Indigenous religious traditions topic of Wade Lecture at Marquette University

February 11, 2016

MILWAUKEE — Rev. Agbonkhianmeghe E. Orobator, S.J., will discuss "Animism revisited: Wangari Maathai, Benedict XVI, Francis, and the cultivation of ecological virtues" during the Rev. Francis Wade, S.J., Public Lecture on Wednesday, Feb. 24, at 4 p.m. in Raynor Memorial Libraries Beaumier Suites.

Father Orobator will examine indigenous religious traditions in Africa, caricatured by missionary Christianity as animist. He will explore the resemblance which beliefs and practices that honor the earth and promote the integrity of creation, bear to the ethical principles, values, and virtues essential for sustainable solutions to the present ecological crisis, in the writings of Nobel Laureate Wangari Mathaai, Emeritus Pope Benedict XVI, and Pope Francis.

Father Orobator, the Rev. Francis Wade, S.J., chair in the Department of Theology, served as provincial superior of Eastern Africa Province of the Society of Jesus (Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Sudan and South Sudan) from 2009 to 2014. A Nigerian, Father Orobator is president/principal of Hekima University College Jesuit School of Theology and Institute of Peace Studies and International Relations, Nairobi, Kenya. He received his Ph.D. in theology and religious studies from the University of Leeds in England in 2004.

Among other books, he is the author of Theology Brewed in an African Pot, editor of Reconciliation, Justice, and Peace: The Second African Synod, and co-editor (with Linda Hogan) of Feminist Catholic Theological Ethics: Conversations in the World Church.

The event is free and open to all students, faculty and staff. Parking is available in the 16th Street parking structure, located between West Wisconsin Avenue and West Wells Street.