SPECIAL REPORT • MISSION IN AN AFRICAN CONTEXT

Jesus Christ Our Ancestor

Mission means inculturation, namely the Gospel taking root in every culture. An eminent pioneer of African theology was the Tanzanian born, Prof. Charles yamiti. One of the founders of the East African Catholic University in Nairobi, he taught theology for many years there. His contribution to Christological reflection in Africa was outstanding: “Who is Jesus for Africans in their cultural milieu?”

BY Laurenti Magesa | Hekima University College, Nairobi

IN THE strict sense of the concept, ‘African theology’, as a theological genre within the Christian churches (and, in the specific case of this article, within the Catholic Church), is barely 60 years old. The notion began to be boldly proposed and openly claimed only in the 1940s and 1950s. It was understood to denote a distinctive way of thinking about and articulating the Christian faith tradition by taking seriously into account, African spirituality, culture and religion. By this was meant the comprehensive way of understanding the world and their place in it by the black peoples of the African continent.

Two texts published during these decades were seminal in the rise and development of African theology in the evident scientific sense. One was the book titled, La Philosophie bantoue (or Bantu philosophy in its English edition) by the Belgian Franciscan missionary in the Congo, Placide Frans Tempels. It was first published in 1945. The other was called Des prêtres noirs s’interrogent (Black priests are wondering). The latter was a compilation of articles from a consultation of a group of African priests studying in France at the time. It was published in 1956. Both books in their own way, raised consciousness within the Church and beyond about the necessity and urgent need for thinking about and living religion ‘in an African way’.

Two giants

To the question: “Who is the most outstanding symbol of such academic African theology today?” The answer is very easy. Any serious student of theology in Africa will come up with two names in the blink of an eye, especially where the English-speaking region of Africa is concerned. Besides the Kenyan Anglican Canon, Prof. John S. Mbiti (1931–2019), the other name to be mentioned quickly will be that of the Catholic Tanzanian priest, Prof. Charles Nyamiti (9 Dec.1931–19 May 2020). Whereas Mbiti specialised particularly in the field of African religious philosophy, Nyamiti worked in the area of theology proper. Without any doubt, these two have been the leading and enduring voices in the African theological field.

Charles Nyamiti served as a professor of theology since 1984, at the Catholic University of Eastern Africa in Nairobi, Kenya. Nyamiti was one of the founder-lecturers at that establishment which was known then as the Catholic Higher Institute of Eastern Africa (CHIEA). Before, he had lectured at St Paul’s National Major Seminary at Kipalapala, on the outskirts of Tabora town, in the north-western parts of Tanzania. He was assigned there in 1976, shortly after completing graduate studies in theology, social anthropology (or ethnology) and music composition at the Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium, and in Vienna, Austria respectively.

African rites and symbols

Young Nyamiti’s theological studies in Belgium were standard in Catholic perspectives, at the time heavily tinged with European ethnocentric biases in terms of expressing the Christian faith—but he had already manifested a remarkable interest in employing African symbols in expressing the Christian faith. Some people explain this away as merely coincidental, but it seems to many of us much more accurate to interpret this in terms of Divine providence that guided him to orient his studies towards an Afrocentric emphasis, despite the dominant European academic environment at the time. As illustrations, we may refer to both his Master’s and Doctoral theses to show this inner inclination.

For both degrees, Nyamiti concentrated on the processes and meanings of the rites and rituals of initiation to adulthood as practised in some African ethnic communities, in view of the understanding of corresponding sacraments in the Catholic Church. He intended to show that, despite the differences of approach between them, African indigenous and Western Christian approaches to these rituals were matching in terms of the meaning and intention at their core.

To say this may not be shocking today, but in 1966 and 1969, when Nyamiti wrote and defended these ideas, they were intellectually and doctrinally revolutionary, if not heretical, to say the least, even if Vatican II had just concluded.

Theology brewed in an African pot

It was this zeal for creating a “mature, adult and dignified way of conceiving, perceiving and talking” about the Christian faith in the African milieu that formed Nyamiti’s theological preoccupation throughout. Again, it involved the issue of how to express Christian mysteries without in the least, adulterating the sense of Christian belief.

In summing up Nyamiti’s lifetime work, we can indeed distinguish in it between what one of his students, Prof. Mika Vähäkangas, characterises as Christianity served in “foreign vessels” and what another African theologian, Agbonkhianmeghe E. Orobator, describes as a theology “brewed in an African pot”. Nyamiti worked tirelessly for the latter.

