‘When we read in Genesis the account of Creation, we risk imagining that God was a magician, with such a magic wand as to be able to do everything. However it was not like that… And thus creation went forward for centuries and centuries, millennia and millennia until it became what we know today, in fact because God is not a demiurge or a magician, but the Creator who gives being to all entities.’ Pope Francis

The recent announcement of the discovery of Homo Naledi, a new species of hominid, has been headline news in South Africa. I have been struck however by some of the concerns that I have heard raised in the wake of the WITS announcement.

Primary amongst them is the resurrection of the tired old debate about the supposed incompatibility between religious belief and modern insights of evolution.  For me one of the most helpful ways of thinking about the relationship between religion and science comes from thinking about their purpose. Evolutionary theory attempts to answer the question ‘how?’ The role of theology is to answer the question ‘why?’

If we were to look briefly at the Genesis accounts of creation, firstly, the emphasis is clearly on showing us the right relationship between the human person and God, that God is the creator, and we are the creatures. Secondly, it explores the right relationship between human beings, that we are all, ‘male and female’ created in the image and likeness of God, and therefore we all have equal dignity. Thirdly, it lays out the right relationship between us and the rest of creation, a role of stewardship and responsibility.

The emphasis is not on a coherent account of how creation came about. It is a theological text about dealing with the questions of meaning and purpose. The explorations of the scientific community and their search for confirmable proof of the origins of creation and of our human evolution are a completely different undertaking. Most importantly the nature of the scientific method is that it must be open to scrutiny. It must be possible to prove that their particular theory is incorrect in some or all of its parts. Whereas the statements of how to live presented in Genesis are normative, and therefore are not proven with facts or data as in science.

However there is a great deal to be added by theories of evolution to our theological understanding of who we are and how we are called to live. As Professor Adam Habib (quoting Prof Phillip Tobias) pointed out in his talk at the announcement of Homo Naledi, ‘This work (of palaeoanthropology) is essentially about establishing the scientific foundation for a common humanity’. The evolutionary notion of a common human ancestry helps us to see past superficial differences of language and culture to the underlying theological reality that we are all created with equal dignity. Prof Tobias speaking about palaeoanthropology under apartheid, was pointing to the scientific reality that all human beings irrespective of race have a common ancestry, and that the central ideas of apartheid, that we are created profoundly different, lack validity in terms of our evolution.

By Frances Correia

Follow the Jesuit Institute on twitter@JesuitInstitute

Attached is letter 3 of 2015 from the office of Archbishop Brislin, plus a Pastoral Statement from the SACBC on the Synod on the Family, and a prayer to the Holy Family for the Synod.

[gview file=”http://adct.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/abp-letter-3-of-2015.pdf”]

A music festival will be held at St Mary’s Cathedral from September 28 to 4 October 2015. Funds raised will be in aid of the Archbishop’s Year of Faith Building Fund. See details in the attachment below.

[gview file=”http://adct.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/Festival.pdf”]

As a response to Pope Francis’ call to make 1st September a “World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation, the first annual Multi-Faith World Day of Prayer for Creation was held at St Mary’s Cathedral at 12.00 on 1st September 2015. Prayers were prayed by Father Bernard Makore, Imam Dr. A. Rashied Omar, Rev Dr Rachel Mash, Rabbi Greg Alexander, and the youth were represented by Ncumisa Magadla, Sabirah Guzana and Sean Lategan, while retired Anglican Bishop Geoff Davies gave an address. Joan Armstrong of the Centre for Pastoral Development welcomed all to the service, and at the end thanked everyone for attending, while Sean Lategan, assistant to the Archdiocesan Youth Chaplain played the piano. Below are some pictures of the prayer service.

In the picture above are, from left to right: Father Bernard Makore (St Mary’s Cathedral), Imam Dr. A. Rashied Omar (Claremont Mosque), Bishop Geoff Davies (Executive Director of SAFCEI and retired Anglican Bishop of Umzimvubu – fondly referred to as The Green Bishop), Ncumisa Magadla, Rev. Dr Rachel Mash (Environmental Co-ordinator of the Anglican Church of Southern Africa), Sabirah Guzana and Rabbi Greg Alexander.

Fr Russell Polllitt’s address to Archdiocese of Cape Town Ecclesia Faith Festival Day on 29 August 2015.

[gview file=”http://adct.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/The-Parish-that-Pope-Francis-Envisions-CT.pdf”]

The Pope’s call to make the 1st of September ‘World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation’ comes at an opportune time. As we draw closer to COP21 in Paris there is a new urgency in drawing awareness to the environmental degradation that is happening through climate change. It is high time that we open our eyes and acknowledge what is happening around us.

In the letter Pope Francis wrote to Cardinal Koch and Cardinal Turkson, he writes that the first of September is the day on which we are “to thank God for the wonderful handiwork which he has entrusted to our care, and to implore his help for the protection of creation as well as his pardon for the sins committed against the world in which we live.” No matter our religion or affiliation, these words should be taken to heart. We need to be thankful for the beauty and bountifulness of nature, but at the same time also recognise that we have been reckless with it.

COP21 provides us with a chance to remedy at least a few of the ills that we have perpetrated, but for this to happen we need to all rally together and demand that our leaders deliver on their promises. We are, as Pope Francis wrote, “faced with the same decisive challenges, to which we must respond together, in order to be more credible and effective.”
Only if we all take action and hold ourselves and our leaders accountable, can we begin to address and reverse the damage that is being done and will be done because of climate change.

