12 febbraio Webinar – Popolazioni indigene, valori universali e pensiero sociale cattolico
12 febbraio Webinar – Popolazioni indigene, valori universali e pensiero sociale cattolico.
WEBINAR: Indigenous peoples, universal values and the Catholic Social Thought.
At the request of and in cooperation with the Foundation’s head office, in partnership with the Luxembourg Diocese, Cœur Vert Luxembourg and LH Europe–Grand-Château d’Ansembourg, The Earth Elders, La Maison de l’Afrique Luxembourg and the Panafrican Federation of Traditional and Customary Authorities, the Luxembourg Chapter was honoured to organise a webinar on 12 February 2025 on the topic of: Indigenous peoples universal values and the Catholic Social Thought, moderated by Christophe Déage, Coordinator of the Luxembourg Chapter.
The keynote address was given by H. Em. Card. Hollerich, who will explain why the situation of indigenous groups, often suffering marginalization discrimination and exclusion, is of great concern for the Catholic Church. Card. Hollerich invited every participant to pursue through honest dialogue the search for the autochthonous seeds of our universal values that, because of their universality must be found in all different cultures and traditions.
Then the floor was given to the different speakers from the indigenous or original cultures asking them to describe their situation, their concerns, the problems they are facing, the enrichment they can provide in this time of crisis and the response they expect.
Speakers and participants started to expose what they expect from the dialogue between original peoples and the universal Church, expressing through this conversation their interest to listen, to engage, to meet and share, and to have a fruitful dialogue.
The webinar has provided promising information to participants and signaled the interest to set in motion a process of information sharing, encounter, dialogue and cooperation. It concludes identifying what are the next steps should be for mutual benefit and enrichment:
– To become pilgrims of hope on a path of conversion, through honest dialogue, to create harmony and become a little more ‘like Christ’, i.e. imbued with universal values and the wisdom experienced over thousands of years by the original peoples.
– One of the results of this approach is the welcoming of new cultures: for example, Queen Diambi is fully a traditional Queen, representing her African origins, but she is also fully an active Luxembourg citizen, committed to the common good.
– Another outcome is, in cooperation with all like-minded people and organizations, the creation and dissemination of new paradigms that will adapt to the challenges of our time. To do this, we need to turn to the concepts that underpin our thinking through honest and harmonious dialogue.
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Prof. Paolo Garonna, Chairman of the CAPPF introduced the webinar, focusing on the importance of indigenous peoples in the world and explaining why the Catholic Church and the Foundation attach great importance to indigenous peoples, about 400 to 600 million people, with 5000 different cultures and more than 4000 native languages, often struggling with a lot of issues. Prof, Garonna underlined that there are two more specific reasons and questions why the Church is interested with this dialogue: first what Pope Francis designates as ‘inculturation’: when we approach different cultures, we really need to speak like in the Pentecost all languages and make ourselves familiar with all cultures. The second reason is the relation between indigenous cultures and globalization, and the quest for new models based on common good, on a global economy and society based on friendship and on universal values.
His Eminence Jean-Claude, Cardinal Hollerich, Archbishop of Luxembourg, who honors the Luxembourg Chapter of the CAPPPF as its ecclesiastical Counsellor, emphasized that globalization has been linked with mission : the same people came to “The new world” to make trade and to do the missionary work” and that it has been often a bad alliance to put this together, in other words, colonialism– even though those missionaries also wrote the first grammars and dictionaries of so many languages. Among other, the recent travel of Pope Francis to Canada was a honest occasion of apology.
But apology is only valid if we try to make better afterwards. Indigenous peoples have the right to keep their ancestral lands, and we have to get along those who are sacrificed through economical game. Already this month, in February, we have used all the resources which were allowed for us for one year. We have to learn from the wisdom of these people, learn to get along with nature and with earth so as to avoid “an economization of humanity”. But if economy and the game, if the profit get absolute, if they determine all the economic activities, we will destroy humanity.
So, being on the side of indigenous people, fighting for their rights also means fighting for humanity. We have to hand over to the next generations an earth on which they can have happy lives. The faith communities, of course the Catholic Church, but also all the other religions, we together, have a big responsibility for the happiness for humanity in the future. For this, we need conversion, and conversion is only established in dialogue with people. Therefore, this dialogue is also a journey which will help us to become a little bit more Christian and a little but more Catholic.
H.H. David Foka, the European Representative of the Panafrican Council of Traditional and Customary Authorities explained that the main objective of the Council is to make use of the knowledge, experience and ancestral know-how in the prevention and management of conflicts and crisis. With the Maison de l’Afrique that he chairs in Luxembourg, he tries to help African people gain self-confidence and get rid of their complexes and become aware that aid and charity should not become a prison.
H.M. Diambi Kabantusuila, Queen of the Bakwa Luntu tribe of Central Kasaï, in the historic Kingdom of Luba, now in the Republic of Congo, described how in recent history universal values that Christianity carries, such as love, peace and respect, were used as a tool for domination, for euro-centrism, and eroded the core message of the Christ of redemption, the Christ of love, the Christ of how we build together a society based on respect of all differences, the Christ that believes that we are all equal and the children of the same God. The message did not correspond to what was seen in fact.
