'Fratelli Tutti' is Ubuntu by any other name

Oct 6, 2020 - National Catholic Reporter
by Agbonkhianmeghe E. Orobator

"Umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu." This saying exists in variant forms in Southern Africa's bantu languages and translates as, "A person is a person through other persons" or ,"I am because we are."

Strikingly, Pope Francis' encyclical Fratelli Tutti contains an equivalent: "Each of us is fully a person when we are part of a people; at the same time, there are no peoples without respect for the individuality of each person" (Paragraph 182). In other words, we are "brothers and sisters all" (8).

Francis credits South African Anglican Bishop Desmond Tutu, among others, as an inspiration for his encyclical (286). Tutu is the main proponent of Ubuntu, an African humanist philosophy based on a culture of sharing, openness, mutual dependence, dialogue and interpersonal encounter. In Ubuntu, human existence reaches fulfillment as part of whole, society thrives on a common humanity, and forgiveness and reconciliation are prerequisites for preserving social harmony.

Francis' twin ideas of fraternity and social friendship underscore the urgency of Ubuntu in our present-day context, where the fabric of humanity is riven by atavistic conflicts, ideological division, isolationist paranoia and political polarization that take a catastrophic toll on the weak and vulnerable (18-19).

Devoid of a common uniting horizon, our ancestral fear of others drives us to build walls (26-27, 37, 41), thereby weakening our belonging to a common family and eviscerating our dream of a common purpose (30). Yet we are in this together (35); hence the imperative of building a community of solidarity and belonging.

"Mountains don't meet, but people do," says a Swahili proverb. A foundational premise of Ubuntu recognizes the centrality of encounter with the other. For Francis, fraternity rests on a culture of authentic encounters whose precondition is creative openness to the other (50).
Mutual openness, sadly, is assailed by a toxic digital communication saturated in social aggression, verbal violence and ideological myopia. The result is a virtual closed circuit connected by shared fear and hatred for the other (42-46).

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