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Save the Date! Save the date! ●Interreligious Pilgrimage to the Holy Door Friday 18 NOVEMBER 2016 AT 5PM (DEPARTURE FROM CASTEL SANT’ANGELO) ●SEDOS General Assembly Thursday 1ST DECEMBER 2016 FROM 3PM TO 5PM, UISG HEADQUARTERS (PONTE CASTEL SANT’ANGELO 28) SEDOS BULLETIN Editor: Peter Baekelmans, CICM Administrator: Cristina Giustozzi, SMSM Secretary: Leila Benassi Editorial Board: Celine Kokkat, JMJ Philippa Wooldridge Advisory Board: Marina Cassarino, SMC Arlindo Dias, SVD Veronica Openibo, SHCJ André Schaminée, MAFR Kathy Schmittgens, SSND Gisela Schreyer, MSOLA Lissy Sebastian, RNDM Emili Turú, FMS The digital version of the bulletin and some translations of the articles can be found on the SEDOS website: www.sedosmission.org Editorial Dear Readers, The present bulletin carries the theme “Inter- country in which they live: democracy, free- religious Dialogue”. The leading article is by dom of expression, etc. However, this is some- Michael Amaladoss. From his Indian experi- what of a contradiction because many of them ence he remarks the following: “While religion state that they belong to Islam, although per- rises above culture in its meta-cosmic dimen- haps more in terms of culture than religion. It is sion, it remains rooted and integrated with cul- difficult to denounce the culture in to which ture in its cosmic dimension. Inter-religious di- one has been born.” Here, the multi-culturalism alogue becomes complex since it is between re- has not yet grown into an inter-culturalism. ligions at different levels, namely cosmic and Opposed to the struggle of the dialogue with meta-cosmic.” For instance, are Asian practices Islam in the Belgian-European context, the ex- such as Yoga and Zen cultural practices or reli- perience of Egidio Picucci in Antioch among gious practices? If they are cultural they can be Catholicism, Orthodox Church, and Islam there adapted by Christians. However, the Church on the level of the parish is a friendly one. It tends to look at them as being religious, meta- encourages us in our belief that it is possible to cosmic. According to the author, we also have dialogue also on the parish level with other re- to free evangelization from its colonial context, ligions inter-cultural as well as inter-religious. so that it does not become a power game. For The last article is more on the level of theo- instance, is being a sannyasa Hindu or Indian? logical dialogue. John O’Brien points out For Le Saux it was Indian, and so he did not see through a thorough study of documents and his- a problem to dress as a Catholic monk in or- tory that the false belief in Islam, that Jesus did ange -as sannyasi do. Lastly, Amaladoss makes not die on the cross but instead Judas died, an appeal to implement the spirit of Second comes forth from a misreading of a particular Vatican: namely that the building of the King- passage in the Koran. dom -mission/evangelization- can only be done If the five-year old Document on how to re- through inculturation, collegiality, and dia- late with other religions as a Christian had been logue. written today, the aspect of “forgiveness” in The problem of inculturation relating to inter- this Holy Year of Mercy would surely have re- religious dialogue we find again in the next ar- ceived an important consideration. Dealing ticle on Islam in Europe by Agustin Arteche with people of other religions is not different as Gorostegui. He is of the opinion that side by within our own religion. We cannot be perfect side with inter-religious dialogue one needs to as human beings in our love for the religious embrace an open and respectful “inter- neighbor. SEDOS has therefore taken the initia- culturalism”. In speaking from his own person- tive to ask forgiveness to other religions for our al relations with Belgian muslims he observes wrongdoing –and to forgive their wrongdoing that there is a movement for openness towards to us- by going through the Holy Door together other religions. However, the power of money with them two days before the doors will put up by petroleum-dollars blocks this evolu- close… Be there! Or join from a distance in our tion in many countries and creates a tension praying together there at that moment. within Islam itself. The author then goes on to We close our bulletin with News Today where describe the situation of Islam in Europe and we ask attention to one of the six saints that sees there the same movement on the rise, but were canonized by Pope Francis this month of with another tension added: “Surveys show that October: Sister Elisabeth of the Trinity. Her young people identify with the values of the short life and great teachings stick to the heart: to live and experience Christ every moment of our life, for better or worse. 