Cotonou, Benin, Nov 20, 2011 / 04:45 am
Pope Benedict XVI’s new apostolic exhortation on Africa aims to encourage the dynamism of the Catholic Church and to prepare for upcoming decades of evangelization, a Vatican official has explained.
Archbishop Nikola Eterović, secretary general of the Synod of Bishops, said that in “Africae Munus” the Catholic Church in Africa “reaffirms her commitment to evangelization and human development” so that “the entire continent may become a vast field of reconciliation, justice and peace.”
“In this way … the Church contributes to forging the new Africa, which is increasingly called to become the ‘spiritual lung’ of humankind,” he said in his official summary of the exhortation issued on Nov. 19.
The new apostolic exhortation is a continuation of Pope John Paul II’s 1995 exhortation “Ecclesia in Africa,” the archbishop said. That earlier document “gave great impetus to the growth of the Church in Africa developing, among other things, the idea of the Church as Family of God.”