FR
EN
QUESTION 126
Hello Papa. First of all I would especially like to thank you for the attention you give to us young seekers of God.
When I observe our Church and how it works I am troubled; and yet I am there every day and always; but for a while now, “my reason speaks in me louder than my faith,” and when I am convinced that at the end of an effort I can obtain a reward for something I throw myself into it wholeheartedly, like many of my age; my goal here, then, is to be certain that “I have sown my seed on good soil” Mt 13:23.
I have often reproached my mother for sometimes visiting “witch doctors,” but each time she answers me, “yes, you are a Christian, I understand you, I too believe in God, but do not forget that it was the white people who brought us this doctrine of Christianity to silence our values and take advantage of us.” This sentence may seem trivial but it sometimes makes me rack my brains, especially about the image our Church has adopted, before which we spend whole days bowing down and adoring (Jesus). I must say that I believe in God the Father almighty, but honestly not in the image (photo) adopted for his son, who is our savior. So my questions are to know: is it really Jesus displayed everywhere in our parishes? Or simply a representation? If it is simply a representation, could I use someone else’s image instead?
Furthermore Papa, several saints have been canonized in our Church, in particular Mother Teresa for her works of charity, Saint Thomas who died a martyr for his faith, etc.…. “Holiness is acquired at the end of a long and meticulous procedure examining the life of a deceased person who sought to identify with Christ.” In Africa, we have several who distinguished themselves, notably NENGAPETA of the DRC who chose to die a martyr in 1964 to preserve her purity, BEKANJA the Congolese who endured atrocious suffering and died of it in 1909 because of his faith, GHEBRE-MICHAEL martyr of Ethiopia who refused to be cowardly in his faith when Catholics were being persecuted; he was imprisoned at Gonda in May 1854 and subjected to great torments, fasts, floggings, humiliation…. He ended up being killed by the emperor. In the case of Cameroon, several martyrs died for such a cause; in 1958, in the very heart of the rebellion in the west of the country, “maquisard” rebels burst into the parish of Toumi in the village of Bamendjou and decided to kill the young parish priest, Father Thomas Fodjo; the young cook Gabriel SOH asked to be killed in the priest’s place, which was done. Our Church is still awaiting to this day the canonization of this martyr, and yet, in the Gospel according to St. John, Jesus says, “there is no greater love than to give one’s life for those one loves” Jn 15:13.
Faced with so many things Papa, I wonder: is it a negligence on the part of our clergy, from the standpoint of their reluctance to initiate the process of canonizing these brave Martyrs? Or is it simply a mockery by the VATICAN? For I do not know 5 African saints out of hundreds, and yet it is the most believing continent!
I pray God to guide and inspire you so that the answers I receive from you may be a lamp for my life, a lever of restoration, for Papa I hear a cry within me ceaselessly whispering to me to the rhythm of the sound of this verse: “Lord, hasten to answer me, for already my spirit grows dark.” Ps 143:7.
Justin
ANSWER
I would first like to encourage you, for you seem to be a young person who seeks the truth, a young person who seeks God. Moreover, you ask questions that allow you to obtain good answers. You must keep doing this, even by seeing the priests of your parish, in case you still have any. Our ancestors, for many of them, sincerely sought God. ‘And he has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, having determined their preappointed times and the boundaries of their dwellings, so that they should seek the Lord, in the hope that they might grope for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us’ (Acts 17:26-27). Whoever seeks justice seeks God.
As for the number of canonized African saints, you are mistaken. There are hundreds of canonized African saints: see the list of a few of them here http://peres-blancs.cef.fr/Calendrier_des_Saints_africains.…
Nevertheless, you must know that the process of canonization requires a great deal of financial means and begins at the level of the dioceses concerned, which often do not have these means. In any case, there are thousands of saints who will never be canonized but who truly are saints. Remember the feast of All Saints on November 1st.
As for the white people who proclaimed the gospel to us, they also brought us many other good things such as education, despite the fact that there was the very dark spot of colonization or slavery.
Statues and images are only representations. You surely have some in your album, in your life. Faith does not consist of statues or images but of Jesus. But these representations are a visual aid for our faith (Num 21).
The New Testament is also a historical book, and there we see that the gospel was not proclaimed only to Africans but in fact to the whole world, beginning with the Europeans themselves, Rome. The gospel is intended for all peoples.
Do not be disturbed. Live your faith calmly. Jesus is the only name by which we are saved. He takes nothing away from us. It is we ourselves who willingly and freely run to our own ruin. The center of the Christian message is love. Love, and you will be a saint.
Henri Bayemi