1 Michael Amaladoss, SJ Gospel-culture encounter as intercultural and interreligious dialogue: an Indian experience The Gospel is already an inculturated docu- be avoided and have to be taken into account. ment: the Aramaic discourses of Jesus as un- Even today, Christianity would be popularly derstood and narrated in Greek in their own identified with European dress and customs living context by four different communities. and organ music. A look at its liturgical ritu- When it encounters a particular community als will only confirm this impression. The with its own culture it becomes an intercultur- Hindu fundamentalists declare Christianity al encounter. Intercultural encounters also take (and Islam) foreign, not only by origin, but al- place in other contexts like migration, com- so culturally. merce and conquest and have their own rules and problems linked to social and cultural Interculturation favoring Cultural power. A more developed culture seeks to Dominance dominate a less developed one. In a colonial Evangelization as intercultural encounter situation, the subject culture tries to adapt it- evokes also another problematic perspective. self to the dominant one. Proclamation of the Though today the Gospel comes to a commu- Gospel will have to take into account such fac- nity embodied in a complex of other cultures, tors. For example, India becomes Anglophone Greco-Latin-European, since the Gospel because of British colonialism. At the reli- transcends all cultures and seeks to become gious level, for instance, people belonging to a incarnate in every culture in view of trans- more developed cultural level were ready to forming it (cf. Evangelii Nuntiandi, 20), the follow Jesus as their Guru, while hesitant to community hearing the Gospel should try to join the Christian community seen as socially free it from its cultural embodiment through and culturally foreign. Even at the popular interpretation, interact with it and respond to level we have today a group of Kristubhaktas it, embodying and expressing it in its own cul- (devotees of Christ), who pray to Christ, but ture. This happened in the early Church, giv- have not become institutionally Christian. On ing rise to many ritual traditions. That such a the other hand, socially oppressed groups like Gospel-culture encounter will take place in the the Dalits (untouchables) and Tribals embrace context of an intercultural encounter is inevi- Christianity precisely because of its different table, but secondary, since the local culture and politically dominant culture in order to es- keeps its identity and dominance. But such in- cape the locally dominant Hindu/Indian cul- tercultural encounter becomes problematic ture and religion. The Christian schools may when the culture in which the Gospel comes also have mediated a British culture and scien- embodied is to be considered normative. To- tific and technological modernity with it, fur- day, some think that the encounter of the Gos- ther strengthened today by the global media. pel with Greek culture is providential. Since Some missionaries may have promote Christ- this encounter is of the Gospel with human ianity as an element of socio-cultural devel- reason and since human reason is universal, opment. The process of conversion to the the Gospel-Greek culture encounter is consid- Gospel then becomes ambiguous. Such pro- cesses of inter-cultural encounter have nothing to do with the Gospel as such. But they cannot 2 ered universally valid.1 But John Paul II has Intercultural is also Interreligious also said: My aim in this brief presentation, however, “Simply because the mission of preaching is to show that Gospel-culture encounter is not the Gospel came first upon Greek philosophy only intercultural, but also interreligious.2 in its journey, this is not taken to mean that Every culture is animated by a religion which other approaches are excluded… An immense seeks to answer the more ultimate questions, spiritual impulse compels the Indian mind to like the meaning of life, of unmerited suffer- an acquiring of that experience which would, ing, of death and of after-life. Culture as a sys- with a spirit freed from the distractions of time tem of meanings is supplemented by religion, and space, attain to the absolute good. This is so that it can be considered as the deeper ele- the time, above all for Indian Christians, to un- ment of culture. In secularized situations ideo- lock these treasures from their inheritance.” logies may serve as quasi-religions. So the (John Paul II, Fides et Ratio, 72) Gospel encountering a culture is also encoun- It is, however, a fact tering the religion or that the Latin Church religions that are ani- has thought of its in- mating it. So it be- culturation of the Gos- comes an interreli- pel as having universal gious encounter. This value till the Second can be difficult and Vatican Council and complex when the re- even later in practice.
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