Africa Matters

Summer 2006

Summer is here: As I prepare to travel to Uganda the end of the week, I look forward to a number of events and activities: a celebration at home in honor of mothers 75th birthday; hosting a number of American friends in Uganda, including Michael Budde (Chicago), Rich and Terrie Payne (Duke Institute for Care at the end of Life), members of Share the Blessings; the ordination to the priesthood of two good friends ; overseeing the construction of three wells for three village communities (funded through Share the Blessings: http://share-the-blessings.org); a trip to Italy, early July, for a meeting of Catholic Theological Ethics in the World Church, in Padua, where I will be reading a paper on “AIDS, Africa and the ‘Age of Miraculous Medicine’. I intend in the midst of these activities and events, comings and goings, to find time for rest and renewal.

Looking Back 2006

I cannot believe, though, it is already June, and a year has gone by since my last post. I must admit, I have done a bad job keeping this webblog up to date. I wish I could send regular updates on ‘current’ events and happenings, so that you do not have to read about what happened last year only now! But there is a sense in which not keeping up to date can be a gift in that it forces me if not to live in memory, to at least, try to remember the past. This can have its grace, for in remembering one often has a better perspective of things and events. That is why, as I remember the year that has been, I am more amazed at the number of journeys that I have been on, and even more so, by the way in which all these journeys continue to lead back to Africa.

May 2006: Center for Reconciliation: Building Momentum

As soon as the classes were out, Chris and I moved on full speed to work on the book series on reconciliation, and to write the lead title in this series, as well as develop some other programs of the Center. Both Chris and I are particularly excited about the Great Lakes Leadership Training Institute Program, through which the Center, in partnership with other key organizations working in the region, will host yearly institutes on the region to train, nurture, and support leaders through a biblically based informed vision of reconciliation. We hope to launch this initiative with a catalytic of key leaders, to be held in Kampala in November.

As I look back to the year that has been, its activities and journeys, it is now very clear that even though Duke might seem to be a long way from Africa, in a strange way, my being at Duke seems to bind me to Africa in far deeper and more enduring ways than I had anticipated. A clear confirmation, at least for me, that all journeys lead back to Africa.

Spring 2006: Journeys of Reconciliation Class

What a great experience, co-teaching with my colleague and co-director Chris, a class on Journeys of Reconciliation, exploring with a group of 16 students the convictions at the heart of the Center for Reconciliation. For the first two months of the course, we were blessed with the gift of Bishop Macleord Baker Ochola, retired bishop of Kitgum, Northern Uganda. He brought to the class not only the gift of personal journey through faith, pain and hope, amidst the madness of the war in Northern Uganda, but a wealth of cultural idioms and stories through which to understand the journey of reconciliation.

Winter 2006

Mid January: A brief stop over at home on the way to South Africa for annual IAAC meeting of SAC: Johannesburg, SA

Early February: at Catholic University of America, for a public lecture on "Pope John Paul II and the Future of the African Church," at the Graduate School of Theology.

November: Two crucial Meetings

November 16-18: Indianapolis at the Christian Community Development Association (CCDA) gathering: over 2000 attending. Highlighs of the meeting: a standing room only workshop led my Chris and myself on 'From Genocide in Rwanda to Peace in Boston and LA'; and a lively consultation with Jim Tyree and others of Stand for Africa.- an organization commited to spread awareness and respond to HIV/AIDS in Africa. http://www.standforafrica.org.index.html . The Lord keeps sowing seeds of hope.

From Indianapolis, I flew directly to Philadelphia for the AAR/SBL - a meeting of a completely different find: the biggest academic gathering of the U.S. - almost all PhDs and PhD wannabes: lots of brilliant ideas and lots of brilliant books to sell. Making a transition from Indianapolis (community development, practical focus) to Philadelphia (world of brilliant 'ideas') was not easy. Fortunately, the paper I read dealt with matters of life and death: AIDS in Africa. Speaking in the African Hermeneutics Group, I pressed the need to embody Hermeneutics of Life in the Academy: "Embodies and Embodying Hermeneutics of Life in the Academy: Musa W. Dube's HIV/AIDS Work." http://www.sbl-site.org/Article.aspx?ArticleId=510

The launch of the Center for Reconciliation

Taking cue from an African proverb: "if you want to go fast, walk alone; if you want to go far, walk with others," Chris and I hosted a vision casting gathering of 50 remarkable leaders to cast the Center for Reconciliation and hear feedback on 'what can such a center distinctively contribute?' The feedback helped shape the Center towards three strategic goals: 1. cultivating new leaders; 2. communicating wisdom, insights, hope, and practices, and 3. connecting in partnership to strengthen leaders globally, nationally and locally. At the launch, as Chris and I lead a plenary session within the Pastors Convocation under the general theme: A new Creation: Building a Ministry of Reconciliation Conference' - I was all the while intensely aware that Duke is a long way from Africa. But as we shared the key convictions about the journey of reconciliation, it was clear that the vision of the center was very much about things I deeply cared about: Africa and a new future for Africa.

