to publish a book about Rwanda which he prefaced and also proposed its title. He did this while he was dying from metastasized pancreatic cancer. The book Risen from the Ashes: Theology as Autobiography in Post-Genocide Rwanda will be available in November 2022. With all this, together with others who share my sentiments because of what Laurenti had done for them, we can safely say that we have lost a father, a brother, a friend, a mentor and a giant of African Theology. Our hope in the Risen Christ is that Laurenti is now interceding for us and that we carry on his legacy which is now left in our hands.

Among many enduring lessons from Laurenti and beyond his scholarship, he taught us that when you know what you are passionate about, few things will be a barrier if you really want to be of service to humanity. He was passionate about Jesus Christ not as an abstract idea, but as a person whose message must be rooted in hearts of Africans. For Laurenti, the place where western Christian structures have failed to tap into African religious values has been in the former’s tendency to see repentance and spiritual transformation as an almost exclusively “personal,” and “inner” endeavor, ignoring the role of the community which, for the African, is pivotal. Social processes of community building, especially across existing divides caused by human wrongdoing, are for the African family very much transformative, as important and as necessary as interior attitudes of repentance.

Additionally, Laurenti knew that he had received much from his scholarly mission, and in return for all he received, he gave generously of himself. He was convinced that, “If you hold on to your life, you lose it, if you give it away, it becomes ever lasting life!” (Mt 16:25). He understood that if we are going to exist, we must give ourselves away. There may be no better way of doing that than spending many years teaching and journeying with students, and forming men and women well for the future Society of Jesus and the Church. He himself did this perfectly.
He gave himself away. He knew his own limitations, but they did not become a barrier. When I accompanied him to Musoma, Tanzania on his last journey, after he retired from Hekima University College, I asked him: “What made you a prolific writer?” He responded. “I am not a great speaker like you, but I hope my writings are my speech.” Two weeks before he died on August 11, 2022, a day after his 76^th birthday, I called him and he was with his brother, Prof. Evaristi Cornelli Magoti and very much at peace. He gave me several bits of wisdom and advice. Before I left for another meeting, he said this: “I conclude with a piece of advice. It is important not to be a burden to yourself as a priest, doing things simply out of duty. This will eventually crush you. But even more important: try not to be a burden to others on account of your own discontents in life.”
In his Tribute to Laurenti Magesa, which was published by The Tablet (August 20-27, 2022), Agbonkhianmeghe E. Orobator could not have been more right. “The belief is strong in many parts of Africa that the status of an ancestor is reserved for people who have made a transformative and enduring contribution of service to their community. By his life of service as a pastor, the depth of his scholarship and the example of his life as a Christian, Magesa now qualifies to join the ranks of ancestors of the Church in Africa and the universal Church.”

Marcel Uwineza, SJ, PhD
Dean, Jesuit School of Theology
Hekima University College
Nairobi, Kenya

Mexico. Missionary Dimension, Taking Off Your Sandals.

Saturday, 1 October 2022 8:00

The diocese of Ciudad Guzmán in the Mexican state of Jalisco has recently celebrated 50 years of its existence. Father Juan Manuel Hurtado López, a Mexican theologian, who spent 17 years in the diocese accompanying the indigenous communities of Tseltal, Tsotsil and Mestizo in southeastern Mexico at the Church of San Cristóbal de Las Casas, presents the missionary dimension of this local church.

Being a Missionary Church means leaving one’s home, one’s security, customs, habits, or ways of doing things and leaving like Abraham for an unknown place, to take another course in life. It means carrying a message that is not one’s own but that of ‘another’ who is the one who speaks, the one who gives the message, that is, Jesus Christ. It is the message of the Good News of the Kingdom. I believe that my experience in a Missionary Church can be described on the basis of five keys.

First key: take off your shoes.
The problem for us mestizos is that we believed we were the centre of culture, of society, of what happens. We think we are always the required reference for doing anything. That just as we do things, so they should be done; this is the norm. We have always walked with the belief that Spanish is the language here in Mexico where things need to be said. Other languages are ‘dialects’, so we think. In fact, this is what most Mexicans say.But there are 65 indigenous languages in Mexico, most of them older than Spanish.
They have their own grammar, syntax, prose, and spelling. They have their own dictionaries, their own myths, and their own narratives. There are living peoples who carry these languages as subjects.

