Teilhard de Chardin and Senghor on the civilization of the universal

II.4.2. The Communal Dimension of Love in Africa

Senghor, who had personally experienced the sterility of hatred, opposition and isolation and had turned towards a synthesis which would bring men together rather than maintain them in a perpetual conflict, sees love as the highest form of human energy. Love achieves that totality and coherence, that communion which African myth has always and fairly effectively been seeking. This communion is achieved at three levels.

First, love brings man's individual acts into a unity of totality within the person himself. We are always tempted to act piecemeal, for the here and now. But if we consciously relate every one of our acts with the ultimate unifying goal, that is God, we thereby also think all acts among themselves and with the events throughout the universe.

Secondly, love totalizes us in the sense of making us aware of ourselves as persons. It is by loving others that we transcend ourselves and thus grow personally. This is not merely an external union like people sitting in the same room, but a communion of persons, like the love between husband and wife which enriches and ennobles both persons. Unless and until man learns to evaluate himself as a person, there is no room for growth in dignity.

Thirdly, humanity as a whole can only be totalized and given social cohesion through love. Any political system and any international organisation which relies exclusively on socio-economic techniques or on laws and police enforcement must fall unless love guides all those structures. It is based on structures to which man is subjected or on fear of which man's dignity is robbed. Senghor has this to say:

They sacrifice the part to the whole, the person to the collectivity. Since a materialist postulate underlies this, and since the collectivity is conceived solely as a technical organization, it does not attract (as love does); to push the individuals towards it, one must resort to constraint and violence.^66(*)

The communal dimension of love in Africa is mostly expressed in the way events are celebrated. An event is never one's event or one's family event: it is a celebration for the whole community or the whole village. A marriage for example engages several families: the family of the bride, maternal and paternal, as well as the family of the bride-groom, maternal and paternal. All are invited to celebrate the event, even those who are not directly concerned. The same holds true for other good events like First Holy Communion, Baptism and others. Bad events such as burials are also celebrated in a community spirit. All come together in order to comfort the bereaved family and in order to express their love and concern to the afflicted members of the community.

As such, Africa can teach western man this dimension of love because western society has come to be more individualistic and materialistic than the African society where solidarity and hospitality are values that have to remain despite the influence of the media and despite what has come to be the westernisation of the world.

Nevertheless, we cannot just place the negro-African contribution exclusively at the level of culture from his vision of the world. Africa has greatly contributed to the development of civilization and of science it is important to note this and to encourage scientific research and innovation in Africa.

* ⁶⁶ Léopold Sédar Senghor, in Ruch, E., (ed.), African Philosophy, Rome, 1981, p.234.