WeeklySA_AdminTESTIMONIES: Pope’s new book celebrates courage and humility of Congolese and South Sudanese men and women…
Africa”. PHOTO: Vatican Publishing House
By Jude Atemanke
“Hands off Africa”, Pope Francis’ new book that was released on Tuesday this week features key moments of his two trips to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and South Sudan earlier this year.
The 152-page book, written in Italian, is a compilation of the Pope’s speeches during his trip to the two African nations from January 31 to February 5.
The title of the new book stems from the Holy Father’s first speech in DRC on January 31, where he urged the international community to give the Central African country its autonomy while not turning a blind eye to exploitation and violence.
Pope Francis’ speech noted DRC’s endurance of political exploitation in what he called “economic colonialism,” child labour, and violence.
In a press release issued on Tuesday, the Vatican Publishing House says the new book also contains “various testimonies, including those of the people who were victims of unprecedented violence and armed conflict.”
“It is a valuable book because it combines the prophetic word of Francis with voices of women and Congolese and South Sudanese men and women who reveal, with great courage and humility, their journey of suffering and faith, offering a rare testimony of man’s capacity for forgiveness,” the leadership of the Vatican Publishing House says.
In the preface, award-winning Nigerian author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie describes the Pope Francis’ latest book “as a beacon of hope for Congo and Africa at large.”
“This book brings me a small sliver of hope for Congo, and for the beloved and broken-hearted continent that I call home,” she says in the preface.
Ngozi says the Holy Father’s message “is not merely that Congo, and by extension Africa, matters but that it matters for one reason only. Not for its resources, which the global North depends on, not for fear that the continent could become again the scene of Western proxy battles as happened during the Cold War, but simply because of the people.”
“Africa matters because Africans matter,” she emphasizes. The Nigerian writer goes on to decry “the level of exploitation and the conflict-driven exhaustion that the country and the continent of Africa have suffered, lamenting also the “silence of the world as the greatest tragedy of the situation.”
“This silence speaks to the continued devaluing of African humanity by a world that nevertheless eagerly consumes African resources,” she says, describing the Pope Francis’ messages as “potent and a necessary rebuke” to wealthy nations.
In the press release issued on Tuesday, the publisher of the book notes that “Pope Francis has always been on the front line against the injustices and greed of the West interested in (plundering) the riches of the African continent.
”The press release further indicates that Pope Francis’ “powerful, authoritative voice has constantly invited political leaders to place the development of Africa at the centre of international agendas.”
“This book, tracing the different stages of Francis’ pilgrimage on African soil, highlights his closeness to two peoples wounded by war, impoverished by predatory foreign powers, weakened by the corruption of the local political classes,” the press release further says.
In an earlier initiative, members of the Pious Society of the Daughters of St Paul (FSP) in Nairobi, Kenya, published a book, “Apostolic Journey of His Holiness Pope Francis to Africa”, that engraves Pope Francis’ third pastoral visit to Sub-Saharan Africa in readers’ minds. The 136-page book provides a summary of Pope Francis’ pastoral visit to DRC and South Sudan.
In an interview with ACI Africa following the release of the book, the Directress of Paulines Publications Africa, an apostolic ministry of FSP members, said that the Daughters of St Paul were driven by the desire to amplify the Holy Father’s messages to the entire continent.
“Through his speeches, Pope Francis talked about the continent of Africa. This means that his message was not just meant for the people in DRC and South Sudan but for all African countries,” Sr. Praxides Nafula said during the March 23 interview.
Published on March 14, a day after Pope Francis celebrated the 10th anniversary of his Pontificate, the book is a special memoir for the people of God in Africa to go back to and remember encounters between the Holy Father and the people of God in DRC and South Sudan.
“Apostolic Journey of His Holiness Pope Francis to Africa” can be found in all Pauline’s Publication’s Africa bookshops in Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, Malawi, South Sudan, and Sudan; and can also be purchased digitally. Hands Off Africa retails at R316. – ACI Africa
TONS OF TOWNSHIP VIBE SPICE UP STORY SET IN RUMBUSTIOUS ALEX
BUSTLE: Family battles plague of pesky “uncles”, rats and rowdy parliament of big-eyed night prowlers…
By Amanda Ngudle
If you are looking for a fun read then this is your book. It appears big but reads so fast I read it over 48 hours, unable to put it down for a moment.
The stage is in Alex where characters play out their lives in a yard somewhere on 9th Avenue, following one incident after the other. The first collision course is an overturned cool drink truck, and the thug who had hijacked it is sent to hospital. Soon there is a rat plague followed by an unexplained parliament of owls.
Told through a 14-year-old Lerato with a wayward mom, a headstrong, loving but rude younger sister, Florence, and a forgettable boy Tshediso. The four of them are living their rat-infested lives, eating cabbage prepared in many different ways, when out of the blue a man who is introduced as their real uncle makes an unannounced appearance and struggles to convince them he is the real deal. They find it hard to accept him because of the numerous uncles who have halted here over the years and left their mom pregnant with babies who mostly died at birth.
What follows is a serendipity of events leading to Lerato finding a new friend and family that helps hone her love for reading to justify why the book is written with such sophistication. I found it extremely remarkable that the writer was able to unpeel the various layers of a fourteen-year-old girl and using her lingo and hormonally corrupted attitude so impeccably. This ability was extended to other characters like Lerato’s friends and suitors. And as expected, there is a lot of violence, and it is ignited by little things and not necessarily squashed by all adults. It’s a tale with a happy ending, but not before every second child in a township’s struggles as they come of age.
Two Tons ‘o Fun-Fred Khumalo- Penguin Random House (R290)
