Pope Francis has begun his visit to the peoples of the Democratic Republic of Congo and South Sudan from Jan. 31 through Feb. 5 for his fortieth apostolic visit abroad. The Democratic Republic of Congo is the primary stop on his visit to the African continent, where he’ll remain until Friday, Feb. 3. Pope Francis has said he’s on a “mission of peace” to those African nations.
The D.R.C. is wealthy in mineral wealth, and though it won independence in 1960, it has continued to be embroiled in political, tribal and even interreligious conflicts. It is usually the most important Catholic community in Africa—45 million Catholics, about 50 percent of the D.RC.’s total population.
I interviewed Toussaint Kafarhire Murhula, S.J., a priest, political analyst, and the director of Centre Arrupe, a middle for research and formation in Lubumbashi, on the country’s southeastern tip, ahead of the primary visit a pope has made there in 38 years.
This excerpt of the interview has been edited for length, clarity and elegance. You may also watch the interview in full on our YouTube channel.
I do know the eagerness, the enjoyment, the preparedness that individuals have put into just welcoming this moment and living through it, since it’s such a novel moment.
Ricardo da Silva, S.J.: This visit of Pope Francis was postponed last July when Pope Francis could now not travel due to the problems he was having along with his knee. What does the visit now mean for the people and for Pope Francis?
Toussaint Kafarhire, S.J.: In early July, the Congolese people and South Sudanese people and the whole continent of Africa, I’d say, were very wanting to receive Pope Francis. And I can inform you the quantity of disappointment that they felt when the visit got canceled.
Pope Francis was capable of make a visit to Canada where he met with the Indigenous community and apologized for all of the wrongs that the church did prior to now to the community. And at that time, I feel, in Africa, people began feeling bad. They felt as in the event that they weren’t considered. They felt that because Africa has at all times been at the underside of the world’s interests, that Pope Francis just canceled that trip. But that was not the explanation.
On Nov. 1, the Feast of All Saints, Pope Francis held a synodal conversation with the youth from Catholic universities across the continent of Africa. I can remember very clearly the query that a young Congolese lady put to Pope Francis, directly. She asked Pope Francis, teasing him, I suppose, “Holy Father, are you able to tell us whether you were scared by all of the wars and conflict and violence occurring within the Congo that made you cancel your trip?” And he or she added, saying, “People from different religions around us are literally teasing Catholics that their pope is a coward.” And Pope Francis, after all, laughed about it. “But,” he said, “I actually have recovered. I’m strong enough. I’m still in a wheelchair, but I promise I can be coming by the tip of January.”
I do know the eagerness, the enjoyment, the preparedness that individuals have put into just welcoming this moment and living through it, since it’s such a novel moment.
We consider there isn’t a other consolation the people within the Congo, or in Africa, would expect. It is de facto a moment that we wish to live in spiritually and humanly.
What’s the importance of this visit? Tell me what the emotion and feeling is like on the streets.
Now the frustration is getting vindicated, I’d say, because Pope Francis is holding his word. And he just isn’t that well; I mean, he’s an old man of 86 years, but as soon as he recovered from the injury within the knee, he was on the way in which. He was like a pilgrim, like St. Ignatius Loyola himself, occurring a pilgrimage to the peripheries.
Persons are waiting for this moment to only be within the presence of the Holy Father. It’s in itself a message—just his being there’s a reminder that that is what the Gospel is alleged to be. We’re hopeful, we’re joyful, we’re excited. We are only waiting for this moment to occur, to have the opportunity to wish along with the top of the Catholic Church, who’s our father in faith. On this regard, we consider there isn’t a other consolation the people within the Congo, or in Africa, would expect. It is de facto a moment that we wish to live in spiritually and humanly.
Give me a way of what is occurring, on the bottom. What is that this need that Pope Francis is coming to reply to? What are the conflicts?
Pope Francis, if you happen to take a look at most of his trips, just isn’t someone who’s going to the places of power and wealth and luxury. Pope Francis just isn’t coming to this wilderness of human rights, of the suffering of individuals to only shake the hand of the top of state. No.
Pope Francis is coming to this existential periphery, to precise the closeness of God and the compassion of God for the individuals who have suffered a lot. And the alternative of South Sudan and the D.R.C. could be very meaningful.
The D.R.C.’s entire history has been fraught with a variety of violence. From colonization to today, the Congolese people have suffered an important deal due to the wealth of the country. And even now, as Pope Francis is coming to precise that closeness, compassion of God, he could be very much aware that the issue just isn’t the Congolese people, who’re very hospitable, loving people.
