MESSAGE OF THE AMECEA BISHOPS
FROM THE 14TH PLENARY ASSEMBLY IN DAR ES SALAAM, TANZANIA
YOU WILL BE MY WITNESSES
(Acts 1:8)
The Message of the Catholic Bishops of the Association of Member Episcopal Conferences of Eastern Africa (AMECEA) at the Conclusion of their 14th Plenary Assembly Addressed to all Catholics, Political and Civil Leaders and the Entire People of God in the Region.
1. We the Catholic Bishops of the AMECEA Region, coming from Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Somalia, Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia, have met for the 14th Plenary Assembly, at Kurasini Catholic Training Centre, of the Tanzanian Episcopal Conference in Dar-es-Salaam, from the 14th to 28th July, 2002. The theme of our study has been "Deeper Evangelisation in the Third Millennium - A Challenge for AMECEA".
2. Under this theme we evaluated the 40 years of AMECEA discovering its strengths, fruits and impact on all of us, the people of God in this Region, as well as the weaknesses which ought to be eliminated. We have put greater emphasis on new ways, methods, and strategies, to cater for the whole person and entire society, through holistic evangelisation and integral development. We have stressed the importance of doing evangelisation as members of the family of God guided by love for each other, care, acceptance, dialogue, solidarity, and justice (The Church in Africa #63). We have chosen Jesus' preferential option for the poor, the vulnerable, and the oppressed in our societies, as the guiding principle in our evangelisation. (Luke 4:18-19)
3. We have emphasised the need for active and full participation of the Lay Faithful in evangelisation and development. We commit ourselves to greater promotion of Christian unity and inter-religious dialogue in the Regions. We have identified the major challenges facing our Region and agreed on the strategies to meet them.
4. We take as our own the pastoral message of Vatican II: "The joy and hope, the grief and anguish of the people of this age, especially those who are poor or are afflicted in any way, are the joy and hope, the grief and anguish of the followers of Christ as well". (Gaudium et Spes, #1) We find these words right and fitting, in terms of our experience in the AMECEA Region, especially in the case of our brothers and sisters in Sudan, Somalia, and Northern Uganda.
5. AMECEA identifies itself with the immense suffering of our sisters and brothers in the war torn Sudan. We are very saddened by the longstanding armed conflict in Southern Sudan, since 1955, and the tragedy it has caused to millions of people. Human lives have been destroyed, millions of refugees and internally displaced persons, and wanton destruction infrastructure, have come as a result of that. We condemn in the strongest terms, the continued practice of slavery, the restriction of the freedom of religion imposed on non-Muslims, and the unequal treatment of non-Muslims in the Sudan. These injustices should be brought to an end.
6. We call upon the Government of the Sudan, the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) and the civil society of that country, to take necessary steps to end the armed conflict through mediated peaceful means. We call upon the political leaders in our Region, and indeed all African leaders, to effectively intervene through mediation with the Government of the Sudan, to see lasting peace being effectively established. While we commend the resolutions contained in the Machakos Protocol (of 20th July 2002) we nevertheless urge the parties concerned to take it seriously as a significant step towards lasting peace in the Sudan. The leaders of IGAD have an important role to play both in the Sudan and Somalia in this regard. On our part, we shall continue to raise our prophetic voice so that the equality of rights and freedoms is ensured and defended for all the people of the Sudan.
7. We join in prayer the people of Somalia, especially the poor and the suffering, in begging God for reconciliation and peace. We ask the Somali leaders, and the leaders of IGAD, particularly the neighbouring country to overcome their particular interests and work effectively to restore law and order, security and peace, in Somalia.
8. We strongly assert that war is the greatest threat to the realisation of the Gospel values of justice and peace, respect for human dignity and human rights, and the integrity of creation (environment). It is because of wars that we have so many millions of Refugees and internally displaced persons in the African continent. In the same vein we condemn terrorism and fundamentalism, in all their forms, which disturb a peaceful social order and bring about social conflict. For this reason we urge all leaders in the Region to always resolve conflicts through peaceful means. We commit ourselves and the entire Catholic Church in the Region to be in the forefront in the peacemaking process.