Faith communities are beginning to recognise this, as is shown by the Pope’s encyclical and the positive response to it from ma
ny quarters. The World Council of Churches has endorsed the encyclical and the Pope’s call for a ‘World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation’ and there is a surge of marches and pilgrimages for climate justice being undertaken.

In Southern Africa, the We Have Faith Campaign – Act Now for Climate Justice is launching a Pan-African cycling caravan. The caravan will travel through nine countries in Southern Africa, creating awareness on climate change and collecting petitions with demands of climate justice aimed at our leaders.

These initiatives are exciting but this movement needs to grow. We urge everyone to take action, whether through a campaign, engaging in COP21 or by adopting more environmentally friendly practices. Climate change is a threat that we all face and we all should be working together to mitigate it.

To find out more about the We Have Faith – Act Now for Climate Justice campaign, visit the official website: http://www.wehavefaith.net/ or follow the campaign on Twitter: @ActNowForCJ or Facebook.

To find out more about the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation please see the Catholic Youth Network for Environmental Sustainability in Africa (CYNESA) Facebook page at www.facebook.com/CYNESA or their website at cynesafrica.webs.com and the Archdiocese of Cape Town Facebook page at www.facebook.com/archdiocesecapetown

We, the Bishops of the Southern African Catholic Bishops Conference (SACBC) gathered here in Mariannhill this August 2015 wish to express our solidarity with our brothers and sisters from the Kingdom of Lesotho. We would like to express that Lesotho is not alone, the Bishops and the Catholic community are with you in this time of need.

We have been following the events in your country since the outbreak of violence in August 2014 with shock and dismay in particular the recent killing of the Lesotho Defence Force Commander, L.G. Maaparankoe Mahao on the 25th June 2015. We are shocked that such a horrendous act was done by some members of the Lesotho Defence Forces. This action reflects the predicament in which many Basotho people find themselves, that they are not safe in their own country. It brings fear and threatens the foundations of human rights, especially the right to life, and throws out the democratic principles on which many constitutions are founded. We are well aware that even last year some disturbances took place in Lesotho. We call upon leaders in Lesotho to come together to seek a lasting solution to the Lesotho problems. As leaders, we condemn any attack on any person.

Affirming that Basotho are best positioned to solve their own problems, we also commend the actions of SADC leaders who acted swiftly and quickly to try and solve the challenges that had befallen the Kingdom of Lesotho. We believe that as long as one of the countries in Southern Africa is unstable, it affects all its neighbours.

We call for open dialogue as a way of solving the problems that are facing Lesotho. We therefore need to stand together with all the Basotho people and condemn any form of violence, especially when it is being done by the state.

We pray for peace in Lesotho and ask the government to respect the human rights of its citizen and to promote tolerance of different opinions.

Issued by: Archbishop Stephen Brislin
President of the Southern African Catholic Bishops’ Conference

Self-styled South African prophet Penuel Mnguni, 24, feeds a snake to one of his congregants. Photo: Facebook/End Times Disciples Ministries.

The recent ‘snake pastor’ incident is simply the latest in a long line of outrages committed in the name of fundamentalist religion. If anything it is comparatively mild compared to others: the Jim Jones death cult in Guyana (1978) led to hundreds of deaths when followers committed suicide by drinking poisoned orange juice at the command of their psychopathic pastor.

We need to demythologise fundamentalism. It is not a return to some pure, original form of a faith but a modern phenomenon rooted in a late 19th/early 20th Century reaction by segments of (initially) the Christian churches to critical theological thinking that sought to reconcile faith with advances in science, politics and culture – in short, with modernity. Biblical scholars came to see how the Bible was itself an intricate combination of sources and literary genres, sometimes drawn from sacred texts of other ancient cultures, that read the history of God’s encounter with humanity (i.e. revelation) in a variety of ways. Historical events were overwritten with ancient myth; theological truths were told through literary fiction (e.g. the meaning of suffering through the fantasy of Job) or poetry (e.g. the Psalms or Song of Songs). The same is true for other great religions.

This insight is nothing new. Early Church theologian Augustine commented that it was mad to imagine the world’s origins as happening literally in seven days. Medieval and early modern giants like Aquinas, Luther and Calvin were also all too aware of the distinction between truth as fact and truth as symbol. Their insights were mirrored in thinkers of other great faiths like Hinduism and Judaism.

Ironically one might say that fundamentalists’ obsession with literal truth was religious capitulation to the very pathology they fought: modernity’s abandonment of the truth we find in poetry and literature, symbol and imagination in favour of a narrow and bland ‘scientific’ literalism.

Fundamentalism also serves a more sinister purpose in many cases: cults of personality and dependence around charismatic pastors who either kept congregations in ignorance of new theological insights or were themselves poorly trained. Religious leadership can attract a range of personalities. Most (I hope) act out of faith in God and a genuine desire to help others grow in the love of God. Some, however, are authoritarian personalities drawn by a desire for power and sometimes wealth. And a few are just mad.

Why does fundamentalism (and dangerous fundamentalist preachers) exist? It claims to defend faith against modernity and doubt, at the price of us leaving our minds at the church door. It offers alleged certainty: because we are too afraid (and sometimes too intellectually lazy) to live and engage critically with religious and moral complexity we prefer to hand ourselves over to irrational religion. The result is that occasionally we end up eating snakes or drinking poisoned orange juice. Some, when they realise they’ve been duped, abandon religion completely. And to religious outsiders, fundamentalism makes all religion seem nonsensical. At bottom fundamentalism exists because we let it exist.

By Fr Anthony Egan SJ

[gview file=”http://adct.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/newsletter.pdf”]