by Rev.J.R. Hyland -
[email protected]
It really didn't seem possible. Although the information
sent to HUMANE RELIGION regarding animal sacrifice claimed to be
factual, it didn't give a source for the article it quoted. The story
was well-written and names of the priests and bishops involved proved to
be accurate. Still, the events being reported were so bizarre that the
possibility of a hoax had to be considered. And there was the lingering
hope that the article was a hoax -- that animals were not really being
sacrificed in South Africa's Christian churches.
But it turned out to be a legitimate story. And not only
was it true, the London DAILY TELEGRAPH which reported these events, as
well as spokesmen for the Roman Catholic church in which the killings
are taking place, do not see these events as a story about the
introduction of animal sacrifice into Christianity. Both secular and
religious observers view it simply as another instance of racial strife.
For them, the story is newsworthy only because the claim of racism has
been made by a group of native, black priests, who support sacrificial
worship.
A coalition of these priests claims that the hesitancy
of Catholic leaders to give their blessing to animal sacrifices is
simply another instance of the white colonial mentality that refuses to
give proper respect to native practices. These priests are supported in
their demand for sacrifices by Archbishop Buti Tlhagale of Bloemfontein
who asserts that "Animal sacrifice has a special place in the scheme of
things and is celebrated in almost all African families. We have kept it
out of God's Church for too long."
But faced with recalcitrant parish priests like Father
Kevin Reynolds, who argues that animal sacrifice is "foreign to
traditional Catholic theology regarding the Mass," the archbishop has
offered a compromise. Although Catholic theology does say that since the
sacrificial death of Jesus 2,000 years ago, there is no longer any need
to offer animal sacrifices to God, the killing can still be carried out.
But instead of offering the blood of the victims to God, it can be
offered in honor of the African ancestors of participating Catholics.
(Ancestor worship is seen by the archbishop, and others, as the native
equivalent of the Catholic practice of honoring its canonized saints.)
Archbishop Buti proposes that the blood of the slain animal -- be it
goat, chicken, sheep or cow -- can be presented during the Mass as "a
gift to the ancestors, not to God."
And what does the "Euro-centric" hierarchy in South
Africa think about the sacrifice of animals in Catholic churches? Well,
Archbishop George Daniel, head of the Pretoria archdiocese for the past
25 years, doesn't seem to be overly concerned about it. He allows that
it could become a problem at some future date -- if the tenor of the
debate escalates -- but says "we will have to cross that bridge when we
come to it."
For him, killing animals in the churches is not
sacrilegious, it is just another facet of the "incultration process."
This process takes place when the Roman Church and Catholics in a given
country try to find a suitable accommodation between church requirements
and traditional practices of the native culture. The incorporation of
African music is presented as another example of incultration. There
were dissenters who fought against having native instruments and hymns
as the background to their church services, but eventually people on
both sides of the debate were accommodated.
But why does Archbishop Daniel treat the slaughter of
animals in the churches as just another problem of incultration? Why
does he allow both priests and media to make this an issue of racial
strife instead of declaring it a moral issue that has to do with the
introduction of blasphemous worship into the churches? Probably because
he has no foundation on which to take such a stand: traditional
Christianity has never rejected the animal sacrifice that is part of its
biblical heritage.
Although prophets like Isaiah, Amos, Hosea, and Jeremiah
denounced animal sacrifices as abominations, those condemnations did not
have an affect on either orthodox Jewish or traditional Christian
attitudes. Judaism continued sacrifices until the destruction of the
Jerusalem Temple in 70 A.D. and Christianity validated sacrificial
religion in retrospect, saying that because Jesus was the ultimate
sacrificial victim, killing animals on the altars of God was no longer
"necessary."
Faced with an act that is considered theologically
unnecessary rather than blasphemous, Archbishop Daniel would be
hard-pressed to make animal sacrifice a moral issue even if he were
inclined to do so. But the only problem he seems to have with this
travesty of Christian worship is the discord that might erupt in his
diocese if he decided to put a stop to sacrificial religious rites. He
wonders "what would happen to those priests who decide to continue with
the practice of animal sacrifice IF we ultimately ruled against
incorporating this activity into any services."
We may never know what would happen if the archbishop
decided to put a stop to the "activity" of animal sacrifices, because so
far he has shown no inclination to do so. And unless there is an outcry
from Christian people of every persuasion against this violent and
blasphemous worship, it will continue.
copyright 2000 Humane Religion
WEB SITE:
http://www.all-creatures.org/hr/hrm.htm
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