Departure From Africa, Libreville, Gabon (19 February 1982)

On Friday, 19 February 1982, the Holy Father spoke these words at his departure from Africa at Libreville.

As I am about to leave this country, I would like to reiterate my satisfaction. In my African journey, it was right to book a pastoral visit to Gabon which was the point of origin of evangelization throughout this region of Africa; the tree of the Church has seriously grown from this earth. It was also appropriate to honor this nation which has appreciable capabilities and which is striving to achieve its full potential.

I renew my gratitude to all those who organized this magnificent welcome of the Pope: to His Excellency the President of the Republic, to the members of the Government and the Administration, to the leaders of this great city of Libreville, to all the population who showed me esteem, warmth, and attention to my words; to the Christians so close in faith, and in particular to the Catholics so happy to receive the Vicar of Christ. I greet and especially thank the Bishops, my Brothers. During these three days, I opened my heart to you, to receive your testimony, and to give you the best I had. May each of you now feel closer to the Pope, loved, comforted and encouraged in the path of good! And I am far from forgetting you. As a MBédé proverb says: “Otcwi holwodo mvudu a nde ha moni” (“The head dreams of the man it has seen”).

God bless Gabon!

Allow me now to add a message to all of Africa, since it is from here that at the end of my second trip I am leaving the continent. This stay confirmed the impressions I gave on May 12, nineteen hundred and eighty, leaving Abidjan. In Rome, as you can well imagine, we closely follow the life of African countries through the visits we receive, through the reports sent to us by the Bishops or the pontifical representatives. But a visit among the inhabitants makes you acquire a new sensitivity. And for this I thank God.

Your continent, dear African friends, continues admirable development efforts in many respects. It was striking in Nigeria, it is evident here, and in many other countries. Natural resources, long lying fallow, are actively exploited, sometimes, it is true, by foreign companies. Health protection is progressing, which provides renewed hope in these equatorial countries with such a trying climate. Political maturity is strengthening, despite fairly frequent upheavals. Cities are growing, often unfortunately to the detriment of rural areas whose products would be very useful. Many access education, on a more universal model, often imported from elsewhere, but at the same time awareness of an African culture is increasing. Relations between countries are being established more closely at the level of regions, the continent, and the rest of the world. There is everywhere a desire to progress, a certain enthusiasm.

But, in addition to the limits of this progress, we also encounter fears and sometimes weariness, disappointments, even regressions in this enthusiasm. In the name of the Church, expert in humanity, I ask, wherever I go, the fundamental questions: what progress are you seeking? What human needs do you want to satisfy? Which man do you want to train? I appeal here to Christians, but also to all men of good will. Because everyone feels the urgent need to control this development.

The African man, like the others, but with his particular characteristics and to an intense degree, needs a space of freedom, of creativity, and at the same time, he has a very deep sense of community, in the family , the tribe, the ethnicity. Without the warmth of friendship, he withers. The anonymity of certain cities, the distance from his family, are particularly depressing and degrading for him.

For him, the problems of hunger are far from being resolved in many regions of Africa, especially when the calamity of drought or the terrible repercussions of wars are added to this drama. But he aspires just as much to be better considered, better respected in his African being, better appreciated in his values.

He needs education to develop his mind and prepare himself for a profession that is interesting and useful to his country. It still needs to achieve maturation that harmonizes with its traditional culture.

He has a strong sense of justice, and wants to live in peace. For him, human life is a great gift from God. All those who stir up in him racial or ideological opposition, even hatred, war and the desire for extermination, bring to mind the bad shepherds of whom Christ spoke, who come to slaughter and destroy, instead of building and encouraging the life.

Above all, the African man has a sense of mystery, of the sacred, of the absolute. Even if this instinct sometimes needs to be purified and elevated, it is an enviable wealth. He therefore aspires to live in harmony with the Master of Nature, freed from alienating fears, and he is ready to enter into deep communion with the God of peace.

Let us add a final observation: what was relatively easy to resolve at the level of the village, the tribe, the ethnic group, must now find its human solution in much broader relationships, at the national and even international level. It is a difficult program, which requires transposed ethics. The quality of men and their civilization is at stake.

Here, briefly mentioned, are the issues which seem to me to be the most important for our African friends. This means that, faced with the models of society presented to them by other countries, it is normal for Africans to be wary of a reductive “humanism”. They will gladly accept fraternal, humanitarian, economic and cultural assistance, which they certainly need, but with respect for their dignity and their ideals; and they want to be recognized as capable of bringing the best of themselves to others.

I hope that such concerns are shared by many people of good will throughout this continent. Those who worship God with a sincere heart should be especially sensitive to those wishes that are in line with His will. Those who share the Christian faith find in it the strongest incentive to thus serve man with whom Christ identified himself, and to serve Christ in man. As for the children of the Catholic Church, I am sure that they will work with all their strength to promote this integral development.

To all, my warm wishes of happiness and peace! My farewell today is just a goodbye. God bless Africa and all its inhabitants!
 

© Copyright 1982 - Libreria Editrice Vaticana

 Copyright © Dicastero per la Comunicazione - Libreria Editrice Vaticana