In the case of the Mayan languages, we are talking about a universe of 30 languages in southern Mexico and parts of Central America. And the Maya are one of the top civilizations of humanity that has lasted 1,000 years, from 50 to 1050 of our Era. The Maya have their own spirituality, their own rituals and their own myths. From that stream, they drink and feed to fight for their needs. They have sought God for 30,000 years or more and have expressed Him in various ways. God’s name has also changed. They express it as Heart of Heaven, Heart of Earth, Creator, Buyer and in other ways. We see this theology expressed in the Popol Vuh, in the Mayan Altar, in the planting of candles and in various rites and myths. Entering these peoples and that culture, for me, meant taking off my shoes to understand a little bit the human, spiritual and philosophical journey of their culture and civilization. It was to experience God but in a different way. A key element is the integrated and non-dichotomous nature of their philosophical and theological vision: there is no inside and outside, corporeal and spiritual, sacred and profane. Indeed, the very dimension of time has another connotation: it is not measured in hours. Things last as long as it takes to do them, even if they last many hours: a prayer, solving a problem, an encounter. The mass must not last forty minutes or an hour. It can last 3 to 4 hours if necessary.

The Second key: inculturation
A culture is like the rainbow in which each of its elements finds its meaning, interpretation, and explanation: language, time, person, life, death, God, man and woman, earth, sky and evil.
This requires a lot of listening, a lot of patience, walking with people for years, and learning their language. It requires the attitude of not asking for explanations in advance, first you have to walk with people, with communities, and on the road, the right time will come to ask the question or wait for the answer. Learn from their life and how they relate to it so as to deal with it.

This means moving towards the geographic and existential peripheries.
It demands on our part that we do not impose our Western culture, our way of understanding and building the Church, the way of assuming services and responsibilities but respect the time that communities need to find solutions.
This key of inculturation poses the challenge of thinking and starting from the conviction that one can live one’s life by incorporating elements of other cultures: in customs, ideas, thoughts, concepts, in the experience of God, in spirituality, in the way to live the Church, over time, in the organization.
You understand that you can drink from God’s unique wisdom, beauty and holiness, but poured into different moulds which, like rays of light, reflect the totality of sunlight, reflected through a crystalline polyhedron.

Third key: walking with a synodal Church of assemblies, of agreements
In the Church of San Cristóbal de Las Casas all heads and officers are elected by the Diocesan Assembly: the Vicar General, the Episcopal Vicar of the Pastoral Care, the Chancellor, the Vicar of Justice and Peace, etc. The bishop is offered a rose and then chooses one. Another example is the Third Diocesan Synod.

From the stage of awareness and awareness to making the Synod, through the Parochial Assemblies, the Teams and the Diocesan Assemblies, all the materials, themes, songs, rites, the main theme, the motto and the symbols have reached each member of the 2,500-strong community of the diocese. It was truly an ecclesiogenesis based on the six proposed themes: the indigenous Church, the liberating Church, the evangelizing Church, the servant Church, the Church in communion and the Church under the guidance of the Spirit. All the agreements and guidelines were made in a diocesan synodal assembly. This synodal experience has marked the diocesan pastoral plans, the plans of the teams and parishes and missions; it marked the plans of the commissions and of the areas.

Fourth key: walking in a ministerial Church
Arriving in the diocese of San Cristóbal de Las Casas, something that is immediately found is the ministerial Church, the servant Church.
There are the Presidents of the Hermitage, the Deans, the candidates for the diaconate, the deacons, the adult catechists, the zone leaders, the zone coordinators, the captains of the celebrations, the health workers, the promoters of Indian theology and the Agents of Pastoral animation
and coordination.

All with various and different responsibilities. This requires us to take off our shoes again from the model of the Church where the priest does everything and decides everything. It is taking another walk, sharing, participating, and respecting the different services and ministries.
This means that you are not the only one with ability, who knows, who decides; you are part of a whole; the others also contribute to the journey, to the pastoral process.
It is not a question of imposing a method, a line, or an agreement. The world of servers is contributing with their path, in their style, with their time, and respecting their culture.

Fifth key: walking with the Church, listening and discerning the signs of the times
I’ll just give two examples of listening to the voice of the Spirit. San Cristóbal welcomed 40,000 refugees due to the internal war that Guatemala was experiencing due to the military dictatorship of the 1980s. It gave them shelter, food, and land to work.
And the second example is the mediation of Conai (National Intermediation Commission), chaired by Don Samuel during the war between the Zapatista Army Of National Liberation (EZLN) and the Federal Government.

Bishop Samuel Ruiz of the Diocese of San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, from 1959 until 1999.

