Four Criteria of Inculturation

Maurice Schepers in his article, “St Thomas and the Project of Enculturation: Christianity in East Africa in the Twenty-First Century,” African Christian Studies 12/3 (1996) 42-47, gives a fourfold criteria of genuine inculturation - four D's: distinction, development, dialectic, and discernment. Moreover, he states that the idea of inculturation is neither a novelty nor nonsense. He is also of the opinion that St. Thomas Aquinas' example of inculturation, i.e., the incarnation of the gospel in the culture of medieval western Europe, is valid and inspirational even today.

Now coming to the four D's, the first criterion of inculturation is the real distinction between gospel message (grace) and culture (nature). For Schepers culture is an instance of development "from below upwards," and gospel is the source of another kind of development "from above downwards." For me such a distinction seems simplistic. Culture is not merely an achievement of developmet from below upwards; the primary development even with regard to culture is the way above downwards. While Schepers takes the two ways of development from Bernard Lonergan, he explicitly quotes from Lonergan's Method in Theology only in the next paragraph. According to Lonergan, when one preaches the gospel, one also preaches one's own culture. Here is where we need to abandon a classicist notion of culture, and embrace an empirical understanding that affirms and acknowledges a multiplicity of cultural traditions. Furthermore, in a tight-compartment distinction between culture-as-nature and gospel-as-grace, we might miss the idea that the plurality of cultures are nothing but expressions not only of the human spirit but also of the divine Spirit. The second criterion talks of the essential integrity of the Christian religion implying a development. When we understand St. Thomas' theology, we also grasp the development of tradition (Paul, John Chrysostom, Clement of Alexandria, Origen, and Augustine). Therefore, in inculturation we are invited to integrate not only the thoughts of Catholic theologians but also of others like Luther, Calvin, et al., inasmuch as they have something positive to contribute to the tradition. In connection with this, Schepers ascertains the fact that the authority of Sacred Scripture is both proper and necessary, whereas the authority of other teachers in the Church is proper, but probable. Thirdly, there is a dialectic between pluralism and unity. St. Thomas was the pope's theologian, this is a lesson in the delicate balance, or the dialectical interaction, between pluralism and unity. Particularly interesting is the author's question in the final endnote: "Is it the Bishop of Rome's prerogative to direct the development of the church's Creed?" And the final criterion is the discernment that every human culture is somewhat faulted, and is incapable of sustained development. In other words, this is a call to exercise a prophetic discernment regarding the culture we are called to integrate and transform.