(President of the Pontifical Council for Culture,
Vatican City)
1. Faith in the same God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit is spoken and lived in the cultures which bring to its expression a multitude of words and symbols, rites and practices, wisdom and customs, marked by limits and not exempt from sin, but also seed of the Word, waiting stones and anchoring points of the incarnation of the Gospel and to live the Paschal Mystery with the universal breath of the Spirit of Pentecost which gives each of us the understanding in one's own language and living in one's own culture the prodigies of God. As the Apostles and the Fathers of the Church did, the African Christians speak the language of men, to teach them in their own language how to live the Mystery of Christ in its liberating fullness from sin and constitutional fullness of the Communion of Saints, as the example of the Virgin Mary, who looks at and meditates the Word with her heart, perfect image and model of inculturated Gospel. There is an immense and multiple challenge which encounters faith in its incarnation in cultures linked to millenary religious traditions.
This task accomplished by the first generation of Christians, who from the second century began creating an original Christian culture, is still the task of today's Christians: the promotion of an autochthonous Christian culture, springing from the faith in Christ, and moulded with the flesh and blood of its great and rich cultural traditions.
2. With Christ a new reality enters into the world, something astonishing and absolutely original in relationship to the natural religions. These new relationships reflect the self-same mystery of the Word incarnate. In the Person of the Word, divine nature and human nature are united "without mixing or confusion, without division or separation". Which is the correct relationship between faith and culture, between the attachment to the earth and the quest for the Kingdom? As the union of the two natures in the Word incarnate, this reality is in itself a mystery. We may only mention something about it starting from the effects that it produces in all areas of human activity. Christian faith is not a slave to culture and does not submit itself to diktats, but neither does it separate itself from this. It is in permanent dialogue with culture, as authentic culture is productive dialogue with faith. And this exists on three levels:
On the theological and catechetic level, "always be prepared to make a defence to any one who calls you to account for the hope that is in you, yet do it with gentleness and reverence" (1 Pt. 3,15), with all the resources of the African cultures.
On the artistic level, the artistically talented African, who intensely lives the mystery of Christ, spontaneously expresses his works of art, which inculturate the Gospel and at the same time evangelise cultures.
On the social, economic and political level, the message of Christ is incarnate and creates relationships full of respect for the dignity and the freedom of each human being, of solidarity and of peace. Briefly, the relationships which reflect those that God has established with us in Jesus Christ.
The Christian, conscious of his mission, translates his faith into his life. Faith does not impoverish and does not shrink culture, but on the contrary is the radiating leaven. Like the rainbow radiates all its colours, the Church in Africa is resplendent with the beauty of the Gospel progressively inculturated in all of its cultures and already fruitful bearers of holiness for the entire Church and the whole world.
Original text: French