With this, Don Samuel avoided thousands of deaths and achieved a cease-fire twelve days after the start. And finally, the function of the believing people, its prophetic function in the line of Don Samuel Ruíz García who is attentive to all events and announces and denounces. With these five keys, we get closer to what we mean by a missionary Church. And this is what Francis proposes with the outgoing Church, a Church that goes towards the geographical and existential peripheries. So … you have to take off your shoes!

DR Congo. Dancing to the Rumba Rhythm.

Saturday, 1 October 2022 8:00

The rumba is a typically Congolese rhythm. This popular music, which crossed the Atlantic Ocean during the slave trade, spread to Latin America. Transformed, it returned home to the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and the Republic of Congo, from where it conquered the African continent and the whole world. Since 2021, it has been an Intangible Heritage of Humanity.

“The rumba is our most important sound mineral, with which we identify ourselves all over the world”, said Antoine Manda Tchebwe, director general of the International Centre for Bantas Civilizations, at the international symposium on Congolese rumba which was held in March 2020 at the new Kinshasa Museum.

For its part, the Joint Scientific Commission on rumba, constituted by the two Congos, in presenting to UNESCO the candidacy of the rumba within the Intangible Heritage of Humanity, in one of its documents, declared that rumba “is the expression par excellence of our passion for life, of our resilience. A travelling companion on the journey of the struggle in the political history of the two countries, it ended up becoming not only a space for celebration but also a vector for mobilizing popular consciences.” On 14 December last, it was included in the list of the Immortal Heritage of Humanity.

African music par excellence
The rumba has its roots in the nkumba – the native dance in Kikongo – practised in the former Kingdom of Congo, which included part of the two Congos and Angola. Between the 16th and 20th centuries, thousands of slaves from these territories were deported to the Caribbean. Despite the conditions to which they were subjected, they preserved their cultural heritage and in their small associations, according to the ethnic groups, they perpetuated their spirituality and the musical richness of their land. In very different contexts – weddings, funerals, births, etc. – and in events of a recreational nature, the practice of the nkumba continued, which the Spanish colonists later called ‘rumba’. This developed and changed under the Latin influence and became popular, especially in Cuba and the Antilles, and then spread throughout Latin America.

Joseph Kabasele with his irresistible hit Independance Cha Cha, in 1960.

The Congolese rumba begins to emerge overwhelmingly in the early 1950s, particularly in Kinshasa. At the end of the decade, its projection on a pan-African scale begins: Independance Cha Cha, the irresistible hit by Joseph Kabasele in 1960, accompanied the negotiations for the independence of the Belgian Congo to Brussels, but then made much of black Africa dance in the wave of independence.
Subsequent albums spurred the rapid expansion of Congolese music, which quickly attracted the attention of radio stations across the continent. Big names like Tabu Ley Rocherau, Franco Luambo Makiadi, Paul Mwanga and Doctor Nico have emerged.
Across the Congo River, in Brazzaville, Franklin Bukaka, Paul Kamba and Pamelo Mounka were the centre of attention.
In 1966, with Tabu Ley and his group Afrisa International, the Congolese rumba was present at the First World Black Art Festival in Dakar, Senegal, and in 1970 Tabu Ley performed at the Olympia in Paris. In a short time, ‘The former Zaire became the standard-bearer of African music: all music lovers, young and old, celebrated and affirmed the coherence and beauty of modern Zairean music. Their recordings attracted all the markets of the country, but also of East and West Africa. The rumba was even considered the African dance par excellence’, wrote the Congolese Pius Ngandu Nkashama in one of his works.

Bakolo Music International, the oldest traditional congolese rumba music group. CC BY-SA 4.0/ Jeanne Vu Van

The merit of the rumba is that it has remained a blend of tradition and modernity that promotes feelings of self-love or belonging and unites different communities, peoples, ethnic groups, and countries. The great interpreters of African rumba began to disappear in the 1970s. They were replaced by new musicians and groups with a “less structured and more complex” modality, according to Clément Ossinodé, the famous Belgian soloist and expert in this musical style.
The new generation of Congolese musicians is enriching the rumba and attracting new generations from almost all of Africa. Among these: Papa Wemba and the Zaiko Langa Langa group; Koffi Olomide – considered a legend of Congolese and African music, with over three hundred songs; Werrason, who has stood out as an active voice against discrimination and early marriage and in promoting women’s education; and again JB Mpiana, Faly Ipupa, Ferre Gola and Héritier Watanabe. (Photo: 123rf.com)

Lwanga Kakule Silusawa

DR Congo. Oil exploration in protected areas causes outcry from environmentalists.

