AFRICAN JOURNAL OF CONTEXTUAL THEOLOGY

African Traditional Ethics for Environmental Sustainability

Peter I. Osuji — 2025-03-05

The importance of environmental sustainability cannot be overemphasized. But it has only recently gained traction in bioethics discourse in the West. Contributors to this traction include Pope Francis’ Encyclical, Laudatio Si', and the Paris Climate Change Conference. Conversely, environmental sustainability is ever present in African traditional ethics, albeit unrecognized in the Western discourse. Therefore, I concur with the African scholars that African traditional ethics is intrinsically orientated towards environmental sustainability, fostering the same values essential for sustainability. But I further argue that this sustainability is directed towards what I call the “cosmic communal good.” To achieve this aim, I outline the following traditional principles and concepts of African traditional ethics: relatedness of all things, cosmic harmony, the cosmic common good, life force (vitality), the interest of the future generation, and respect for the earth; and discuss how they relate to environmental sustainability. Hopefully, this paper contributes to the discourse and literature on environmental sustainability and amplifies the traditional African values and practices essential for the achievement of ecological sustainability.

The Renewal of the Parish in terms of Ecclesial Communion and Mission: Road to Proper Catechesis, Authentic Pastoral Care and Evangelization in Nigeria

Amobi S. Omeayo — 2025-03-05

The consciousness of the Church as a communion of the people of God on mission as we have it today belongs to the ecclesiology of the Second Vatican Council. From this ecclesiology, we learn that the Church exists to evangelize; a sensibility that was not rife until after the Council. However, to realize herself truly as an evangelizing entity, the Church has to be well-positioned by renewing herself in terms of the new ecclesiology. The idea of communion implies that the entire people of God has to precede the hierarchy in the order of ecclesiological importance and that benefits should no longer be disproportionately slanted in favor of the latter. That is why the renewal has to commence in the parish since it is therein that the people of God are concretely found. If the parish is the place where the people of God are concretely found, it means that efforts should be made within the context of the renewal to remove all the structures that promote diocese-centered mentality in order to allow parishes to function well as the preferred place for catechesis and other pastoral actions. The parish ought to become a community of praxis so that Christians can learn in practice and develop their charisms for the purpose of evangelization. Too much concentration of evangelical projects in the diocese at the expense of the parish can lead to “economy of exclusion” and exploitation. The idea of laboratory ecclesiology has to be developed so that it will be easy to provide employment opportunity for the youth, financially run the Church and reach out to the marginal persons.

The Catholic Church and Football in Nigeria, Today and Tomorrow: A Socio-Theological Assessment

Adolphus Ekedimma Amaefule, SDV — 2025-03-05

With a popularity that cuts across tribe, class, religion, culture, sex, physical constitution, and politics, football has become almost a Nigerian game. Apart from the government, many individuals, religious bodies and organizations played significant part towards its attaining such a status. One of such religious bodies is the Roman Catholic Church. In the past, this was mainly through its mission schools which produced many notable footballers, coaches, and administrators. This article, however, examines the nature of her involvement with football, today, and, then suggests ways of ensuring a much more engagement in the future so as to enhance not only the development of football in the country, but, also, the Church’s overall work of evangelization.

Nigerian Spiritans and Prophetic Witnessing in their Homeland

Charles Ebelebe, CSSp — 2025-03-05

The Spiritans (Holy Ghost Fathers and Brothers) appropriate the mission statement of Jesus in Lk 4:18 in which Jesus speaks of his being anointed by the Holy Spirit to bring good news to the poor, to proclaim freedom to prisoners, recovery of sight to the blind and to set captives free. Nigeria currently has the greatest number of Spiritans world-wide, so it is an important demography in the Church’s missionary apostolate. This essay examines how Nigerian Spiritans are living out this mission statement of the Spiritans in their homeland, Nigeria, challenged as it is by poverty, insecurity, corruption and other factors that diminish human flourishing. The essay will do this by highlighting some of the missionary engagements of Nigerian Spiritans, with a view to establishing their fidelity to their prophetic calling. It concludes that while Nigerian Spiritans have reasons to celebrate their accomplishments, much more is expected of them in the living out of the prophetic mission.

