By Magdalene Kahiu, SECAM
The Prefect of the Holy See’s Dicastery for Communication, Dr. Paolo Ruffini, has called on the Church in Africa to adopt a form of communication that heals and fosters peace and unity amid conflicts.
In a message that was shared with participants at the 20th Plenary Assembly of the Symposium for Episcopal Conferences in Africa and Madagascar (SECAM), Dr. Ruffini reflected on the double-edged power of communication, noting that it is capable of building peace and fueling violence.
“Let us strive to promote a communication that can heal the wounds of our humanity,” reads the Vatican official’s message in the speech delivered on the first day of the July 30 to August 4 Assembly.
“Too often today communication generates not hope, but fear and despair, prejudice and resentment, fanaticism and even hatred.”
Dr. Ruffini stressed the importance of adopting communication that builds rather than destroys.
He said, referencing Pope Leo XIV’s message to media representatives, “strive for a different kind of communication-one that does not seek consensus at all costs, does not use aggressive language, does not follow the culture of competition, and never separates the search for truth from the love with which we must humbly seek it.”
“We all need to find the roots of peace,” this was shared during the Assembly held under the theme “Christ, Source of Hope, Peace and Reconciliation.”
Dr. Ruffini further called for communion among Church communicators and urged them to center their mission on spreading the Gospel in his address to the over 200 participants of the meeting.
“As witnesses of Christ in a world in motion, our identity-rooted in communion and otherness-becomes even more evident. The first ‘means of communication’ to spread the Gospel is therefore our life, our entire life, transfigured by communion with God and with one another,” read the message in parts.
Dr. Ruffini stressed that it is possible to adopt a new way of togetherness that recognizes every person’s worth.
“We have embarked on this journey to witness that another way of being together is possible-one that always values, as the people of God united by baptism, what unites us, and never what divides us.”
He added, “To understand that the co-responsibility to which everyone is called, in the diversity of charisms and ministries, is a service, not a power. To rediscover, within the Church as the Family of God, the importance of each person, and especially the communion that makes us one, “members of one another.” To be a welcoming Church for all. Everyone, no one excluded.”
The Vatican official warned that unless the Church builds on communion, it would be “an imitation of the world: yet another attempt to build the Tower of Babel.”
For this reason, there is a need for a “formation in communication for communion.”
