Since the title of the conference referred to “collections,” we focused on archival collections. This is our immediate need, the mission of the Historical Institute. We can never fully appreciate the initiative itself, and be grateful to the organizers: bringing together academic experts, museologists, historians, and archivists to discuss the question of what to do with the missionary heritage in Europe, especially as vocations are declining, and with them, finances and the possibility of maintaining a legacy that has often become burdensome.
For those who regularly read our editorials in this Newsletter, we are interested! But only in archives. At least for now. Because the missionary heritage in Europe is complex, its management a headache for our missionary congregations, many of which are losing their former splendor. Questions abound. Is it a colonial legacy? And what would such an identification imply for the ideological debate that has been unsettling the youth of Europe for several years now? Who owns these collections? Are they public cultural heritage, and whose management, maintenance and availability are regulated by local, federal or European government laws, hopefully respecting international conventions of UNESCO or the International Council of Archivists (ICA)?
Or is it, on the contrary, a Church asset, and for which the Church and the missionary congregations that created these archives, collected (purchased, extracted) these artifacts and human remains, would be responsible for their management, maintenance, disposal, or restitution? And if the said congregation is in crisis, on the verge of possible extinction, where should these archival and cultural assets, specific to it, be preserved? At the level of ecclesiastical archives/museums created in synergy with other congregations? Governmental institutions in Europe? States of origin, here in Africa? Or, where the congregation and the Church still exist or subsist? In the latter case, what can be said about the laws of inalienability and respect for the origins of the collections? What if, precisely where these congregations subsist, there are no adequate structures or personnel for managing such a legacy? The list of questions can be extended!
For our part, the Society of Jesus, which has been conducting this reflection since at least 2001, which led to the creation of the Historical Institute in Africa in 2010, is thinking of increasing the number of historical centers globally that can carry out this collection work. And if for the moment we are proposing to take archives or at least copies of them relating to our common history, it is because they are more manageable.
We have trained, and continue to train, archivists for the Church of God and the Society of Jesus in Africa; we still have some space in our respective archives at the Province, Region, and Church levels, and in the event of a space crisis, there is always the option of digitization and shared use.
This is an economic, identity-based, and scientific necessity for Africa, which still does not have access to the sources of its history, and is growing impatient. And yet, it is clear that, despite joint efforts between the various archives of the Society, which are increasingly working in synergy and networking (a unique case in the African religious world regarding archives), the conversation sometimes stalls, limited as we are by archiving laws imposed by states, and which, until the 19th century, did not even exist, or which other states like France were able to revise when it came to returning works of art to Benin.
The conversation also stalls due to a lack of material means, a collective desire to see certain collections returned to the African origin of their production, and for many Africans, due to a malaise of globalization which consecrates a certain indifference towards them. For the Church, however, it is the Society of Jesus which dares, and can, thanks to its experience, lead other religious and ecclesial groups towards a proactive attitude.
And yet, if this workshop in Germany taught me anything, it is that we must anticipate the solution to these problems before time catches up with us, that is to say, when, due to a lack of vocations and a lack of financial means, the congregation finds itself paralyzed, without clear alternatives. Such anticipation, as we have long repeated, would require a considerable investment, to create a decent space where the congregation remains, a space large enough to accommodate a significant quantity of archives, and/or to serve as a transit point for other art collections intended for African countries and communities eager (sometimes not at all) for the return of the objects of which they were stripped in the last century.
This would be a massive and collective investment, which would involve the entire congregation, or a consortium of congregations, the universal Church, and which would also benefit from the protection of buildings, religious and cultural heritage in times of war. The last time the Institute considered such a project, the cost was approximately $5 million, a million more than the Jesuits’ central archive in the United States. The American example shows that with a strong will, such an investment/sacrifice is possible for a greater good in the future; even more so for a continent experiencing rapid demographic and vocational growth, is in search for identity, and whose young people, in a few years, would understand our failure to act now as another unfortunate legacy of a past encounter viewed by them, rightly or wrongly, from a colonial perspective.
UNESCO? Governments? Church? Individual congregations or consortiums? Men and women of good will? “Which way to go? Which way to run?”
In the meantime, let us pray!
By Dr. Jean Luc Enyegue, SJ – Director, Jesuit Historical Institute in Africa