It is why she works on building bridges and make people understand the different cultures, and why people acted in certain ways, and to look at history in a way that we use the lessons and mistake to shape a much better present and tomorrow. The Ancestors of indigenous people accumulated for hundreds of thousand years an immense life experience, they used to live with what we call ‘universal values’, with how to live together, how to build community, how to survive, how to respect each other – and how to interact with different life systems and how to find places in them. We need to recognize that originally, God created one human being and that we are all descending from this one. Therefore, we are all brothers and sisters. The reverence for ancestors in Africa refers ultimately to the common Ancestor which is God, the Creator God, this wonderful intelligent energy which manifests itself in everything. When European ancestors went to conquer the world, they failed to see the wonderful heritage that was already built. Instead of building from and upon an amazing heritage, we started to destroy this heritage.
Most African peoples did not have a religious faith, but they had a spiritual practice. They understood that everything that God is, is written in God’s Creation. So it suffices to be in tune with God’s Creation, observes it to understand God’s mind and those values and laws that God placed upon us, upon this earth so as to live an harmonious life, understand the different cycles and how we have to interact, considering that everything is the manifestation of divine forces, God, and that there is a divine reason behind all of that.
Women have always been transmitters of cultures, educators and the farmers. they have also a role in economic activities, they engage in craftmanship, they produce a lot of things that are sold on the markets. Women have also a role of council on leadership. In African values, power is not a male attribute, but a female attribute. However, the male attribute is the one of authority. Therefore, authority and power have to work together in order to deliver a very harmonious and balanced leadership so as to deal with every situation in a more balanced way.
We have to re-imbue ourselves with these universal fundamental values and may-be re-structure the discourse about the collaboration between the Catholic Church. In this way, we have a chance to become Christ-like – and it what matters, as it drives towards the best choices for us, for life, for the planet and how we interact with each other.
Mindahi Batisda, the founder of the Earth Elders, emphasized that Intercultural and especially spiritual dialogue is highly need in this time. Humanity as a specie is away from the original principles, the cosmic ethics, nature. Every day we are losing possibilities lying in the diversity. We need spiritual knowledge to recover wisdom: what to do with information, how to carry on a dialogue based on a science and a technology that gives life. We also need to go beyond the doctrines that are even continuing to exercise domination. Those we call indigenous people are actually the original peoples. Some sacred objects and sacred documents are still in possession of the Vatican and they need to go back home. Sacred sites also need to be freed of exploitation. Dialogue needs to be held in responsibility.
Masaaki Nagai, as representative of the Kannagara tradition, which consists in always seeking to align one’s actions, thoughts and motivations with the will of the One, as the Origin and the great benefactor of the Creation. It is the ancient wisdom tradition coming from the Jomon civilization or culture, spanning more than 16 000 years. It is basically a way of life, in living in harmony with the will of the Creator, and therefore with all our world family of brothers and sisters. We are all family members. Similar types of paradigms or frameworks presently talk about value-based principles, such as SDG’s of the United Nations, the Gross National Index of Bhutan, the thought of Teilhard de Chardin and Thomas Berry. Another paradigm is proposed by the Earth Charter, and of course Laudato Si. So, with the network of the Kannagara tradition, we intend to find like-minded individuals and work together to help shift the current materialistic oriented civilization to something which is more spiritually oriented. This can only be done through dialogue.
Thomas Antoine added that we are not talking there about a rational approach, but a relational approach. Every member of our world family is different but we love them and we want to build something with them. The key word in the dialogue with different peoples is ‘harmony’. When you are in a logic of hospitality, you welcome someone different from you in the “common home”, it is what is interesting. If not, it would be a cloning factory.
Alessandro Politi mentioned that examples of the past on how other crises have been solved is of good inspiration to the help overcome present crisis, even if actors say it is impossible to find a solution or an interlocutor. The dialogue of today is the occasion to launch this hope over the world.
Prof Garonna concluded the webinar in coming back to His Eminence’s words: “it’s an experience of conversion for all of us.”: We are all pilgrims of hope in this jubilee year and I this hope can only be achieved through dialogue. DIA-LOGOS, logos is God. Through dialogue, we are in a sacred land.
We are also creating new cultures. The living example is Queen Diambi. It is amazing how much she represents her traditional background, she is fully a traditional queen, coming from Africa, but she is also a Luxembourg citizen. There might be some tension, abut we all live through tensions, and there is no inconsistency.
So the question is how we can build a common culture without losing our own specificities and features, commit themselves to work for an agenda for peace and for the protection of nature and the environment, and for establishing brotherhood like in Fratelli Tutti.
Eventually, the climax was brought about by Cardinal Hollerich in these terms:
We have to look to the concepts which underlie our thinking. For example, I have been very happy to be corrected during this webinar: not to speak about indigenous people, but about original peoples.
We know from university discussion that the paradigm of progress is not the actual paradigm anymore. Still, this paradigm of progress underlies most of economic activities, and that this paradigm of progress is destroying people. Therefore, we must find different concepts for conceiving a world in dialogue and in harmony. Dialogue is needed to maintain harmony, otherwise this harmony gets distorted and new models of domination are being established. To bring about an honest dialogue together is a prerequisite for finding new paradigms.