Connecting with Africa
Una Barry writes ...
My first visit to Africa was in 1989 when I was invited to go to Kenya. It was not some package deal from a travel agent to see the lions but an unexpected opportunity to visit Marigat High School in the Rift Valley during my years of living in Manchester. Life is never that certain and of course one thing leads to another. Little did I know it was to be a turning point in my life and this safari should lead to more visits and my becoming interested in Africa; so interested that, amidst what was a busy singing career at the time, I found myself and still am faced with new challenges. In 1994 I decided to go back to study and took an MA in Area Studies (Africa) at London University's School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS). Not only was there the fees to pay and shock of going back into full-time education after many years but to be in a totally different and unrelated field of study and environment to that of being a classical singer.
I have now visited East Africa many times since that first visit in 1989. In 2004 another opportunity arose for me to visit and work with street children in French and Kirundi-speaking Burundi. This visit then led to my returning in 2005 to teach the history of church music to forty-two theological students at Light University, Bujumbura. Having never taught such a subject, I felt for most of the time I was only one page ahead of them and having to teach in a mixture of English, Swahili and French. Many colleagues I know are far more equipped and would take that subject in their stride but I was the one given the opportunity and the task of carrying out the teaching, and I came back with better French!
Each time I have come home from Africa, my mind has been full of contradictions and unanswered questions. One soon realizes that it is impossible to go very far in any part of Africa without coming up against religion and politics. It is a culture shock coming from England, where there is generally apathy to both, to find that everyone is of some religious persuasion or other, and that the political commitment and argument is just as astonishing. And it is with this mixture of religion and politics that inspired me to try and simply fathom out why oppression in all its forms, unending poverty plus a dependency on the West should remain so prevalent. Consequently, although not the intention whilst at SOAS, this led me down the road of theology in Africa through inculturation and liberation. It is a hard road to follow, primarily because the subject, even for the theologians it seems, is complex and vast. Secondly, I have experienced not sympathy from those in the Church, particularly the conservatives of various denominations who simply believe rather arrogantly that all Africans should conform to the Western way of worshiping, with Church services either in Latin for Catholics or the Common Book of Prayer for Anglicans. That of course will never happen for there is no going back in life. If anything, it will be the Africans who have so much to teach us all at this side of the world about what it is to have a relationship with God, be they Christian, Jewish or Muslim.
In September 2006, I am taking up part-time study for two years at London University's Heythrop College. The course is another MA, this time in Christianity and Inter-Religious Relations. We talk about the spread of Christianity in the Developing World but the spread of Islam must not be ignored and of which I think all Christians should get a grasp and understanding for the common ground needs to be found.
Not all my contradictions and questions have been resolved but I have certainly become more wise. Travelling as oneself albeit safely but without all the trappings of status, as well as learning to be interested in other people who have to much to teach us, is the best education there is and an enormous privilege. We hear that phrase so often but we do need to leave our comfort zones, for in the end itis ourselves who benefit and develop the most.
Una Barry
London, September 2006