African theologians would agree with Vähäkangas that “there are few people who have dared to venture as far as Nyamiti… in constructing a complete African theology, covering the whole field of dogmatics”. In a field now quite replete with individual theologians and theological associations, in one way or another interested in the field, this is no mean compliment. I claim that, in doing what he has done, Nyamiti has lifted African culture to a status that is “equally capable and worthy as any other to be a receptacle of Christian values in the African context”. Here we have Nyamiti’s greatest bequest to African and, indeed, world Christianity.

It was this zeal for creating a “mature, adult and dignified way of conceiving, perceiving and talking” about the Christian faith in the African milieu that formed Nyamiti’s theological preoccupation throughout

Nyamiti’s struggle had been to unearth values deeply embedded in African beliefs and behaviour that, in the words of Joseph T. Djabare, “can unlock the African soul and open it for an authentic union with Christ”. Pope Paul VI had already affirmed this in his Message to Africa in 1967, saying: “Many [African] customs and rites, once considered to be strange, are seen today … [to be] worthy of study and commanding respect”. These include, in the Pope’s mind, the Africans’ “spiritual view of life”, their “idea of God”, “respect for human dignity”, and “the sense of family and community life”. All of these the Pope viewed as “providential” insights. It is to these that, in his theological method, Nyamiti had sought to offer Christian expression.

In line with this intuition and goal, Pope Francis wrote in his recent Apostolic Exhortation, The joy of the Gospel—Evangelii Gaudium (EG): “We cannot demand that peoples of every continent, in expressing their Christian faith, imitate modes of expression which European nations developed at a particular moment of their history, because the faith cannot be constricted to the limits of understanding and expression of any one culture. It is an indisputable fact that no single culture can exhaust the mystery of our redemption in Christ” (EG 118). The core of Nyamiti’s work captured this truth.

Who Christ is for Africa

One outstanding contribution by Nyamiti to theological discourse in Africa that will be remembered above all, is in the area of Christology. Who is Jesus for Africa? Who is Jesus for Africans in their cultural milieu?

Early on in his reflections, Nyamiti proposed the image of ‘ancestor’ to depict the identity, mission and ministry of Jesus as one that the majority of African peoples could easily understand and relate to. His African Ancestral Christology has been lauded throughout the continent as a theological breakthrough. Nyamiti’s seminal publication in this area, titled, Christ as our Ancestor—Christology from an African perspective, is identified as “monumental” by one of his former students, Prof. Patrick N. Wachege.

In many of his writings, Nyamiti constantly returned to this theme as central, as well in terms of appreciating the mission and ministry of the Church in Africa. In view of the values rooted in the African worldview, as was explained previously, Jesus is the Ancestor par excellence in the “Family-called-Church” or in “the-Church-as-Family”. Canadian Africanist scholar, Diane B. Stinton explains why, on account of the indisputable “vital role” ancestors play in African life, the vast majority of African theologians “lend various degrees of assent and priority” to this image of Jesus Christ as our Ancestor.

Nyamiti proposed the image of ‘ancestor’ to depict the identity, mission and ministry of Jesus

On this issue, Nyamiti was not merely theoretical. He put it quite clearly that the “most decisive step” in the development of African (Ancestral) Christology will only come when “it is allowed to enter into the magisterial teaching of the Church”. His call to African theologians and the African Church at large is that the goal of Christological thinking in the African continent should be to enable this perception of Jesus Christ “to influence, as far as possible, the doctrinal formulations of African bishops’ conferences and synods”.

Even during his earthly life, Nyamiti was popularly known and referred to by his students as ‘ancestor’, on account of his wisdom. Now that he has gone to join the ancestors in reality, the African Church must remember what an African saying reminds us all: “To forget one’s ancestors is to be a brook without a source, a tree without roots”. It is a grave responsibility we owe to this illustrious giant of African theology, Charles Nyamiti.

The Scriptures similarly enjoin Christians in this regard: “Remember your leaders. They taught God’s message to you. Remember how they lived and died, and copy their faith. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. Do not let all kinds of strange teachings lead you into the wrong way. Depend only on God’s grace for spiritual strength, not on rules about foods. Obeying those rules does not help anyone.” (Heb 13: 7–9).

The African Church remains ever grateful to God for the life and theological thought of Prof. Charles Nyamiti.