The powers of the world that covet the wealth of the Congo wish to keep a really weak government within the Congo in order that they’ll proceed to get the benefits of timber, coltan, gold, all of the minerals, even the soil. Once you get to the Congo nowadays, you’ll just be appalled by the way in which a handful of wealthy people have monopolized the land, the wealth, almost all the things, on the expense of the poor. And Pope Francis is coming to remind us that what we want is love, human rights, social justice, right distribution and just the dignity for which each single human being was created.
The Catholic Church has been very, very outgoing, and we’re very lucky. We’re very grateful also to have such a committed, dedicated Catholic Church.
These are covetous international powers which have come to plunder the country of its mineral wealth, amongst those, many developed nations? The D.R.C. has a troubled history with america?
Yes. It’s unlucky that america and most of those powerful countries, developed countries, as you call them, they speak one thing and so they do the other. They call it politics, they call it realism. Once you read “Fratelli Tutti,” I feel it’s a robust message that the pope is getting on the market reminding politicians that actually, politics just isn’t about lying to people or exploiting the those that we’re alleged to serve. Pope Francis is reminding us that the younger generation of individuals are getting disinterested, completely, in politics due to those corrupted actions, due to the fraud, due to all the things that goes against the common good. Pope Francis is reminding us that we want that conversion to come back back to do the suitable politics.
Are you able to talk over with us in regards to the country’s Catholicity? What does “Catholic Congo” appear like?
The country has for the last 30 years been completely destabilized; partly due to the international policies of neoliberalism, which even Pope Francis has been stigmatizing, in some ways. Privatization and the death of the general public service and the general public sector is felt almost all over the place.
And the Catholic Church has been one in every of these institutions that has are available in to fill out the vacuum of whatever the federal government was alleged to be doing, when it comes to public education, when it comes to health provisions, when it comes to so many other social actions and commitments.
The Catholic Church has been very, very outgoing, and we’re very lucky. We’re very grateful also to have such a committed, dedicated Catholic Church. I feel most individuals in Africa would agree that the Conference of Catholic Bishops of the Congo is probably the most vocal and the strongest on the continent with regards to matters of politics and social issues.
There’s a lot hope in Africa, despite each challenge that individuals are going through, and it gives you a pause, and also you wonder: How are you going to explain this paradox? Where is that this joy coming from?
In case you were advising Pope Francis, what would you say he must bring when he involves the D.R.C.?
If I needed to expect any words of wisdom from Pope Francis, it’s to proceed to be outspoken because the church must be, because it has at all times been, and speak truth to the powers. The people in Africa usually are not on the neck of one another, but more often than not it’s politicians who instrumentalize their background, their communities, ethnic communities, to only get access to that power, to that wealth, and so many other things. I feel what we actually need probably the most now in Africa is to set the record right and speak the reality. And that truth must be spoken to politicians who wish to relativize all the things.
Human life has develop into relative to wealth and power, and we don’t need any of that. We’d like to place the human person at the middle of communities, societies, structures, institutions, wealth, work, all the things we do. We’re doing it in order that human beings will be human beings again. And so we wish Pope Francis to remind us of those truths that nobody can change, irrespective of where you’re, the colour of your skin, the quantity of education you may have acquired, the wealth that you may have gathered: that a human being is a human being and deserves respect unconditionally.
One in every of the ways during which we regularly hear Pope Francis seek advice from Africa is he says, Africa is the guts of Catholicism, right? It has joy. There is important joy. And so what’s that—as an African myself. What’s the joy amid the strife?
There’s a lot hope in Africa, despite each challenge that individuals are going through, and it gives you a pause, and also you wonder: How are you going to explain this paradox? Where is that this joy coming from? How can these people still be so human, or so humane—I don’t know learn how to put this—despite every violence? I feel, initially, that we’ve to agree that the standard of religion amongst our people is something we cannot take away from them.
Last yr, Pope Francis sent a bunch of theologians from internationally to the existential peripheries. And Pope Francis reminded the theologians, you’ll hearken to people. You usually are not going there with the quantity of data that you may have acquired in universities and degrees. It’s worthwhile to go to those people and hearken to how God can surprise you thru their life stories.
How much voice are we giving to the feminine body of the church?
Perspectives on the Synod on Synodality: women, sexuality, clericalism
You’re referring to the Synod on Synodality. We frequently hear that girls in Africa aren’t speaking up, gay people in Africa aren’t speaking up. And yet we’re getting this from the synthesis document within the synod saying that internationally, individuals are speaking up, women and the L.G.B.T. community. What are the problems that you simply’ve heard coming from the D.R.C.?
We’re still very strongly a hierarchical church. The church continues to be a really strong, rigid institution where power is distributed, after all, among the many male bishops and priests. However the world is de facto on the move, and it is due to those rigidities of power that many other abuses of power occur. I do know that African theologians are literally looking into spiritual abuses, sexual abuses—that we usually are not talking about. Perhaps individuals are still very shy to speak in regards to the gay issue. Although the gay community still exists. I mean, there are gay Africans who’re on the market and invisible, not-recognized people.
