Notes in CFE 3 – Catholic Foundations of Mission

Chapter 3, Lesson 3
MISSION AND CULTURE

CONTEXT
All of us belong to a culture and all cultures have their own uniqueness. Cultural
differences are important because we can learn from them. In the encounter between
cultures, both are enriched. Perhaps, this was what happened when Jesus encountered
the Samaritan woman.

INSPIRED WORD: Jesus and the Samaritan Woman (John 4:1-42)

Jesus tired from his journey sits by Jacob’s well. Moved by God’s love… Jesus
begins a dialogue with the woman, asking her for a drink. Jesus is not disturbed by the
woman’s initial resistance, and carries on a dialogue… In the end, the woman puts
down her water jug and hurried to tell people about the Christ.

This Gospel passage exemplifies the encounter with Jesus. It underlies the
following essential elements.
- The initiative comes from Jesus. He waited by the well. He was the one who
opened the conversation by asking for a drink.
- There is active participation from the person: the woman came to the well; she
expressed herself openly.
- There is a meeting of persons and a progress in their dialogue. Jesus is not
disturbed by the woman’s initial resistance, and carries on a dialogue that
develops through the woman’s 7 answers to Jesus’ 7 statements.

The story of the meeting of Jesus and the Samaritan woman mirrors the long-
running hostility between the Samaritans and Jews. Originally, both people belonged to
similar traditions but because of historical circumstances, the two developed in separate
directions. The result was that Jews looked down on Samaritans because they were
supposed to be a mixed race. Of course, the Samaritans did not like this and responded
in kind.
This hostile relationship remained even up to the time of Jesus so that the
disciples were shocked to find Jesus talking to a Samaritan and to a woman. But Jesus
did not see the cultural and gender divide as a reason for not relating in a humane way
with others. As it was His usual way, He breached the wall of division to reach out to
the other in charity and openness. Such is the missionary way.

CHURCH TEACHING
Notions of Culture
Definitions of Culture
Culture refers to the cumulative deposit of knowledge, experience, beliefs,
values, attitudes, meanings, hierarchies, religion, notions of time, roles, spatial relations,
concepts of the universe, and material objects and possessions acquired by a group of
people in the course of generations through individual and group striving.
Culture in its broadest sense is cultivated behavior; that is the totality of a
person’s learned, accumulated experience which is socially transmitted, or more briefly,
behavior through social learning.
A culture is a way of life of a group of people – the behaviors, beliefs, values, and
symbols that they accept, generally without thinking about them, and that are passed
along by communication and imitation from one generation to the next.

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Notes in CFE 3 – Catholic Foundations of Mission

Culture is symbolic communication. Some of its symbols include a group’s skills,

knowledge, attitude, values, and motives. The meanings of the symbols are learned and
deliberately perpetuated in a society through its institutions.
Culture consists of patterns, explicit and implicit, of and for behavior acquired
and transmitted by symbols, constituting the distinctive achievement of human groups,
including their embodiments in artifacts; the essential core of culture consists of
traditional ideas and especially their attached values; culture systems may, on the one
hand, be considered as products of action, on the other hand, as conditioning influences
upon further action.
Culture is the sum total of the learned behavior of a group of people that are
generally considered to be the tradition of that people and are transmitted from
generation to generation.

Second Vatican Council Understanding of Culture

Culture is the particular way in which persons and peoples cultivate their
relationship with nature and their brothers and sisters, with themselves and with God,
so as to attain a fully human existence (Cf. Gaudium et Spes, 53). Culture only exists
through man, by man and for man. Culture is the whole of human activity, human
intelligence and emotions, the human quest for meaning, human customs and ethics.
Culture is so natural to man that human nature can only be revealed through culture.

Relationship Between Faith and Culture

Culture as an integral aspect of being human
Culture influences the way people think, feel and behave. Culture is the total
way of living of a people, including:
- Beliefs about human life and the world;
- Stories in myths, epics, saying or proverbs, songs and dances; and
- Rituals, customs, manners and ceremonies.
Culture gives people:
- Identity (who we are as a people)
- Belonging (who is one of us and who is not one of us)
- Dignity (our value or worth as a people)
- Continuity (why we are this way today and what is our direction as a people)

Culture as the ground where faith grows and flourishes

For all culture is an effort to ponder the mystery of the world and in particular of
the human person: it is a way of giving expression to the transcendent dimension of
human life. The heart of every culture is its approach to the greatest mystery: the
mystery of God. A faith that does not become culture is a faith not fully accepted, not
entirely thought out, not faithfully lived.

Necessity of inculturation: dialogue between faith and culture

Through inculturation the Church makes the Gospel incarnate in different
cultures and at the same time introduces peoples, together with their cultures, into her
own community. She transmits to them her own values, at the same time taking the
good elements that already exist in them and renewing them from within. Through
inculturation the Church, for her part, becomes a more intelligible sign of what she is,
and a more effective instrument of mission.
The evangelization of cultures and the inculturation of the Gospel go hand in
hand, in a reciprocal relationship which presupposes constant discernment in the light
of the Gospel, to facilitate the identification of values and counter-values in a given
culture, so as to build on the former and vigorously combat the latter.

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Notes in CFE 3 – Catholic Foundations of Mission

Necessity of interculturation: dialogue between and among cultures

What is most noticeable about the world in which the Church carries out her
mission of evangelization today is the diversity of cultural situations which have
developed from the perspectives of different religions.
The Church recognizes religious values enshrined in traditional cultures, such as
a sense of family, love and respect for life, veneration of ancestors, a sense of solidarity
and community, respect for the chief and elders and promotes those which are
consonant with the Gospel.
Many elements of spirituality and mysticism, like holiness, self-denial, chastity,
universal love, a love for peace, prayer and contemplation, bliss in God and
compassion, which are very much alive in the cultures of the world major religions, can
lead on to faith in the God of Jesus Christ.

MISSIONARY RESPONSE
As missionaries, we are called to dialogue with others in the following ways:
1. Avoid the tendency to look down on and make fun of other cultures by our
words and gestures;
2. Cultivate the attitude of openness to the ways other people look at things. They
might see things differently because they come from a different background;
3. Always put in mind that there are many cultures when dealing with others, and
each culture has its own logic and wisdom; and
4. Participate in fora, talks and presentations which have to do with culture to
widen our cultural knowledge and appreciation.

Prepared by:
MICHAEL ANGELO F. EMPIZO
Saint Louis College, City of San Fernando, La Union
Memorial of Saint Francis Xavier, Priest, Patron of Missions
December 03, 2019

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