The Church’s Role in Liberating the Poor: Jesus’ Peaceful and Strategic Approach to Empowering the Marginalized

Titus Aliyu — 2025-03-05

This paper examines the Messianic identity of the life and death of emphasizing his self-identification with the marginalized and liminal people. The work looks at Jesus as the foot print of a Crusader for justice, who pitched his tent with the poor and the suffering, against the tax collectors, the Pharisees and the Sadducees. Jesus’ revolution started from a radical solidarity with the down trodden. He overlooked those of high class and started from the oppressed. With respect to the liberation of the poor, this paper assesses the enthusiasm that Jesus sparked in the poor and the marginalized of his era. The paper equally evaluates the fact that those individuals understood Jesus, and Jesus knew how to respond to their questions and their needs. It also looks at Jesus as a pioneer in the development and liberation of the down trodden and identifies the strategic options he employed to protect them from oppression. A multi disciplinary approach was adopted and the findings reveal Jesus Christ as a ‘suffering servant’ in relation to the reality of poverty, and marginalization experienced by the poor of his time with the conclusion that the need to care, provide and protect the poor and the marginalized is deeply rooted in the Bible. The paper recommends that the Church as Christ’s offshoot should befriend the oppressed and create programs that will help reduce oppression, poverty and promote social welfare in our Nigeria society.

A Critical Examination of the Concept of Homosexuality in the Bible and its Implications for the Contemporary African (Nigerian) Context

Philemon Ibrahim — 2025-03-05

The African Church is still seeking the proper way to address homosexuality and the act of homosexuality through its daily quest for better hermeneutical interpretation of biblical texts without African cultural influence and biases. This paper uses a historico-grammatical method to critically engage the biblical texts for their contribution to the existing interpretive discourse of the passages that condemned homosexuality. The author evaluates the context of Genesis’ and Leviticus' prohibition of homosexuality as a form of counter-narrative to the Ancient Near Eastern culture of the Old Testament and argues that the New Testament writers, especially Paul and the apostles, condemned the act of homosexuality as a counter-narrative to its Greco Roman culture too. The Israelites were warned not to engage in such homosexual practices because they were exclusive of the community of Yahweh. The early Church also followed suit to distinguish itself as a new Israel and an exclusive community ofYahweh through salvation in Christ Jesus. Therefore, the paper submits that the present Church must join the war of counter narrative against homosexuality that is rooted in the Old Testament and has its bearing in the New Testament to speak against the act of homosexuality today irrespective of the cultural indifference, prohibition or legalization of homosexuality. This condemnation of the act of homosexuality in the Church must be done in the sense of embracing homosexuals without compromising the counter-narrative of the Old and New Testaments regarding homosexuals today.

Aladimma: A Model for True and Lasting Post-Nigeria/Biafra War Reconciliation

Iwejuo Isidore Nkwocha, CSSp — 2025-03-05

In a world that is bedeviled with constant conflicts and wars, the need for a model of conflict resolution that can produce a lasting peace and reconciliation cannot be over emphasized. While the Western world focuses on retributive justice in conflict resolutions, Africans pay more attention to restorative justice. The aim is to reconcile and restore a lasting peace between the conflicting parties. Africans, therefore, have models of conflict resolution like palaver, ubuntu, and aladimma for example, that focus on reconciling conflicting parties and restoring severed relationships in such a manner that the conflicting parties go away at the end not as enemies, but friends without at the same time letting the perpetrators get away with impunity. This paper explores the concept and rite of aladimma, an Igbo process of reconciliation. It avows to its functionality and proposes it as a model for a true and lasting post-Nigeria/Biafra warreconciliation. It gives a brief recommendation on how to go about it.