However it’s a part of what perhaps we want to hearken to because synodality is about listening. We must be prophetic enough to not hearken to ourselves and our fears, but to essentially hearken to what Pope Francis would call the “promptings of the Holy Spirit.” Where is God calling us in today’s world to be witnesses to the Gospel? I used to be listening to the pope recently, and he was saying, it just isn’t right to mistreat people just because they’re gay because it just isn’t a criminal offense to be a gay person. But in Africa, I feel we’re lagging behind because people will inform you we’ve more pressing issues than those of sex, sexuality and whatever. It’s like a luxury topic.
From what I’m hearing you say, you’re saying that individuals are aware that the church has a hierarchical nature, that the church has systems which contribute towards systems of violence, and so they are speaking out, they’re saying it’s enough. We’d like to revise who we’re as church.
Changing the culture could be very difficult. People wish to shake off the clericalism of the church. I feel actually we simply need to acknowledge that the way in which power inside the church is distributed is biased. I mean, it’s skewed toward the male figures. And so what’s the role that girls have been playing inside the church? How much voice are we giving to the feminine body of the church?
Pope Francis goes to say to young people, “It is rather vital, the work that you simply’re doing, the torch, the lights, that you simply are bearing, you’re carrying, and we want to maintain running with that.”
I remember a woman who reminded us: “Fathers, if you end up preparing your homilies, please don’t insult our intelligence. Because within the audience, you may have many ladies who got here with a hunger, the thirst for the word of God, and so they really need you to organize rightly and properly your homilies. But don’t come to inform us the rubbish said just because you may have that stole around your neck and since you may have been ordained. Remember there are lots of female theologians now who know higher than you who were your professors. And don’t just abuse your power to inform us anything.” I discovered it very deep and really powerful. And so women expect to see some changes begin to occur, to have spaces open for discussion, for conversation, for rethinking the form of communities that we wish to construct as a Catholic Church in Africa: authentically African, authentically Catholic.
We all know that Pope Francis goes to fulfill with priests and consecrated religious people while he’s in Kinshasa. What else is of significance?
Pope Francis goes to be meeting with the victims of violence and wars from eastern Congo. We’re sure Pope Francis is coming to precise compassion to this group of individuals. After that, Pope Francis is talking also to the youth and the catechists.
Pope Francis is the hope of this vibrant but additionally growing church, inside the youth and the catechists. So if changes must occur, what form of message, what form of legacy or faith are we handing right down to the younger generation, but at the identical time, what’s the content that we’re putting in our catechism today? Pope Francis goes to talk over with these groups to say, “It is rather vital, the work that you simply’re doing, the torch, the lights, that you simply are bearing, you’re carrying, and we want to maintain running with that.”
It’s our hope that the political sphere is one other area where Pope Francis can be addressing one other existential periphery inside the Congolese periphery.
After that only is when Pope Francis goes to fulfill, perhaps, with the priests and non secular men and girls. I feel Pope Francis goes to remind religious men and girls that we want to play that prophetic role. Because we discuss clericalism. And clericalism is when perhaps we content ourselves with a minimum, bare minimum, actually, because we’re covered by the institution. It is nearly like that parable that Pope Francis likes to cite fairly often in regards to the Good Samaritan, right?
You may have a priest who passes by and goes his way because he’s on duty. He doesn’t wish to defile himself. And that clericalism style is what Pope Francis is telling us: “You quit that attitude, that position. There are numerous expectations from people, and you must be on the market with the people of God without fear. The spirit to receive just isn’t a spirit of fear, St. Paul would say. However it is a spirit of freedom that sets us on the market to profess, to proclaim Jesus.”
One other area I actually consider [in] strongly is that of addressing the political class, the politicians. Lots of them are Catholics. We’ve got 45 million Catholics; half the population, meaning they arrive to the church every Sunday, they receive Communion every Sunday. But with regards to the sphere of acting just or acting rightly, our structures and institutions overwhelm their willingness to do what is true. How can they be good Christians and good politicians at the identical time? Good Catholics and witnesses of the Gospel in places where they’re working? It’s our hope that that’s one other area where Pope Francis can be addressing one other existential periphery inside the Congolese periphery.
You spoke about light, and bearing light. What’s the light that you simply are most hoping for with this visit?
I see Pope Francis reviving our way of being Christians within the twenty first century.
We’re coming from a past that’s heavy. We’re going to a future that’s lighter but with the sunshine of Christ. Pope Francis is a Jesuit, and I like when Pedro Arrupe tries to define a Jesuit, and he says, “It’s just Christ and attempting to imitate Christ.” The sunshine is, “How can we start to be Christ to at least one one other again?”
That’s the sunshine, the hope that I hope.