[LadyDoc]

I, and I suspect most Africans, am completely inured to reports of African suffering, for whatever cause.

Africans? Which tribe are you discussing?

Bantus feel deeply, but keep their emotions in check especially in front of strangers. When someone died in our hospital, they would scream and cry loudly, then quickly get up and coldly make arrangements to take the person home. (usually a baby or a child, since old people preferred to die at home).

But lack of emotion? No, because when I learned the language I would have mothers tell me sadly of how their firstborn died, or when their children were sick, or why they named their children. (My name was "troubles" because I was born in the year of famine. My 8 year old is named "Leave him" because he was born right after measles killed children in the village and we wante God to Leave him with us).

This stoicism is often interpreted by more direct tribes-- like the British immigrants or by the Boer tribe (du Toit is a Boer name) as lack of feeling.

it is not. It is a passivity in the face of what cannot be changed. The good part of this passivity is a quiet grace and deep feelings. The bad part is that common people do not fight back when a tyrant orders them to kill, or indeed when a tyrant kills them. The flip side of passivity is violence: witchcraft, poisoning, burning people in huts at night, and outbreaks of terrible wars.

When I worked in Africa, our German nuns would shake their heads about this violence. I usually replied, yes, sisters, you Germans were much more civilized and neat in your killings.

Finally, Africans, like other primitive peoples (such as Hindus, Baptists and Catholics) believe that death is not the end, but that the soul lives beyond death. This faith is much much deeper than many in the secularized west. So death is not an end, merely a passing over.

Cardinal Arinze says that what we can learn from Africa is how to pray. Indeed, African priests serve "heathens" in many countries, both in Africa, but also in Europe and in my own diocese. An African bishop is supporting the "anglican mission in America" to revive Christianity in the Anglican church. You see, in these countries, Christianity still has meaning.

During Idi Amin's atrocities, someone asked a visiting Anglican African bishop what he needed for his people. He said Roman collars. The American reporter asked why, thinking it was a vanity request. The bishop replied: We need the collar so that when they murder our people, they know we priests are still with them, and that God is there.

[MEG33]

Thank you for your insight.I see no end,do you?

[mo]

You are right...most "successful" westernization is preceeded by a Christian mission...indeed most of the civilizing of the West in relation to Africa is the consequence of Judeo- Christianity and the daily one on one gifting and giving that creates a durable and viable social fabric.

[happygrl]

Thank you for your eloquent apologetic for Africa. So much more worthy of print than this diatribe from this admittedly spiritually stunted "man."

Dennis, would you find this kind of bigotry acceptable if it was directed at YOUR people ?

[Dr. Eckleburg]

Thanks for your post.

God is there.

Amen, even when so much of the world averts its eyes.

[Theo]

Finally, Africans, like other primitive peoples (such as Hindus, Baptists and Catholics)

Christians are primitive people? All right, you had me agreeing until you inexplicably came out with that one. Perhaps your definition of "primitive" is different from mine....

I'm not Baptist, by the way, but as a Christian my doctrine is essentially identical to theirs....

[Hacksaw]

Finally, Africans, like other primitive peoples (such as Hindus, Baptists and Catholics) believe that death is not the end, but that the soul lives beyond death. This faith is much much deeper than many in the secularized west. So death is not an end, merely a passing over.

What a racist statement.

[Own Drummer]

Ladydoc, The Boer "tribe" you sneeringly refer to has as much right to call themselves "African" as Jesse Jackson has to call himself "American". My ancestry traces back directly to two Huguenot brothers who arrived in Africa in 1692 (fleeing Catholic persecution). How much longer must one live in a country before being "allowed" to call themselves by the appellation?

Never mind. If my skin isn't black, I can't be an African, I guess.

But on to more serious matters. What you call "impassivity" I call "fatalism". Any attempt to ignore the fatalism in the African mentality (of whatever skin color) is to ignore reality. Emotion has nothing to do with it -- and clearly, you didn't attend too many Black funerals to see this "impassivity".

Don't get me started on the good Cardinal's suggestion that Africa teaches you how to pray. It doesn't.

What it teaches you is that charity, no matter how deep, how well-intentioned and how well-funded, will never solve the ills of Africa: it won't even alleviate those ills.

Everyone is entitled to preach nostrums like "moral imperative" or "Christian duty". They will fail, however, just like everything else in Africa has failed. I admire Christians in their altruism -- but sometimes that altruism is just folly, and the sooner everyone realizes that about Africa, the better we'll all be for it.

Oh, and for the record, I helped build a school for Black kids in 1973, and it was burned to the ground in 1976. I was jailed and tried for protesting and fighting against apartheid in 1972 -- my phone was tapped for years afterwards, and I only managed to get a passport (in 1982!) after lobbying by friends.

I left there, finally, because I saw no hope for the future; and Mrs. Paton just provided the eloquent proof of that hopelessness.

Remember: Mandela's (and now Mbeki's) South Africa is a shining beacon of civilization in sub-Saharan Africa -- where you're lucky if you were mugged and / or raped, and escaped with your life. And if that South Africa is a shining beacon, consider Nigeria, Somalia or the Congo.

So, LadyDoc, your worldly European viewpoint about Africa and its peoples doesn't impress me -- talk is cheap. I was born there, and I lived there; you were just a visitor.