The Shadow of Global Conflict at the Synod
Peacemakers in Africa and the Holy Land
In last week’s update on the Synod, I noted that while the gathering began with a keen sense that the war in Ukraine cast a shadow over its proceedings, the conflict in Israel and Gaza is now also a profound part of the Synod’s context. It’s important to remember, however, that even though these two conflicts have dominated the attention of Western media, they are not the only conflicts going on in the world, nor the only ones to impact the Synod participants.
According to ACI Africa, the Association of Episcopal Conferences of Central Africa (ACEAC), which represents the Catholic bishops from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Rwanda, and Burundi, held a three-day gathering in Rome from October 16-18, during the Synod’s third week. The Central African bishops made a commitment to “finding alternative paths to peace-building, peaceful conflict resolution and unity in the diversity of peoples” in the midst of the ongoing conflict in the North Kivu and South Kivu provinces of the eastern DRC, the latest in a string of devastating conflicts in Africa’s Great Lakes region going back to the 1990s.
Seven of the participants at the Synod are from the DRC, Rwanda, and Burundi. Undoubtedly the most prominent is Cardinal Fridolin Ambongo Besungu, O.F.M.Cap., the Archbishop of Kinshasa in the DRC. Ambongo, who is the president of the Symposium of the Episcopal Conferences of Africa and Madagascar (SECAM), the federation of all of the regional bishops’ conferences in Africa, was among the first Synod participants to speak at a daily press briefing, commenting on the process adopted during the working sessions. Cardinal Ambongo is joined at the Synod by two episcopal colleagues from the DRC, Archbishop Marcel Utembi Tapa of Kinsangani and Bishop Pierre-Célestin Tshitoko Mamba of Luebo. Bishop Georges Bizimana of Ngozi is representing Burundi at the Synod, and Bishop Edouard Sinayobye of Cyangugu is representing Rwanda. It’s not clear if any of these bishops attended the gathering of the ACEAC, or if they were occupied by Synod business.
Also present at the Synod are Sr. Elysée Izerimana, Op. S.D.N. from Burundi, who is the General Councilor of the Working Sisters of the Holy House of Nazareth, and the theologian Sr. Josée Ngalula, R.S.A., from the DRC. As I noted in my earlier survey of the Synod participants from Africa, Sr. Ngalula is a member of the Faculty of Theology at the Catholic University of Congo and Director of the Observatory on Religious Violence and Fundamentalism at that university, as well as the first African woman appointed to the Vatican’s International Theological Commission.
The Kivu conflict has waxed and waned since 2004 and has pitted the DRC’s military against several militia groups, some supported by the militaries of neighboring Uganda and Rwanda. Some of the militias are also funded by the illegal mining and trade of minerals like gold and coltan, the latter used to manufacture cell phones. A United Nations peacekeeping force, present in the country since the Second Congo War (1998-2003), is also a party to the conflict, and since 2020, the Islamic State - Central Africa Province, an offshoot of ISIS, has likewise participated in hostilities, despite the DRC’s small Muslim population (about 1 percent of the population). The Second Congo War was the deadliest conflict since the Second World War, with over 5 million dying from violence, disease, and starvation, and involved nine countries in the region, as well as several non-state militias, and yet was largely ignored in the West.
Cardinal Ambongo has criticized the international community’s lack of attention to the current conflict in the Kivu region and the ineffectiveness of the UN peacekeepers. He and the other bishops from the DRC have offered their support to peace negotiations to end the conflict. In their more recent statement, the bishops of the ACEAC reiterate their “gratitude to all those who, in the international community, within our governments, institutions and communities, are working tirelessly, sometimes at the cost of their lives, to restore hope of justice and peace to our peoples.” They also appeal to members of the Church using language associated with the synodal process, calling on them to “journey together towards the renewal of conviviality, respect for life and the dignity of each person.”
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In that same article on Synod participants from Africa, I explained that since 2020, there has been a remarkable string of eight military coups in six countries of West and Central Africa: Guinea, Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, Chad, Sudan, and Gabon. I mentioned this to note that some of the bishops participating in the Synod had taken on the roles of mediator or peacemaker in the wake of these coups, including Archbishop Gabriel Sayaogo of Koupéla in Burkina Faso and Archbishop Vincent Coulibaly of Conakry, Guinea. Other bishops at the Synod have been advocates for democratic stability in countries that have experienced civil war and other types of turmoil in the recent past, including Bishop Marcellin Yao Kouadio of Daloa and Archbishop Ignace Bessi Dogbo of Korhogo from Côte d'Ivoire, Archbishop Edward Tamba Charles of Freetown, Sierra Leone, and Bishop Anthony Fallah Borwah of Gbarnga, Liberia.