Talking about a New Future for Africa: November saw the release of my new book. A Future for Africa (Scranton Press) a mix of essays ranging from Idi Amin's legacy, to AIDS, the Rwanda Genocide... http://press.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/hfs.cgi/00/170775.ctl A Future for Africa was also featured on the Duke Divinity School Website Spotlight page for March-May: http://www.divinity.duke.edu/news/spotlight/afutureforafrica/

But November also brought another strange: the gift of a house in Durham- a home away from home. My nephew, Godfrey , and his fiance, Agnes, visited my in this new home, and we were able to celebrate Christmas as 'family'. With this gift I am humbled and yet constantly reminded: "If the Lord does not build the house, in vain do its builders toil (Ps 127:1).

October 2005: Oklahoma and the Gift of the Center

Earlier in October, I was at Oklahoma State University at the invitation of Michael Bartley and the Wesleyan Foundation, to give the annual Lecture Series on Pacifism and the Christian Tradition. The topic for my lecture was not the Oklahoma bombing memorialm which I had visited earlier in the day, but, 'Pacifism, Politics and Christianity in Africa': On the Resurrection of the body (politic). http://www.theotherjournal.com/article.php?id=115

Share the Blessings in Uganada

Following the Pilgrimage of Pain and Hope, it was time to welcome another group of visitors , from St. Michael's church in Cary and Sacred Heart, Pinehurst: hosted by Share-the-Blessings. The highlights of their visit: launching two water projects and attending ordination to priesthood of more than ten young men. Two close friends of STB, Sebastian and Steven, were ordained to the Diaconate.

Pilgrimage of Pain and Hope

A week later, a group of 16 Duke students and staff joined their first group of visitors on a 'Pilgrimage of Pain and Hope' to Uganda and Rwanda. In Rwanda, we met survivors and church leaders, and visited genocide sites, where the memory of genocide is still too fresh. The most memorable challenge came from the Archbishop Emmanuel Kolini; Talking about the church's failure during genocide, Kolini noted: 'how do we form Christians who are capable of saying no to killing. We wer simply baptizing but not educatiing."

Duke Divinity School in Uganda

First, the Dean Greg Jones and his family responded tp my invitation to 'come and see' Africa. He was joined by my collegue, Chris Rice and his family. The highlights of their stay: a visit to my home and school; a day at our Lady of Lourdes parish in Nakasongola, where two DDS students spent a summer of Field Education; a day with Emmanuel Cardinal Wamala, who hosted us to a sumptuous lunch on a boat cruise; an evening of stories of pain and hope from leaders working in the conflict in Northern Uganda.

July-August 2005

I spent close to two months in Uganda, which was a time of rest, renewal and fellowship with family and friends. It was also a time for drawing other, from America, into the journey of Africa.

A Center for Reconciliation at Duke University

A new initiative is underway at Duke Divinity School- the Center for Reconciliation- and I have been invited to be part of it, to help set its vision, design its programs and provide leadership as co-director. 

I sit in my office thinking about this invitation, and the words of St. Paul come to mind:  “All this from God who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation.” (2 Corinthians 5: 18). I am therefore both reminded and encouraged by the fact that reconciliation is God’s mission – and in fact, he has already set its vision (in Christ): we are simply invited to become part of God’s vision of a reconciled universe. But I am also reminded by the fact reconciliation is a journey, a process that involves a gradual transformation of the old creation into God’s new creation: "If anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away. See everything has become new…”

And so, I also think of the journey, the many journeys, that have led me into, and shaped my vision of,  this ministry...

Pattaya, Thailand

September 29- October 5: I was in Pattaya Thailand, as part of the Lausanne Forum for World Evangelization – one of only two Catholics (and one Orthodox) in a meeting of over 1800 Protestant, mostly Evangelical leaders from around the world; a theologian in a world of mostly practioners and activists. Chris Rice, then a student in our M Div program at Duke, was asked to convener Issue Group 22 (on reconciliation), and he invited me to be part of the group, and to contribute from with my gifts as a theologian, as a Catholic and as a scholar whose research and teaching focused on issues of politics and violence in Africa and called on the church to be a new imagination.

In the course of the year, I met a couple of times with the leadership team in Durham(Duke University) and in Rwanda(July 2003), and helped to shape the key concept paper for our Issue Group 22. It was in Thailand however, that we met for the first time all the 54 members of the issue Group – drawn from all over the world, representing various organizations and ministries.

During the course of one week, we prayed together, listened to stories of pain violence from the many places of brokenness in the world; discovered signs of hopes; we studied together, debated and revised a concept paper, "Reconciliation as God’s Mission," and concluded the meeting with a ritual of foot washing: Hutu and Tutsi washing each other’s feet; male and female; Jew and Palestinian, black, white and Asian; Orthodox, Catholic and Evangelical pastors…. In this ritual, we captured the vision of reconciliation: a church on her knees washing feet- in humble service- across the many divides and brokenness in the world. We came out of Thailand with a sense of common mission and shared convictions about the nature and shape of reconciliation as God’s mission and of the church as both the sign and agent of God’s reconciliation.