Saturday, 1 October 2022 8:00

By early 2023, controversial oil exploration will start in protected areas and world strategic ecosystems in the DRC.
This is the last episode of the rush of oil companies inside national parks throughout the continent, pushed by soaring costs of oil exploration in the deep offshore that is taking even more momentum since the beginning of the Ukraine war and the new quest for alternative sources of hydrocarbon.

On the last 28 July, the Congolese government auctioned 27 oil blocks: three in the coast Basin on the Atlantic, nine in the central Cuvette, eleven in and around Lake Tanganyika Graben and four in the Lake Albert region. Three more gas blocks on the Lake Kivu were also auctioned. According to the Ministry of Hydrocarbons, these oil blocks will be awarded within six months whereas the gas blocks will be awarded within three months.
The stakes are considerable. According to the Ministry, the DRC is endowed with a crude oil potential of over 23 billion barrels (3bn in the Coastal Basin, 6.4 bn in the Cuvette, 7.25 bn in the Tanganyika Basin and 6.5 for the Albertine Graben) while gas reserves are estimated to 66 billion cubic meters. The oil bonanza alone represents an estimated value of US $ 450 billion while the gas reserves are worth nearly $ 200 bn at current prices.

Congo River. (Mauro Burzio)

However, the auction has provoked an outcry from environmentalist organizations. According to the Environment Ministry Forest Atlas, nine of these oil blocks overlap protected areas, including a national park, nature reserves, and a mangroves marine park.
Greenpeace Africa and others groups have indeed expressed alarm that three of the blocks overlap with the Cuvette Centrale peatlands, a biodiversity hotspot containing about 30 gigatons of carbon, equivalent to three years of global emissions. Oil drilling could release these immense stocks of carbon, warns Professor Simon Lewis of University College London. Moreover, Block 18, is only 20 kilometres from the Salonga National Park, a World Heritage UNESCO site.
In such conditions, the auction of new oil blocks is “mad”, says Irene Wabiwa Betoko, International Project Leader for the Congo Basin Forest at Greenpeace Africa. “If oil exploitation takes place in these areas, we must expect a global climate catastrophe”, she warns.

Lake Tanganyika 123rf.com

Besides, says Greenpeace, communities whose territory is overlapped by these blocks have not been consulted, about the government’s oil exploration plans. In the Upemba National Park, in the South-East of the country, local chiefs only heard of them from Greenpeace. But the DRC government is adamant to go ahead with the project. In May 2022, it announced its intention to renew memoranda of understanding with the governments of Tanzania and Zambia to allow exploration in Lake Tanganyika, Africa’s largest fresh water lake and in Lake Moero.
The government’s answer to the criticism of the NGOs and local communities has been ambivalent. When he announced the tenders on the 28 July, President Felix Tshisekedi tried to reassure the DRC’s international partners about the government’s determination to carry out exploration while protecting the ecosystems. The Minister of Hydrocarbons, Didier Budimbu, claimed that the drilling techniques that would be applied would be harmless for the environment. In a statement to Greenpeace Africa, the Hydrocarbons Ministry emphasized that no areas inside UNESCO World Heritage sites were up for auction and that overlaps would be restricted to other Protected Areas. Yet, the Congolese law, makes no distinction, in terms of oil exploration, between protected areas in general and World Heritage sites.

“Our priority is not to save the planet”
Clearly, conservation is not the government’s main concern. “Our priority is not to save the planet but to earn more money” declared Budimbu. In this context, the Greenpeace staff received death threats from anonymous callers related to its criticism of the 28-29 July oil and gas auction, told the NGO in a letter to the Inter-Donor Group for the Environment in the DRC.
Such threats are not surprising owing to the climate of hostility against Greenpeace stoked by a statement of the Environment Minister, Eve Bazaiba who described the NGO as an “organization […] full of pathological and unrestrained animosity towards the government” whose staff are “beneficiaries of imperialist backers.”

DR. Congo. Pygmy women.

The Congolese government is particularly irritated because Greenpeace sustains that the 28 July auction was illegal since accordingly, some of the calls for tenders issued by the Ministry of Hydrocarbons contain “a flagrant anomaly”. For instance, the Graben Tanganyika call for tenders which refers to the 8 April 2022 Council of Ministers meeting, includes seven blocks which are not mentioned in the meeting minutes.
Unfortunately, the carbon sinks of the Central African rainforest are also threatened by the promulgation on the 31 December 2019 of a production sharing agreement for the Mokelembembe license by the Congo-Brazzaville government which covers part of the country’s peatlands, between the Société nationale des pétroles du Congo (SNPC) parastatal and TotalEnergies.

