 |
| (Bishop Rodrigo Mejía Saldarriaga, from Soddo (Southern Ethiopia) |
Tourists should not treat the members of African tribes as if they were objects. This was the call of Bishop Rodrigo Mejía Saldarriaga, from Soddo (Southern Ethiopia), in a meeting with the international Catholic pastoral charity Aid to the Church in Need (ACN).
It was understandable that the tourists might want to take home photos with exotic motifs. But they should “not regard the people as strange objects”. Moreover, the tribe members expected to be paid for each and every photo. On the face of it, this may seem like a “good thing”, but it destroys the people’s work ethic because they learn that “money can be earned without work”. The territory of the Apostolic Vicariate in Southern Ethiopia is inhabited by 16 different tribes, some of which are among the most primitive ethnic groups in the world.
The best-known is the Mursi tribe, in which it is the custom for married women to be decorated with lip plates. For a long time the tribes refused all contact with civilisation, the Bishop explained. But now they can no longer avoid contact with the outside world because of the construction of the Pan-African Highway, which will connect Cape Town with Cairo and which passes through their territory.
Therefore they asked the Catholic Church to help them prepare for this event.The Church is helping especially by setting up kindergartens. These open up “the gateway to more education”, because attendance at a kindergarten is compulsory in Ethiopia and otherwise the children cannot be admitted to primary school, Bishop Mejíja explained. The Church is also helping with peace education, because bloody fights often take place between livestock owners due to disputes about pastures and watering places.The Apostolic Vicariate of Soddo was only created in January 2010, with the division of the Apostolic Vicariate of Soddo-Hosanna.It covers an area in which 4.8 million people live, 128,000 of whom are Catholics.
Editor’s Notes Directly under the Holy See, Aid to the Church in Need supports the faithful wherever they are persecuted, oppressed or in pastoral need. ACN is a Catholic charity – helping to bring Christ to the world through prayer, information and action.The charity undertakes thousands of projects every year including providing transport for clergy and lay Church workers, construction of church buildings, funding for priests and nuns and help to train seminarians. Since the initiative’s launch in 1979, Aid to the Church in Need’s Child’s Bible – God Speaks to his Children has been translated into 162 languages and 48 million copies have been distributed all over the world.While ACN gives full permission for the media to freely make use of the charity’s press releases, please acknowledge ACN as the source of stories when using the material.
http://members4.boardhost.com
It was understandable that the tourists might want to take home photos with exotic motifs. But they should “not regard the people as strange objects”. Moreover, the tribe members expected to be paid for each and every photo. On the face of it, this may seem like a “good thing”, but it destroys the people’s work ethic because they learn that “money can be earned without work”. The territory of the Apostolic Vicariate in Southern Ethiopia is inhabited by 16 different tribes, some of which are among the most primitive ethnic groups in the world.
The best-known is the Mursi tribe, in which it is the custom for married women to be decorated with lip plates. For a long time the tribes refused all contact with civilisation, the Bishop explained. But now they can no longer avoid contact with the outside world because of the construction of the Pan-African Highway, which will connect Cape Town with Cairo and which passes through their territory.
Therefore they asked the Catholic Church to help them prepare for this event.The Church is helping especially by setting up kindergartens. These open up “the gateway to more education”, because attendance at a kindergarten is compulsory in Ethiopia and otherwise the children cannot be admitted to primary school, Bishop Mejíja explained. The Church is also helping with peace education, because bloody fights often take place between livestock owners due to disputes about pastures and watering places.The Apostolic Vicariate of Soddo was only created in January 2010, with the division of the Apostolic Vicariate of Soddo-Hosanna.It covers an area in which 4.8 million people live, 128,000 of whom are Catholics.
Editor’s Notes Directly under the Holy See, Aid to the Church in Need supports the faithful wherever they are persecuted, oppressed or in pastoral need. ACN is a Catholic charity – helping to bring Christ to the world through prayer, information and action.The charity undertakes thousands of projects every year including providing transport for clergy and lay Church workers, construction of church buildings, funding for priests and nuns and help to train seminarians. Since the initiative’s launch in 1979, Aid to the Church in Need’s Child’s Bible – God Speaks to his Children has been translated into 162 languages and 48 million copies have been distributed all over the world.While ACN gives full permission for the media to freely make use of the charity’s press releases, please acknowledge ACN as the source of stories when using the material.
http://members4.boardhost.com
No comments:
Post a Comment