“PLEASE FATHER TALK TO US ABOUT TRADITION, CULTURE AND RELIGION”
(Cultural Manifestation in Bafmeng Village, Cameroon)
One of many things we, missionary disciples, do not seem to resemble or resonate with the Lord Jesus is that when we go home for holidays to our own people, they receive us so well; they pray for us, they encourage and support our mission, they long to see and hear us, as if to say, preach, heal, teach us – bring us home the same Good News that you take to others abroad or elsewhere. Perhaps the excitement is yet to turn to rejection as with Palm Sunday and Good Friday; no one can always tell how things end, who is actually for or against us.
Back home in December, the young people invited traditional groups, dances, leaders, elders, and any others to come out in their regalia to showcase their culture and tradition.
One of the organizers prior approached me, saying: please, Father, can you come and give us a talk on Tradition, Culture and Religion. I couldn’t but instinctively recall the celebrated John Mbiti’s works and words on African Traditional Religions. Needless to say there was enough internet access to browse a google definition of culture, tradition and religion.
I led a prayer and recalled how my talk and song were on a famous Church song in the dialect two years ago: God’s laws are sweet; keep them, and you will have life.
But how do you recall and translate ATR to your people in the dialect in 30 minutes? They wanted a talk to uplift the spirit; not too obvious and not too intellectual but relatable, valuable, sensible, challenging, at once ancient and at once new. After a few singsongs and dances of traditional choruses around culture, tradition, ancestry and Christianity, I stumbled over what I had jotted.
Whatever I said, the following stood out: ceremonies and celebrations, spirits, rituals, ancestors, values, community, destiny… Whatever they heard, the MC echoed back after my talk that not every deceased village man, woman or elder can be an ANCESTOR, but those who have lived respectable and reputable lives; also that the vital threat that runs through tradition, culture and religion is VALUES as opposed to vices in living one’s life in the Culture, tradition or religion – values of respect, courtesy, obedience, supplication, decency, goodness, kindness… It seems I overlooked the precedence of wisdom; that insight and disposition that distinguishes anyone in any culture, tradition or religion.
Tradition! what is handed down or passed on; Culture! the way of doing things by a particular people or tribe; Religion! belief in God or deity, evil, good and bad. In our Bafmeng tradition, what has been handed down to us by our ancestors before and during migration, settlement, and inheritance includes ancestry, clans, inheritance, various rites of deaths, birth, spirits, sacrifices, initiation, invocations, libations, celebrations, market days, leadership, hierarchy, blessings, atonement, reconciliation, dance, music, feasts, community. Culture goes with and brings out tradition.
Religion brings out the mystery, the other world, salvation and atonement; Christianity comes in with evangelization and demonstrates how sacrifice restores (whether libation, goat, Chicken or Jesus’ death) and the ultimate way of values, celebrations, life after death, battle between good and evil and the certainty of life after death.
Where tradition, culture and religion (especially Christianity or even Islam intersect) are felt, seen and lived out, the realities of values, initiation, atonement, reconciliation, procreation, community spirit, and eschatology are taught or transmitted orally or written. It is evident that not all tradition, libations, culture, and sacrifice are good; some are demonic or occultic, and time does reveal the truth; it is a fact, even if arguably so. Not all that glitter is gold!
The first and last words of tradition, culture and religion are choosing or fighting for good, not evil, community, not individualism, virtue, not vices, love, not hatred; God is love (1 John 4:16 and 1 Corinthians 13). All this is so easy to say, teach, or quote as to believe, live, or practice in any culture, religion, or tradition.
And my first and last words are, make your God proud, make your parents proud. Christianity, Jesus, the Holy Spirit, Holy Water, and blessings by parents, family, leaders, or the Church are lifegiving, enduring, and life-changing, just like a curse on the other spectrum or realm. Choose the way of love and suffering like the saints and aim to become an ancestor, for not all our deceased leaders or relatives can or will become ancestors; the lifestyle of dignity, diligence, prophetic, priestly, kingly or queenly countenance and character counts.
One’s cultural identity is one thing; the Christian identity is another, and intercultural integration is the other. The challenge to comprehend, articulate, assimilate or compromise all or either is real. Such was and is my take viz a viz culture, tradition, and religion.
(Emmanuel Mbeh, February 2024)