Macron supports controversial oil pipeline project
In Eastern Congo and in neighboring countries, other initiatives are threatening wildlife sanctuaries. Despite President Emmanuel Macron’s statements about the need to end the use of fossil fuels, TotalEnergies whose main shareholder is the French state is planning to drill inside the Murchinson national park in Uganda. And this controversial project has even received French ddiplomatic support. In a letter sent in 2021 to Uganda’s president, Yoweri Museveni, Macron described the East African Crude Oil Pipeline which will evacuate the production from the Ugandan field to the Indian Ocean, as a “major opportunity” for both countries.

123rf.com

Total plans to drill more than 400 wells on the Tilenga fields in an area which provides habitat to diverse species of birds, giraffes, elephants, pangolins, lions, chimpanzees, buffaloes, hippos, hartebeests, and warthogs. In addition, activists accuse Total Uganda and the subcontractor it hired, to have forced farmers to sign compensation agreements under pressure or intimidation and deprived them of access to their land before compensation was received.
Six NGOs including Friends of the Earth France and the Kampala-based Civil Response on Environment and Development, warn about the danger of the potential displacement of tens of thousands of Ugandans and massive environmental risk posed by a network of pipelines passing under the Nile river. They also stress that burning the oil that will be produced by the Ugandan fields could release the equivalent of 34 million tonnes of carbon dioxide a year into the atmosphere.

Drilling in the Kavango Basin
In Angola, the government has drafted in 2021 a legislation to allow oil, gas and mining activities in 14 national conservation areas, including the Luengue-Luiana National Park. In the neighbouring Namibia, the Canadian company Reconnaissance Energy Africa, is drilling in the onshore Kavango Basin; and in north-eastern Botswana. Greenpeace considers that the Kavango Basin project is completely incompatible with combating climate change and stresses that it is facing growing opposition from local communities as it affects an environmentally sensitive area which is home to Africa’s largest remaining population of savanna elephants and other threatened species. Oil exploration could also be a threat for the 200,000 people who live in the area, including the First Nations San and Kavango peoples.

Botswana. Elephants in the Okavango delta. 123rf.com

Besides, the use of the controversial fracking technology by ReconAfrica, could provoke irreversible damage to the Okavango Delta since drilling for oil requires large quantities of water and poses risks of pollution of the marshlands and seasonally flooded plains of the Delta, which is the main source of water in the region. Namibian NGO calculated that the project could generate up to 51.6 gigatonnes of CO2, and therefore constitutes a “carbon bomb”.
Extensive oil development would pose also a threat to the abundant wildlife since the license is within the Kavango–Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area, which covers 520,000 sq km of Angola, Botswana, Namibia, Zambia and Zimbabwe. Since the Delta is a protected World Heritage Site, in August 2021, UNESCO’ expressed concern about the project. In 2019, the largest protected area of the continent, the Termit and Tin-Toumma national reserve in Niger was also partly declassified to allow oil exploration inside its territory by the Chinese National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC). Despite official claims from all governments to reduce emissions and protect the environment, the assault by oil companies against Africa’s ecosystems is going on. (Open Photo: 123rf.com)

François Misser

Young People make their roots flower again.

Wednesday, 14 September 2022 20:10

The new Latin American generations are following the invitation of Pope Francis to “be proud of the history of their peoples”. Two examples of sustainable development from the Bolivian Amazon.

Listening to the young indigenous descendants opens the heart and renews hope. In fact, they embody in their life the well-known “honour your father and your mother”, as the first commandment says, which contains a promise: “that you may be happy and enjoy a long life on earth” (Ep 6,3).

They honour their fathers and mothers by consciously recognizing their human value, their knowledge, their ability and their work in cultivating the land so that their children become (like it or not) participants in today’s history. Aware of this, young people build the present and the future by remaining tied to their ancestors.

This is, for example, the experience of Bernal, born in the Yunga in the Bolivian Amazon. His ancestors sowed and grew coffee which they sold at competitive prices to support the family. Having grown up surrounded by coffee, Bernal became passionate about it and this prompted him to study agronomy. He tells us: “When I entered university I knew the subject well, having learned from my father and my mother how to sow and cultivate without damaging the ecosystem. The studies helped me to diversify production and to obtain a finished product ready for consumption. Today the work of my grandparents and my father, as well as of my community, is appreciated and recognized, and our coffee is sold at a fair price both in Italy and in other countries such as Japan”.

