A Semiotic Approach to the Theology of Inculturation

This book argues that though it is a difficult and delicate task inculturation is still a requisite demand of a World Church and that without it the church is unrecognizable and unsustainable. The book also suggests that the past failures of inculturation experiments in Africa can be overcome only by critically applying the science of semiotics which can serve as an antidote to the nature of human knowing and reductionism that characterized earlier attempts to make Christianity African to the African. Drawing from the semiotic works of C. S. Peirce Clifford Geertz and Bernard Lonergan the book shows why semiotics is best suited to an African theology of inculturation and offers ten pinpointed precepts identified as Habits which underline the attentiveness reasonableness and responsibility required in a semiotic approach to a theology of inculturation. The Habits are also akin to the imperatives inherent in the notion of catholicity--that catholicity is not identified with uniformity but with reconciled diversity and also that catholicity demands different forms in different places times and cultural settings. This book is the first of its kind to take Lonergans critique of classicist culture as a context and apply it concretely towards a method for theological reflection in an African context. He transposes Lonergans critique into ten principles for the constructive engagement between theology and culture. It promises to become a handbook for contextual theologians. --John D. Dadosky Associate Professor Regis College/University of Toronto Cyril Orji has written an important book on the theology of Inculturation. His argument that a semiotic approach to spreading the gospel in non-western societies is refreshing and consistent with new directions of research in the humanities disciplines. While Christianity has made major strides in postcolonial Africa Orji argues that it must continuously look for ways to include in the delivery of the gospel African traditions values and history in order to remain relevant in the continent. It should attract a wide readership in African studies. --Julius A. Amin Professor University of Dayton Cyril Orji is Associate Professor of Systematic Theology and Core Integrated Study at the University of Dayton. He is the author of The Catholic University and the Search for Truth (2013) and Ethnic and Religious Conflict in Africa: An Analysis of Bias and Conversion Based on the Works of Bernard Lonergan (2008).