Posted on 02/06/2016 4:26:49 PM PST by marshmallow
Cardinal Robert Sarah has the quiet authority to stand up to Western ideology
God or Nothing by Cardinal Robert Sarah, Ignatius, £12.99
I would bet that many Catholics in the West had not heard of Cardinal Sarah of Guinea before the family synod in October. Then his name kept cropping up, dispelling the disquiet many of us felt over the Church, when we heard his voice: strong, wise and confidently Catholic.
It has become a cliche to survey the Church worldwide, note the moral turmoil in Europe alongside its decreasing populations, and then suggest that it might be Africa's turn to take up the baton of the faith. When you read these reflections by Cardinal Sarah you realise that any such pious patronage of the African Church must give way in the face of his quiet authority.
This book-length interview gives him a platform to share his love for the Church and the influences that took this boy from an animist tribe in a remote village in Guinea, West Africa, to the post of Archbishop of Conakry and, latterly, prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments. He was born in 1945 and, as he describes the French Holy Ghost missionaries who converted his parents and his village, it is obvious that their example of self-sacrifice and prayer have been the basis of his own priestly life ever since.
Where some people tend to disparage missionary activity as being a pre-Vatican II relic of a patrician institution, for Sarah, an only child, and his devout parents, it released them from the superstitions and fears of tribal beliefs, from the darkness of paganism into the light of truth. In his replies he constantly makes clear his gratitude, saying: "I owe my entrance into Christ's family entirely to them."
(Excerpt) Read more at catholicherald.co.uk ...
He’ll do.
A light to guide us through our current chastisement.
It is an excellent book. Three days without water sounds difficult.
A tremendous sacrifice. Of course, it would only be recommended for those with sufficient physical strength.
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