In a certain sense, the advice that Pope Francis addressed to young people in January 2019 to “be proud of the history of their peoples and tenacious in facing the challenges they face, so as to proceed quickly in the construction of another possible world”, is grafted onto everyday life in these southern countries where the experience and wisdom of the elderly transmit strength and knowledge to the new generations to overcome the hostile environment and be grateful for their lives.

Lucia was born in Chapare and had a difficult childhood due to the poverty of the family. Growing up, she saw that the land of her community was very fertile. She produces a lot of fruit and yet she is rapidly becoming impoverished. She is sure that being able to process the fruit will benefit the entire community.

This is why she has decided to study food production engineering, and in her second year, she says: “Whenever I have time, I go home where my mother and I are already extending our farm. We are also discussing with the people of the area how to avoid using toxic materials and herbicides in production. We want to take care of our land because our roots are in it but also our future, we can’t just think about moving to the cities “.

Lucia, therefore, concretely translates the words of the pope who recommends “returning to one’s own original culture, taking care of one’s roots, because from them the strength to grow, make it flourish and bear fruit” is born.

These two simple experiences of young Bolivians show that in the face of a system of global competitiveness, it is possible to build and live in a synodal context that passes from the ‘I’ to the inclusive ‘we’, thus respecting our Creator and creation as a whole. (Photo:123rf.com)

Tania Ávila Meneses
Bolivia

Peru. The Ayahuasca Ritual: the Gateway to the World of Plants and Natural Medicine.

Thursday, 1 September 2022 8:00

The ancestral Andean Amazonian wisdom is transmitted through songs, mythological stories, and the narratives of the wise men and women, whose message is the importance of generating,
preserving, and caring for life in its entirety.
The Ayahuasca ritual in the Peruvian Amazon and the preparation process of the aspiring Amazonian shaman.

The name ayahuasca is a compound word from the Quechua language where aya, means dead person and huasca rope, so ayahuasca can mean the rope of death or of the dead. Though in the Asheninka culture, this term means to be drunk or hallucinatory. Ayahuasca is a powerful hallucinogenic and healing potion, brewed by indigenous peoples of the Amazon rainforest, which was traditionally consumed by shamans for purposes of magic, divination, and healing.
They used this vine-shaped plant for divinatory purposes, by holding healing ceremonies; they used the medicine as a diagnostic tool to discover the roots of illnesses in their patients.

Photo: 123rf.com

The Ayahuasca ritual
The Ayahuasca ritual is prepared and directed by a spiritual teacher or shaman, that is, by someone who has the knowledge of these things. That is why a shaman is in charge of collecting the ayahuasca plant and other ingredients. He decides where and when the brew will be prepared. By the day of the preparation of the concoction, the shaman is supposed to have all the ingredients ready. The ayahuasca stems are shredded into fine strips and are added to a pot of clean water along with their leaves, other herbs, and tree bark. All these ingredients are left to simmer until the concoction turns red, which takes between14 and 16 hours. Once it is ready, the concoction is left to cool and then it is filtered through a strainer and stored in a container for ritual consumption.

The consumption of the ayahuasca, which has been prepared by a shaman, generally takes place during night sessions. The shaman prepares a cosy environment in an ample space so that the participants in the ceremony can feel comfortable after having ingested the concoction. The shaman who leads the session begins to sing the icaros, which are healing songs that guide the effects of ayahuasca, known as dizziness. These ceremonial songs accompany the participants during their inner journey and are sung by the shamans during an Ayahuasca ceremony. The icaros are used for many purposes by the shamans but generally they are used to work with and direct the healing powers of the plant spirits.
At the same time, the shaman observes the different effects of the brew on the participants in the session. The ingestion of the ayahuasca causes different reactions: some of the participants begin to cry or to vomit, others have visions or experience imaginary journeys, during which they go back to the past or imagine meeting ancestral spirits. It is said that the effects of the ayahuasca brew can last between 6 to 12 hours. During that time the shaman accompanies and observes the participants. When the effects of the Ayahusca are over, the participants listen to the recommendations of the shaman and then go back home to rest. The ayahuasca ritual is considered the gateway to the world of plants and natural medicine; through it, one can learn the medicinal properties of plants and use them as therapeutic tools.

The preparation process of the aspiring Amazonian shaman
The person willing to become a shaman is supposed to undertake a preparation process. He must make a retreat in the depths of the jungle where he will learn the plant properties from his master shaman. He must remain in the jungle ingesting and getting to know medicinal plants. He will have to follow a diet that includes white rice, green bananas, and a type of fish only.
These foods will be cooked without salt or seasonings. Sugar is also forbidden in the diet of the aspiring shaman.

