frica is the continent with the highest annual percentage growth of Christianity in the world,” said cardinal Francis Arinze, Prefect of the Congregation for the Congregation of the Divine Cult and the Discipline of the Sacraments, during the presentation of the guidelines for the second Assembly for Africa of the Synod of Bishops.
The cardinal noted the vivacity and growth of the African church testified by the creation of “new parishes and dioceses” and by “the growing number of monasteries and superior ecclesiastic institutes”.
The Nigerian cardinal remembered the various beatification cases being heard, including that for former Tanzanian president Julius Nyerere, who died on October 14, 1999.
Africa is the continent with the highest annual percentage growth of Christianity in the world.
The “concrete initiatives for Christian solidarity toward the poor and the needy are encouraging for an African church that does not lack specific ‘Commissions for Peace and Justice’, which among other things – he said – “also help to educate citizens about their rights and their duty to vote”.
The cardinal also recalled the situation in Somalia, Darfur, Cote d’ Ivoire and Democratic Republic of Congo, indicating the church “as one of the few institutions able to take care” of refugees in search of better conditions. They still constitute a challenge for the harmonic and peaceful construction of African countries made up by “numerous ethnic groups aggregated in a single country,” “as well as poverty misery and AIDS”. Cardinal Arinze also noted the sign “of greater democratization”’ realized by the uncontested victory of opposition parties in Senegal, Ghana, Malawi e Zambia.
(From MISNA)