9. Inspired by our vision of being "a Holy Spirit-filled family of God, committed to holistic Evangelisation and Integral Development", we pledge to continue speaking out against war and conflict and to do whatever is necessary to bring about lasting peace and harmony based on social justice. This is a necessary condition if we have to build the family of God in the AMECEA Region, where no child of God will continue to live under war and inhuman conditions. Each and every person is made in the image of God and is therefore sacred. (Genesis 1:26-27)
10. We call upon all Christians to fully recognise that working for and witnessing to justice is constitutive to what it means to be a true follower of Christ. (cf. Synod of Bishops, Justice in the World, 1971). Every Christian ought to be an active agent of justice and a committed peacemaker.(Matthew 5:9) We emphasise the need for collaboration in the work of justice and peace with all organisations, groups and individuals who are committed to the same cause.
11. We call upon our Justice and Peace Commissions and Committees, at all levels of the Church, to conscientise all the people of God, through an appropriate catechesis and spirituality of justice and peace, based on the Social Teaching of the Church. All agents of evangelisation should be formed in these Social teachings. We call upon our pastoral agents to instil the Kingdom values of justice and peace particularly among our teachers, medical personnel, police, armed forces, civil servants, politicians, professionals, and business people. We further urge the Justice and Peace Commissions in the AMECEA Region to train people, at all levels of society, in the skills of mediation, negotiation, arbitration, and reconciliation, so as to manage conflict as well as investing in lasting peace.
12. We are greatly concerned by the magnitude of the HIV/AIDS pandemic in our Region. On our part, we commit ourselves to stand in solidarity with the affected and infected people. We pledge to take the lead and urge all pastoral agents to undertake stronger awareness creation and education on this major problem. We also request them to take a holistic care for the people and families affected and infected by the disease. We call upon our governments to do all in their power and capacities to transparently and effectively respond to this challenge of HIV/AIDS. Resources for drugs should be made available to those who need them.. We call upon all the people of God to radically change their sexual behaviour, adhere to marital faithfulness and sexual abstinence outside marriage, as the fully assured means to fight against HIV/AIDS. We assure those living with HIV/AIDS that God and the Church are with them in their suffering.
13. We are disturbed by the ever increasing abject poverty in the Region. More and more people are failing to have the basic needs of life: food and food security, clean and safe water, basic health and education, permanent shelter, accepted human conditions of life, a clean and healthy environment. Extreme poverty leads to conflicts. We urge the governments and civil society and all people of God to fight the root causes of poverty through hard work, proper policies, accountability and transparency.
14. Meanwhile we recognise the looming famine in some parts of our Region, mainly caused by crop failure due to poor rains. Zambia and Malawi in Southern Africa, and Ethiopia and Eritrea, in the Horn of Africa, are already facing serious food shortages this year. We call upon the world community and humanitarian organisations to do whatever they can to prevent the impending human catastrophe. We commit ourselves to share the food with those who have less, and we ask the international community to assist us with the necessary infrastructure and logistics to realise this.
15. We commit ourselves to work towards poverty eradication in our respective countries. Some of the common causes of poverty and underdevelopment in our Region are corruption, fraud, embezzlement, and diversion of public resources which we strongly condemn. As we commit ourselves to accountability and transparency in our various offices and services in the Church, we equally ask the people in our Region to demand accountability and transparency from all holders of public office. We are committed to integral development, therefore we urge our Caritas/Development offices, at all levels of the Church, to empower people for authentic development. As Pope Paul VI reminded us, "Development is the new name for Peace" (Populorum Progressio, #76-80)
16. Globalisation has its positive values like the worldwide human rights movement, the empowerment of the formerly marginalised groups of society, world commitment to peace and peaceful resolution of conflicts which is best known as the globalisation of solidarity. We note, however, with sadness and anguish the negative aspects of Globalisation, particularly when viewed from the perspective of its victims. This is when globalisation is abused by naked global capitalism, to glorify profit at the expense of the poor, to perpetuate unfair terms of trade, to undermine ownership of vital assets of the people, and to promote disvalues which often undermine morality and cultural values through the new technological means of communication. We call upon all professionals in our Region to assist the people of God to examine globalisation critically, so as to utilise its positive aspects, while fully rejecting its negative elements.