Photo: 123rf.com

Furthermore, he is not supposed to meet anybody but his master shaman, because, for instance, if he came in touch with a woman who is menstruating, or with a sick person, or someone who has had sexual intercourse, his diet could be seriously affected. That is why diets are done in isolation. The ayahuasca ritual can be considered as the time to restore personal balance with the ancestral spirits and with the cosmos. The apprentice ritual therefore is considered an important step in the formation of the shaman who wants to learn to heal the brothers of his community in order to restore harmony with all creation. That is why the ayahuasca ritual has been transmitted orally and through practices from generation to generation for millennia. (Open Photo: 123rf.com)

Jhonny Mancilla Pérez

Why all the cows belong to the Maasai.

Thursday, 1 September 2022 8:00

In the beginning, the Maasai did not have any cattle. One day God called Maasinta, who was the first Maasai and said to him: “I want you to make a large enclosure, and when you have done so, come back and inform me.”

Maasinta went and did as he was instructed, and came back to report what he had done. Next God said to him: “Tomorrow, very early in the morning, I want you to go and stand against the outside wall of the house for I will give you something called cattle. But when you see or hear anything do not be surprised. Keep very silent.”

Very early in the morning, Maasinta went to wait for what was to be given him. He soon heard the sound of thunder and God released a long leather thong from heaven to earth. Cattle descended down this thong into the enclosure. The surface of the earth shook so vigorously that his house almost fell over. Maasinta was gripped with fear, but did not make any move or sound.

While cattle were still descending, the Dorobo, who was a house-mate of Maasinta, woke up from his sleep. He went outside and on seeing the countless cattle coming down the strap, he was so surprised that he said: ‘Ayieyieyie!’ and exclamation of utter shock. On hearing this, God took back the thong and the cattle stopped descending.

God then said to Maasinta, thinking he was the one who had spoken: “Is it that these cattle are enough for you? I will never again do this to you, so you had better love these cattle in the same way I love you.” That is why the Maasai love cattle very much.

How about the Dorobo? Maasinta was very upset with him for having cut God’s thong. He cursed him thus: “Dorobo, are you the one who cut God’s thong? May you remain as poor as you have always been. You and your offspring will forever remain my servants. Let it be that you will live off animals in the wild. May the milk of my cattle be poison if you ever taste it.” This is why up to this day the Dorobo still live in the forest and they are never given milk. (Open Photo: 123rf.com)

Folktale from Maasai People of Tanzania

Towards the 2023 Synod. The Spirit Shows the Paths to Follow.

Thursday, 1 September 2022 8:00

From the diocese of Pando in the Bolivian Amazon region, Monsignor Eugenio Coter explains the horizons that the synodal journey is opening up to the Church.

“The synodal path is not a motorway. It is like one of the great rivers of the Amazon that I sail on when I go to visit the communities. You see the river and you think it has a current that only goes in one direction, but it is not true. There is a large mass of water flowing underneath, moving in various directions, flowing at different levels, and making eddies. In one place the water is warmer, in others colder. It is an underwater world that if you look at only from above, you cannot imagine. You see it as a compact expanse and instead, it is in constant motion and it proceeds in only one direction: towards the sea”.

Monsignor Eugenio Coter, bishop of Pando in the Bolivian Amazon region

“There is a thread of continuity – explains Monsignor Coter – that binds the meeting, held in May 2017, at the Shrine of Our Lady of Aparecida, in Brazil (at the conclusion of the fifth General Conference of the Episcopates of Latin America and the Caribbean, Celam), to the Synod of the Amazon (2019), despite the post-synodal work being slowed down by the pandemic, to the Ecclesial Conference of the Amazon (Ceama), and the synodal journey that will end in October 2023.
In Aparecida, 15 years ago the Holy Spirit pointed out the Amazon as an emblematic place for the evangelizing mission of the Church. The Synod of the Amazon was a milestone, and afterwards, Pope Francis launched the proposal of the synodal journey with the participation not only of bishops but of religious and laity. But where will the thread of the Holy Spirit lead us? We will know this from the indications that will come from the ecclesial world, in docility to the Church and to the will of the Spirit”.

