MIL OSI Translation. Region: Italy –
Source: The Holy See in Italian
Vatican Media
by Gianni ValenteRome (Agenzia Fides) – With the arrival in Jakarta of the flight from Rome, the 45th international apostolic journey of Pope Francis began. The Bishop of Rome, at almost 88 years of age, is making the longest journey to meet the Churches and peoples of Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, East Timor and Singapore. He moves along routes that take him far from the places of war and power struggle on which the attention of the global media system is focused. “Reality is seen better from the periphery than from the center”, Pope Francis once explained, in an interview given to a parish bulletin of Villa la Càrcova, a slum in Greater Buenos Aires. “Normally”, Bergoglio added on that occasion – “we move in spaces that we control in one way or another. This is the center. To the extent that we leave the center and move away from it, we discover more things”. A suggestion also present in the studies of the Argentine philosopher Amelia Podetti (1928-1979), known to Pope Bergoglio when she was young. She also repeated in her lessons that Europe had “seen” itself differently after the voyage made by Ferdinand Magellan to circumnavigate the earth. Looking at the world from Madrid was not like looking at it from Tierra del Fuego: the view was wider and you could see things hidden from those who looked at everything from the “center” of the empire. Even Pope Francis’s trip to Asia and Oceania can help us grasp important details for the path of the Church and for the current world scene. Details often missed or obscured in the prevailing conformisms in the media representation of the present time. In many areas of Asia, Christian communities, due to given conditions, live dynamics that are in some ways close to those of the apostolic beginnings of Christianity. A perspective that in this historical moment should be kept in mind even in countries of ancient “Christianity”, where growing majorities, especially among young people, no longer have a real interest and a vital, existential contact with Christianity. The condition of living in “plural” contexts culturally shaped by great religious traditions such as Buddhism, Islam and Hinduism is the condition for the majority of Christian communities in Asia. This also brings them closer to apostolic times. In particular, the Indonesian case, with the substantially harmonious coexistence with the Muslim majority shows that Christian communities, in their flourishing among peoples, find ways to avoid becoming hostages to the logic of “clash of civilizations”. In East Timor, ecclesial communities have shared the troubled path of the history of this young nation. They have immersed themselves in that historical process. Going through that time of trial, participation in ecclesial and sacramental life has grown, and now there is an urgent need to heal the wounds and also help reconciliation with Indonesia. The baptized have confessed their faith immersed in the history of the country. Sharing the pains and hopes of all. Also in Papua New Guinea, as in many countries in Asia and Oceania, the local Churches guard the grateful memory of the memory of many missionary martyrs. The local Catholic communities, also encouraged by the teaching of Pope Francis, are following paths of adaptation to the contexts, gradually erasing the prejudice that reads and represents the entire relationship between Christianity and Asia in terms of “cultural colonization”. While the missionaries who will meet Pope Francis attest that the mission, going out of one’s own spheres to announce to all the love and salvation of Christ, does not represent outdated customs, but continues to flourish as a gift of Grace that continues to make the Church live. Christianity began in Asia and does not “return” to Asia as a religious correlate of the West. The communities of baptized people that he will meet along the journey, rooted in the context, are not “foreign bodies”. This is especially important in the current historical contingency, where everything is interpreted in terms of opposition and “struggle” between the so-called West and everything that is not the West. (Agenzia Fides 3/9/2024) Share:
EDITOR’S NOTE: This article is a translation. Apologies should the grammar and/or sentence structure not be perfect.