At America, Russell Pollitt, S.J. has an insightful article exploring the root causes of this wave of coups, focusing specifically on events in Gabon, the site of the most recent coup. Pollitt identifies weak states, fragile democratic institutions, dissatisfaction with poverty and social inequality among a growing population of young people, and the influence of foreign powers like France and more recently Russia as important factors contributing to coups.
Intriguingly, Pollitt points out that in Gabon, Church leaders, including Synod participant Jean-Patrick Iba-Ba, the Archbishop of Libreville, have been largely supportive of the coup. In other countries, in contrast, Church leaders have tended to remain neutral, instead advocating for peace or social cohesion. As Pollitt notes, however, Iba-Ba met with the coup’s leader and insisted that the new government act with respect for human dignity, suggesting a needed independence from the new government.
Writing for Crux, Ngala Killian Chimtom reports that the Catholic bishops in Ethiopia have expressed concern that the country may be on the brink of a return to violent conflict despite a peace treaty signed nearly a year ago, in November 2022. Like the Great Lakes region, the Horn of Africa, including the countries of Ethiopia, Eritrea, Djibouti, and Somalia, has been ravaged by a series of conflicts going back several decades.
In my article on Synod participants from Africa, I discussed how the leaders of the Ethiopian and Eritrean Catholic Churches, Cardinal Berhaneyesus Demerew Souraphiel, C.M. and Archbishop Menghesteab Tesfamariam, M.C.C.J., respectively, had contributed to peace between their two countries after a war lasting from 1998 to 2000, but with peace negotiations stretching until 2018.
More recently, from 2020 to 2022, the Ethiopian government was engaged in conflict with the Tigray regional government over the representation of Tigray in the federal government. Many Tigrayans also resented the 2018 peace treaty with Eritrea, which borders the Tigray region, because of lingering border disputes. Despite the fact that the Tigray conflict pitted countrymen against each other, it was shockingly brutal; thousands of civilians were killed, with many more dying from famine and others displaced from their homes. Cardinal Souraphiel and Markos Ghebremedhin, C.M., the Apostolic Vicar of Jimma-Bonga, both of whom are participants in the Synod, were advocates for peace in that conflict.
The current crisis in Ethiopia is centered on the region of Amhara, which is directly south of Tigray. Regional militias from Amhara have continued to engage in conflict with Tigrayan forces and have resisted becoming a party to the 2022 peace treaty. The conflict risks expanding, the bishops warn, because, so far, the Amhara militias have resisted calls from the federal government to lay down their arms. The bishops have reason to be concerned; the Kivu conflict in the DRC began when armed groups refused to participate in the peace process that ended the Second Congo War.
The recent Ethiopian bishops’ statement laments the deaths that occurred in the recent Tigray conflict and that continue in Amhara: “Our Church expresses its sorrow for the people who are dying in the war that is going on in the Amhara region. She will come before God and offer her prayer for their souls.” It also, however, chastises their fellow Ethiopians for failing to learn from the suffering of the past several years.
The Synod assembly applauded the participants from Ukraine when the gathering began, but it’s clear that a great number of the participants from Africa likewise carry the weight of conflict and turmoil in their own countries, as well. Although the violent conflicts and political upheaval plaguing Africa are reason for lamentation, it is nevertheless encouraging that so many Church leaders are emerging as advocates for peace “journeying together” with their people in the midst of violence and encouraging the faithful to build a “culture of peace” and to engage in “active nonviolence,” in the words of the ACEAC.
Although it’s important not to let the violence in Israel and Gaza overshadow other conflicts around the world, we also can’t ignore the human suffering and ethical dilemmas arising from the situation in Gaza. Speaking of episcopal advocates for peace, Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, has continued to provide a balanced but pointed message in response to the violence, condemning Hamas and the October 7 terrorist attack, but likewise condemning Israel’s cutting off of water and electricity supplies to Gaza, indiscriminate destruction of neighborhoods, and disproportionate civilian casualties (which have already surpassed 5,000, according to the United Nations). Warning of an ongoing cycle of violence, Pizzaballa has called for an end to the war.
Notably, although insisting that “war is always a defeat for humanity,” Pope Francis has not directly called for a ceasefire. As I noted in my reflections on the conflict last week, Francis affirmed Israel’s right to defend itself while condemning a “siege” of Gaza and insisting that humanitarian law must be respected. Although tentative, I reached similar conclusions in my own analysis, recognizing, like Francis, that Israel has a right to defend itself, but insisting that the right to self-defense is not an open-ended justification for the indiscriminate use of force. I expressed concerns that the actions taken by Israel up to that point, including cutting off water and electricity to the Gaza Strip and an order to evacuate over a million people from northern Gaza, suggested indifference toward considerations of noncombatant immunity and proportionality.