The Dream of Querida Amazonia
In Bolivia, vicariates, dioceses, and archdioceses, the synodal commissions are at work carrying out community reflection. “And this is already a way of making Church – emphasizes the bishop of Pando. All the Bishops’ Conferences of Latin America and the Caribbean have created a coordination system. At a basic level, we in Pando also have our commission made up of lay people and religious, priests and there is also myself” Elected two years ago as head of Ceama, Monsignor Coter was the protagonist of both the Amazon synodal and post-synodal path, characterized by the birth of the Amazon Bishops’ Conference, in which he was elected as representative of the bishops.
Last March, with the passage of the presidency of Ceama to Cardinal Barreto, the bishop of Manaus Leonardo Ulrich Steiner and a lay representative Maurizio Lopez were elected as vice-presidents, while Monsignor Coter was confirmed as the representative of the Amazonian bishops in the presidency of Ceama.

Through a full program of meetings, including online, Ceama is working on the ecclesial dream of Querida Amazonìa, giving space to a dialogue that opens the door to the laity, reflecting realities already alive in the field. But are the laity ready to be invested with a wider ecclesial involvement? Monsignor Coter has no doubts: “We have prepared lay people; they are not theologians but they have always maintained ecclesial participation with an open heart. They are most willing to build with creativity and patience, to move an institution like the Church which, despite its 2000 years, is full of vitality. Some intervene in a critical way, however, posing themes for reflection. Some stay at the window but don’t want to roll up their sleeves to get to work and build change. They too must help us, be a stimulus to bring words of light and hope to society. There are prodigal sons who leave the house and have to rediscover the hard way how much better it was to eat at their father’s house; others who stay at home and do not understand how important it is to sit at the table all together, to work together, find it difficult to grasp this dimension of openness. We must be grateful to Pope Francis who places us on this path”.

A Synod of the People
Many expectations are being concentrated around the work in progress for the next synod. The bishop comments: “Pope Francis has always shown himself to be very careful in opening paths, in generating openings, in moving rigid situations, always with a lot of attention to unity and communion. We remember how the Amazon Synod did not answer everything but gave us the ABCs to build the answers
along the way”.

A variegated and complex world horizon opens up on how this synodal journey will be lived by the individual local Churches. The working document is a map that is already in the hands of countless realities of the Church in Africa, Asia, the Americas, Oceania and Europe, territories with other histories and cultures that study how to face the new road that is opening up towards the future. What do such different realities have in common in terms of history, dimensions and local problems?
Msgr. Coter points out: “Certainly there is in common the fact of being Christians, the feeling of being a community. Now, these communities led by priests alone are becoming communities led by commissions in which there is a priest who animates and coordinates together with the laity. Together they reflect and generate participation. In some realities, there is still a very clerical vision of the Church that struggles to leave room for the laity who are a wealth not only as an operational contribution but also as a vision, reflection, incarnation of faith and new proposals. If we do not do it out of conviction, out of conscience, because that was the way the early Church was, we must learn to do it soon as we will be short of priests”.

In Latin America where grassroots communities have been a popular and widespread tradition since the years following the Second Vatican Council, how will the ecclesial community grow on the synodal journey? In a context of great changes in which the reform of the Curia desired by Pope Francis with Praedicate Evangelium is fully inserted, what are the most topical issues for the Churches of the continent? “In this phase, new words are emerging as milestones that help the heart to translate dreams into concrete steps – explains Monsignor Coter. We are writing the answers that will come from the synodal journey. For example, in the commission in which we have been examining the Amazonian rite for a full year, we see that elements oriented towards respect for some typically local realities are emerging. These responses will be defined not by a bishop nor by a parish priest but by an ecclesiastical province, by a synodal group at the local and inter-diocesan level. The answers will come through a synodal practice, that of the common journey”.

The bishop continues: “A problem for the communities of the Churches of the Amazon region is the lack of priests available to accompany pastorally the communities scattered throughout the territory. But now, on the other side of the globe, even in Europe with the decline in vocations, there is only one parish priest for four or five communities and on Sundays, he finds himself running from one side to the other to celebrate Masses, becoming predominantly the minister of worship and losing contact with the people. The European Churches with this problem must find their answer. With so much geographical and historical distance between us, there is the same problem here and we must understand how to give the sacraments to our faithful. In the Synod of the Amazon, we reflected on this and other problems of the incarnation of the faith, and now we must build the answers. Thus enter the challenges of a new reality of the Church with fewer priests and the need for greater participation of the laity. These basic problems also exist in Asia and Africa, albeit in different cultural contexts”. And are the pastors ready for this journey with the laity? “It is important that the episcopal conferences know how to delegate people who want to take risks, to walk. It is important that the bishops know how to delegate pastors with the ability to listen and with the courage not to seek certainties but the light of the Spirit that never indicates highways but pieces of a path to walk on. And not alone”.

Miela Fagiolo D’Attilia/PM

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