17. We want to see total debt cancellation for all the poor countries of the world. It is immoral and unethical and indeed a structure of sin for rich countries to continue demanding from our countries the payment of huge sums of money as debt repayments. This servicing of the debt is at the expense of providing basic healthcare, education and other social services to the poor in our countries. The structural adjustments that the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank have imposed on our countries in various forms, have in many instances resulted in rising rates of poverty, food insecurity, massive job losses, rising cost of living, devaluation of local currencies, and accelerated privatisation that put the control of the economy in the hands of a small ruling class. We stand for economic justice for Africa and for every country in our Region. We ask all the people in our Region to ensure that money from debt forgiveness is solely used for the uplifting of the poor.
18. Good governance is still a challenge to all countries in the Region. We call upon all the leaders to respect the values and principles of good governance particularly, tolerance, pluralism, rule of law, and the full participation of the people in their own governance. We call upon all pastoral agents to give liberating civic education to the citizens. Finally we call upon all the citizens to know their rights and demand them, and to fulfil their civic obligations. In this respect we acknowledge the recent positive intervention of the Church and the people of Zambia and Malawi in defending constitutionalism against those who wanted to selfishly undermine it. This is the type of participation we would like Christians to manifest, working with all people of good will, in all our countries.
19. We welcome the transformation of the Organisation of African Unity into the African Union. Similarly we commend the efforts to build and strengthen Regional economic and political groupings like the Common Market for East and Southern Africa (COMESA) East African Community (EAC) and the Southern African Development Community (SADC). We are encouraged by the desire by our political leaders in the Region, and elsewhere in Africa, to look for greater political and economic integration and unity. We call upon them to ensure that the success of these efforts depends on the active participation of their citizens in these processes and these new bodies. On our part, we are committed to play an active role in these bodies for the welfare of all.
20. We strongly condemn the oppressive cultural practices and customs which violate the equal dignity and rights of sections of God's people in the Region. We call upon our governments, entire civil society and all our pastoral agents to join us in advocating total elimination of female genital mutilation, the commercialisation of "bride-wealth", domestic violence against women, abuse of patriachalism to discriminate against women, the practices of widow inheritance, and exclusion of women from property ownership. We are fully aware of the dangerous divisions and hatred, often leading to deaths, which come as a result of the belief in witchcraft and the practice of witch-finding, therefore we condemn evils and call upon all our Christians and people of good will to complete disassociate from them and to educate others to abandon them. We also denounce the evils of tribalism and ethnocentricism, which stand at the root of social conflict in our Region.
21. We call upon all of you, our pastoral agents in the Region, to revitalise Small Christian Communities (SCCs), which often encourage people to live as members of the family of God regardless of race or political affiliation. We urge you to utilise the SCCs for deeper holistic evangelisation and to embrace the preferential option for the poor and oppressed. We call all of you to read, study and implement our resolutions of this plenary, and to disseminate AMECEA's new Vision and Mission statements, and Mandate, among all the people of God, in the Region.
22. As far as it is within our authority, we shall not condone nor compromise, in situations of sexual abuse of women and children in the Church and all our institutions. It is incumbent upon all of us, as God's people, to respect the inviolable dignity of each and every human person.
23. We call upon you, the lay faithful: women, men, youth, and professionals, to evangelise the entire society, wherever you are, with Gospel values. We urge you to pay particular attention to those in the political, economic and cultural sectors since you are the best placed to do so. We call upon you to exercise your rights and responsibilities, both in the Church and society. We recommend to you to value Christianity through the SCCs and through the preferential love and care for the poor and children and to recognise their role in envangelisation. Deeper evangelisation, demands constant conversion to Christ, and the uncompromising commitment, through prayer and action, to the values of the Kingdom of God.
24. In conclusion we wish to affirm our hope and optimism for the future of our Region. We call upon the media houses to be agents of our message of hope and the resolutions of our Plenary to all the people of God in the Region. With God on our side we shall overcome the many and serious challenges that confront us. What is demanded of all of us is that we work in unity and solidarity, attentively listening to the cries of our people and effectively responding to them. Since Christ our hope is alive, we shall live! (Ecclesia in Africa #13)
Signed: :………...………………………………..
The Most Reverend Paul BAKYENGA
CHAIRMAN of AMECEA
Archbishop of Mbarara - Uganda
26th July 2002