I believe those concerns have been borne out over the past week. Although Israel is yet to initiate a ground campaign in Gaza, it has engaged in hundreds of airstrikes, destroying wide areas of Gaza’s urban landscape and contributing to mounting civilian casualties. Complicating matters is Hamas’s practice of using civilian buildings as cover for conducting its own missile strikes into Israel, deliberately putting civilians in danger. Israel is also continuing to limit access to water and electricity, with only a trickle of humanitarian aid entering the region.
Perhaps just as damning as the disregard for civilian life is the fact that, other than wiping out Hamas, Israel has no plan as to what its strategic goals in Gaza are. With no intention of governing Gaza itself, it is not at all clear how Israel plans to establish peace in the aftermath of the hoped-far destruction of Hamas. As recent American experience in Iraq suggests, such lack of planning is likely to lead to long-term conflict with mounting casualties. As I wrote last week,
[The just-war tradition] asks us to think clearly and soberly about the consequences of actions and which choices will truly help us achieve the aims we set out to accomplish. If the stated aim of war is to defend Israel from attack so that it can live in peace, then waging a just war will mean conducting it in such a way that makes this outcome more likely and avoiding conduct that will contribute to the ongoing cycle of violence.
The problem is that Israel does not have a clear sense of what its aims are, therefore making it impossible to think clearly and soberly about how to conduct itself in pursuit of those aims.
Let us pray for peace!
Of Interest…
On Monday, October 30 at 7 pm Eastern, the Catholic Theological Society of America will host a virtual event, “The End of the Golden Era: Theology in the Age of Academic Precarity.” I will be one of the panelists, along with Catherine Punsalan-Manlimos, Kate Ward, and Mary Beth Yount. The event will focus on themes I have written about here at Window Light, particularly the challenges facing theologians working at universities and what the vocation of a theologian outside of academia might look like. Membership in the CTSA required to attend.
Back in September, Pope Francis made a surprise announcement that two bishops from the mainland of China would be attending the Synod in Rome, even though the Church in China had not participated in the synodal process. Both bishops had been selected by Pope Francis from a list approved by the Chinese government. Early last week, however, the two bishops left Rome without much explanation. Fortunately, The Pillar uncovered the reason: as a power play, the Chinese government had only issued them 10-day exist visas. The bishops, however, to demonstrate their independence from the government, overstayed their visas by two days before returning! Read the whole account for more details.
A few months ago, I mentioned that the state of Oklahoma had approved the country’s first publicly-funded religious charter school, St. Isidore of Seville Virtual School, run by the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City and the Diocese of Tulsa. Although some readers may disagree, as I stated at the time, I believe that a “pluralistic” system in which public funds support a variety of religious and non-religious private schools, alongside public schools, would have advantages over our current public school system, if all families were provided equitable access to quality schools of their choice (a big “if”). At the time, the Republican governor of Oklahoma offered his support to the school, while the Republican attorney general expressed objections. Now, that attorney general, Gentner Drummond, has filed a lawsuit against the state’s Virtual Charter School Board for approving the school on First Amendment religious freedom grounds. Although there are valid constitutional arguments to be made here, the lawsuit is also couched in bigotry: “Today, Oklahomans are being compelled to fund Catholicism. Because of the legal precedent created by the Board’s actions, tomorrow we may be forced to fund radical Muslim teachings like Sharia law. In fact, Governor Stitt has already indicated that he would welcome a Muslim charter school funded by our tax dollars. That is a gross violation of our religious liberty.” The case will likely hinge on whether the Board can show that Oklahomans are not being compelled to “fund Catholicism,” but rather to fund secular educational goals carried out by a religious institution. As the attorney general’s own remarks make clear, it is hard to argue that the opening of the school represents the establishment of a particular religion, since the funding is available to schools affiliated with any religion.
Coming Soon…
The Synod Secretariat has announced that they will release the Synod’s synthesis document on Saturday, so I will delay my weekly update on the Synod for paid subscribers until Saturday evening or Sunday morning so I can read and respond to that document. I am excited to read what the Synod participants and theological experts have to say, even though the document is likely to be inconclusive and written as a guide for the second Synod gathering next year. Stay tuned.
Once the Synod is over, I am hoping to return to interviewing fascinating people working in theology and ministry, so keep an eye out for future interviews.
On a personal note, for those readers who have been following my professional and vocational journey, at the end of this week I will start a new position as the assessment coordinator for the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at the University of Iowa, working part-time for now and starting full-time in December. I am excited about the opportunity and happy to continue working in higher education, but this also means that my vocation as a theologian will be separate from my employment, which will be an interesting journey. I still believe my vocation as a theologian will continue to be grounded in my participation in the community of theologians, for example the CTSA and the College Theology Society, and in my research and writing, not least the Window Light newsletter. But figuring out how that works will be an ongoing adventure, but one I know I don’t embark on alone!
Thank you for putting the wars in Ukraine and Israel in the context of wars in Africa. I did not know how destructive the Second Congo War was.