Catholic Bishop in Senegal Concerned about Upsurge in Violence, Calls for Moral Education

“Videos posted on Youtube and TikTok show an angry mob of men surrounding a young man in broad daylight, barefoot and wearing only pants, and slapping him on the back and head with homophobic slurs,” according to VOA News. 

In recent weeks, hundreds of people have fled the latest flare-up of one of Africa’s oldest continual conflicts, the Guardian reported.

Speaking at the May 24 press conference, Bishop Tine said, “This upsurge in violence in our country is the result of a situation that was already simmering in our society.”

“We talk about Senegal as a haven of peace, but deep down our society is simmering with unheard-of violence. Even if in the eyes of the world there is no war, families are being destroyed by violence,” the 55-year-old Senegalese Bishop said.

He continued, “What can we say then about the relationship between one individual and another... There is certainly something to be done and we must all be aware of this.”

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The Catholic Bishop regretted the fact that Senegalese “are practically living in the law of retaliation: an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.”

“We have become impatient, intransigent with others. It really hurts to see this in our Senegal today. We create a lot of suffering that is not often taken into account in the healing process. We go from suffering to suffering and society finally becomes a victim of violence and reproduces it,” the Local Ordinary of Kaolack Diocese told journalists during the May 24 press conference.

Bishop Tine called for awareness about the challenge of violence that he said is internal before it gets external. He said, “We need to be aware that violence is initially rooted in the heart of each of us. It is in our hearts that we project and maintain bad ideas about others.” 

The individual heart, he added, “is where we need to work first and foremost.”

“We are not called to live in this violence, in this evil towards one another, but rather to a brotherhood, to recognize in the other a brother or a sister, to be able to overcome the error that he or she may have committed towards me and to grant forgiveness,” Bishop Tine said.

The Senegalese Catholic Bishop who has been at the helm of Kaolack Diocese since his Episcopal Ordination in November 2018 called on his compatriots “to contribute to the eradication of violence in our society.”

“This requires first of all an awareness of the fact that violence is rooted in the heart of each of us and the culture of fraternity,” he reiterated. 

Bishop Tine also called on leaders to revisit moral education in families, encouraging parents “not to let young people grow up with a certain way of communicating that does not take into account the respect due to parents, elders, brothers and sisters and others.”

“At the end of the day, we hear hurtful words in front of parents who let it happen. As a result, people grow up in an atmosphere of violence, which is unleashed at the slightest opportunity, either in our own family or in the family of others, and often for nothing,” Bishop Tine said.

Jude Atemanke is a Cameroonian journalist with a passion for Catholic Church communication. He holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Journalism and Mass Communication from the University of Buea in Cameroon. Currently, Jude serves as a journalist for ACI Africa.