Durham: October 2004

On returning to Duke, I was eager to get back to my regular work in theology and world Christianity (and Chris Rice, who had now finished his degree program at Duke was thinking of going to Africa, possibly to work with the Mennonite Central Committee). Then Dean Gregory Jones surprised both us with an invitation to shape the vision and provide leadership to a center for reconciliation. There was a sense of interruption; a sense of anxiety, and yet a feeling of being drawn into something of God’s doing, something new and exciting, a story bigger than our individual stories, and bigger than Duke. In this time of uncertainty and discernment, we began to feel a sense of call (encouraged by the words of a dear friend of Chris who even in the midst of uncertainty would say, “God is doing something new. I do not know what it is, but I am so glad to be part of it.” I was equally encouraged by Greg’s leadership, as by the bond of friendship and shared convictions between Chris and myself – and grateful that a Protestant and a Catholic; an activist and a theologian; black and white; an American and an African; a student and a former professor will be working together, learning from each other and jointly shaping the vision and providing the leadership for the center.

End of Year in Africa

I gave a tentative yes to the Dean, but told him that before a final commitment I needed to consult the ancestors back home, and get inspiration from mother Africa. So, in December, I traveled to Africa, first, to confer with my Ordinary (archbishop Emmanuel Wamala), and then onward to Rwanda, where I spent ten days. Ten years after the genocide, the memories, stories, bones and bodies of the genocide are still painfully fresh. As I visited genocide sites and listened to stories by survivors , I became more attentive to the wider story- the story of Rwanda, which formed Hutu and Tutsi identities. I was reminded how the stories that form our lives are ‘hidden’ – and to get to the violence and brokenness that marks the life of individuals, communities and nations, one must also engage these underlying stories. Otherwise, the church herself becomes simply an actor in this wider story of violence.  But I also came to Rwandato discover signs of hope- ten years after the genocide. There were signs of hope: from the many weddings; to the faces of children;  a genocide survivor providing hospitality to possible perpetrators; Chantal Mujjamawolo and her classmates – school children willing to die together rather than divide among Hutu and Tutsi.

Christmas at home

Home - Malube (Uganda) for Christmas.   Praying, dancing, and eating together - with family and friends:

Unless you hear the mouth eating, you cannot hear it crying"- a Rwandan proverb. So true.

South Africa

January 2005: South Africa, where I re-lived the story of apartheid, its brutality, violence and depravity- On Robben Island as well as in the Apartheid museum in Johannesburg, I came fact to face with the power of apartheid. I was overwhelmed by the sense of the depth to which human beings can go to control, exploit, humiliate and subjugate others in the name of power. And yet,  also discovered the hope which the stories and lives of people  like Mandela, Robert Subukwe, Patrick Matanjane and Michael Lapsely point to. Genuine hope, born of born of reconciliation, forgiveness and healing – in being a ‘wounded healer’

And then, a beautiful day at Cape Point: the south-most tip of Africa; where the Indian ocean and the Atlantic meet; East meets West; a vision of reconciliation: not just a journey, but also the meeting place,  the intersection of many journeys: sin and grace; violence and peace; past and present and future; justice and forgiveness…

After a 3 day meeting of the Annual International Academic advisory Council at St. Augustine’s College of South Africa, I travel back to Durham, ready to embark on the vision of the center, and to other journeys together with Chris...

And many other journeys -with Chris

A vision of the center emerging out of these journeys, and many other journeys (together with Chris) to places of pain and hope: to Mississippi- the home that shaped Chris: 17 years at voice of Calvary: An opportunity to relive the story of race in America– and to see the challenges of reconciliation; to Sandtown in Baltimore to discover hope (New Song) amidst inner city brokenness and hope; to (EMU) Eastern Menonite University in Virginia, to learn from their Conflict Transformation program; to Coventry (UK), to form a Global Reconciliation Network; to Chicago, for speaking engagements at a local church at De Paul University (lecturing to political science majors on Thomas Sankara and 're-inventing the future in Africa'), to New York....

On these and many other journeys  Chris and I had lots of conversations about shared convictions; we read together and discussed seminal texts; we cast visions and goals of reconciliation; we explored the landscape of Peace Studies; learnt many lessons from the places and people we visited as we put forth dreams and plans for the center at Duke.

A New Center, a Unique Vision

As we look forward to the launching of center in October 2005, we are very excited by among other things: 

* its unique vision: grounded in Biblical story of God’s reconciliation; and yet attentive to the many forms of brokenness in the world; committed to the naming of signs of hope, and ever calling on the church to be a sign and agent of reconciliation.

* its diverse programs: bringing together practioners and theologians; activists and scholars; involving areas of teaching, research, formation of leadership and ongoing partnerships and collaborations with other leaders in the US; in Africa; and in the world.

* its exciting possibilities: seeking to be a catalyst for reconciliation; a space for learning, for Sabbath, for ongoing transformation; an intersection.