Liturgical Inculturation: Decolonization or Decolonialization? Examining Misa ng Bayang Pilipino

Roman Catholic eucharistic worship is steeped in Western traditions and law. Since Vatican II there has been permission for the inculturation of worship, including the Eucharist. This study will explore to what extent such inculturation is true decolonization while continuing to be a faux decolonialization. The thesis being tested here is that inculturation as a form of liturgical decolonization returns the “sacred land” or liturgical terrain—for example, language, architecture, vesture, music, and so forth—to various indigenous peoples, societies, and even countries. Such decolonizing, however, is not necessarily a decolonializing. The epistemic frameworks and European (even medieval) imagination foundational for the legal and theological frameworks that officially define Roman Catholic Eucharist are seldom if ever challenged, much less changed. The underlying question is whether Roman Catholic Eucharist can ever achieve true decolonialization.

The Roman Catholic Church in Nigeria and Liturgical Inculturation in Chimamanda Adichie’s Purple Hibiscus

Beyond its entertainment value, every piece of creative literature has something more to say which reading between the lines often has a way of revealing. This is true of the novel Purple Hibiscus by the award-winning Nigerian writer, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. While his novel says something about the family, politics, post-colonial history and religious realities such as priesthood, mission, Mary, and the Eucharist, this paper looks at what it can tell us about liturgical inculturation and its implications for the Roman Catholic Church in Nigeria. It is hoped that the paper would help to continue, in the spirit of interdisciplinarity, the conversation on the nexus between Ecclesiology and Creative Literature.

INCULTURATION: BLENDING CHRISTIANITY INTO LOCAL CULTURE

As Christianity seeks to spread its mission around the world, they face cultural barriers in a way that Christianity is not always easily acceptable to the non-European settings due to the differences in values and cultural practices. In order to cope with such challenges, the churches established inculturation and equivalent policies in evangelizing and minister the non-western communities worldwide. In Kampung Bungan Besar, Matu, a Melanau-populated village, Christianity at the present time is the main religion alongside with the minority practitioners of traditional belief. The growing of Christianity from a totally ‘foreign’ religion to the main religion among the Melanau can be associated with the missionary efforts, and it is the inculturation process that ensured the triumph of the mission. Liturgical inculturation and object-centered inculturation is the most obvious two inculturation strategies used in spreading of the gospel message among the Melanau.

Liturgical inculturation or liberation? A qualitative exploration of major themes in liturgical reform in South Africa

In this article, the notion of liturgical inculturation is revisited in the light of qualitative liturgical research conducted in local faith communities as well as with church leaders in South Africa regarding liturgical reform over recent decades. Two central themes were identified as representing important changes that occurred and are still occurring in the liturgy in South Africa roughly since Vatican II and the promulgation of Sacrosanctum Concilium. They are referred to here as ‘the language of women’ and ‘the language of justice’. The concept of liturgical inculturation is revisited in the light of the ways in which these two ‘languages’ function and functioned in the liturgies of churches in South Africa. In conclusion, an argument is advanced for a more comprehensive understanding of the notion of liturgical inculturation in order to assist the liturgy to regain its prophetic voice in South Africa today.