Special Hearings — Faith Community Hearings — 1997-11-17

THOMAS MANTHATA: I am sorry to have sounded like I am singling out. That is not   the issue. I am just saying that as the Truth and Reconciliation Commission   and for the process of reconciliation we are requesting all concerned bodies   to assist in that direction. I don't know whether this is even necessary because   at least with hindsight the Catholic Church has been able to make for what it   could have omitted or couldn't see at certain stages. For example the support   it gave to the Archbishop Hurley when he came to trial. To Father Mkatshwa when   he was detained in the Ciskei. That support was wanting at a very early age   when the Catholic Bishops' General Secretary, Colin Collins, was involved in   the UCM and he had to end up fleeing the country and at that time he never got   the support of the church. I don't know whether there could be any enlightenment   along that line.

FATHER BUTI THLAGALE: I do not know about the circumstances of Father Colin   Collins and how he left but I think this probably simply reflects the attitudes   that were existing within the Catholic Church where probably the leadership   of the Catholic Church then was divided and certainly not always sympathetic   towards those who opposed the apartheid system and a leadership that merely   saw trouble makers within its own community.

THOMAS MANTHATA: Finally, I see a lot of work having to come out of the church   where we have communities as divided as those of the Portuguese speaking community   and of the black communities, having to be brought together. I just wonder what   at the Catholic Church the efforts are in that direction?

BISHOP KEVIN DOWLING: I think we recognise that we have a long road to go in   this direction. Certainly as I hinted at in my part of the submission what require   for the ...[indistinct] group in terms of the realities of South Africa is a   true conversion process and that takes time and not only that, but it also takes   ongoing and really deep exposure to the realities of the oppressed majority   of this country. 
For example even in terms of myself as a white South African, and this would   explain the kind of reality that I am talking about. I grew up in Pretoria.   Even as part of our Catholic Church community I used to visit the townships   as a young church worker, but that did not impinge on my heart and spirit in   terms of shocking me into the harsh reality of what apartheid was doing. I left   the country at the age of 17 to go to England to study, then I came back and   at the age of 26 I was posted to the townships in Cape Town. And it was then   that for the first time in my journey as a christian that I came to experience   firsthand in sense of it touching my being, what was happening, what was being   done to people. I began to at least partially appreciate the realities of the   apartheid system as it affected the oppressed majority by seeing through the   eyes of oppressed people and listening through their ears and therefore taking   on a whole other perspective. That was a conversion process which brought me,   in terms of joining the christian institute in those days in Cape Town, and   an increasing stance for justice. That was a whole conversion process that I   went through simply because I as a white South African was exposed and experienced   firsthand reality, not cut off from it, but with the people and it was they   who evangelised me and therefore brought about that.
Now how one translates a conversion process like that (this is my personal   view) in terms of whole communities or sections of communities if precisely   the challenge facing us. As we said, and as Father Buti has already said, we   are committed as a church to find a way to reconcile ourselves as a community   and to go a lot further than where we are at the moment. We've got to find creative   ways to bring people together in terms of understanding each other and above   all, understanding what the past has done and how we were involved in that past,   especially through our silence and especially through not standing. But the   whole church community requires reconciliation as part of the wider community   in South Africa and we've got to find the ways to that conversion process.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much. Khoza?

MR K MOJO: Thank you Sir. I am asking this question. I know that I am sticking   out my neck, but I feel that I must do it. During the time of apartheid, there   have been many voices coming from different macedonians. One of the macedonians   which I want to put here before you is that one of the gender issues. How far   has your church made a journey as far as the gender issue is concerned? Because   there have been some people within our community who have been feeling that   they are oppressed by certain sections of our churches and our communities,   and those are women.

FATHER BUTI THLAGALE: The Catholic Church on the question of, for example,   the ordination of women maintains what is generally referred to and described   as an extremely conservative position. I think that is still the position. You   certainly are aware, Sir, that the Catholic structure as it exists, some of   these things are decided not so much at a local level but they are part of the   entire Catholic Church in the world. And at present with regard to specifically   again the ordination of women, the Catholic Church has reiterated its position   that according to its tradition, ordination will only be offered to males and   not to women. That is the position of the Catholic Church. However, I think   where we, the church, also fails with regard to women is simply the development   of leadership or the provision of leadership opportunities for women within   the Catholic Church, if for a moment we are to forget the question of ordination.   For women to play a more meaningful role, for women to become deacons in the   church, for women to run parishes or institutions within the church. Certainly   there is a wide area of possibilities and this is where the Catholic Church   still falls short.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, Virginia?

UNKNOWN: Thank you your Grace. Dr Mgojo just took the question which   I was thinking of putting to our two brothers there. Especially in light of   what they have said, or what the Catholic Church has done to face other forms   of discrimination right on. Already there is a voice of women in the Catholic   Church who are concerned about this very issue of ordination of women. Now I   would like to hear whether now that there is a voice, is the church beginning   also to take seriously these voices. I take the point that some of your policies   have to be decided elsewhere, but I think even in your struggle within injustices   in this country, you knew that some of the polices were coming from elsewhere.   I would like to bring the question nearer home because we have sisters already   here in South Africa who are raising questions about the ordination of women.   Is the church going to support the local churches who are prepared to support   the women on that?